Harper stared at Rowan like she’d sprouted antlers.
“The Autumn *Prince*,” she repeated. “As in: capital P, fae royalty, walks-out-of-your-nightmares, offers-you-candy-from-his-van *Prince*?”
Zia blinked slowly. “You dreamed about him,” she said. “And then he showed up. That’s…not great.”
Rowan sank onto the little stepstool they used to reach the top shelves. Her knees didn’t seem interested in holding her up anymore.
“Yeah,” she said faintly. “That about sums it up.”
Harper abandoned the takeout and crossed the aisle in three strides. She grabbed Rowan’s face between her hands, squishing her cheeks gently until Rowan’s lips puckered.
“Did he hurt you?” Harper demanded. “Did he say anything? Touch anything? Vibe ominously in your direction beyond the accepted ominous-vibe quota?”
Rowan pried Harper’s hands off her face. “He talked,” she said. “A lot. And vibed even more. No touching.” A pause. “Well. Not physically.”
Zia leaned a hip against the shelf, tattoos shifting on her forearms. “Define ‘not physically.’”
“He…stood there,” Rowan said helplessly. “And looked at me. And dropped a prophecy on aisle seven.”
Harper made a strangled noise. “That’s it. We’re moving. New town, new name, new identities. You can be…Jane. I’ll be…also Jane. No one will suspect two Janes.”
“Deep plan,” Zia murmured.
Rowan pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes until sparks danced behind them. “I don’t think…moving is going to help. They’re not exactly bound by zip codes.”
“You are *way* too calm about this,” Harper said. “I just saw the man version of your recurring nightmare saunter out of your place of employment.”
“I’m not calm,” Rowan said. “I’m compartmentalizing. Panic has been scheduled for…later.”
“When is ‘later’?” Harper asked.
“Approximately three in the morning,” Rowan said. “When my brain realizes it has free time.”
“Put me down for a panic at three-thirty,” Harper said. “We can coordinate.”
Zia crossed her arms. “What did he want?” she asked. “Specifically.”
Rowan exhaled, then told them.
She tried to keep it clinical. Factual. Sticking to the parts that mattered: the prophecy, the debt, the choices that weren’t really choices, the offer to come as his “guest” instead of as cargo.
She left out the parts that felt…too raw. The way his voice had wrapped around her name. How the air between them had crackled when he stepped close. The way his eyes had gone soft, just for a moment, when he talked about her sitting by Gran’s bed.
Harper listened with a frown deepening between her brows. Zia’s face went still, all her reactions tucked under a layer of sharp focus.
“Okay,” Harper said when Rowan finished. “So your options are: stay and get hunted, go and become his…project, or somehow blow up a centuries-old magical contract using the power of *vibes.*”
“More or less,” Rowan said.
“You’re not going,” Harper said immediately.
Zia shot her a look. “Babe.”
“No,” Harper said. “Absolutely not. They don’t get to just…show up here and scoop her like she’s store-brand ice cream. ‘Oh, you have inconvenient feelings and a tragic backstory? Guess we’ll take that.’ No.”
Rowan stared at the scuffed floorboards. “If I stay,” she said, “he’s right. They’ll send…the Hunt. Or something like it. And I won’t have him standing in the way. Or…I will, and he’ll die with me. Which is not actually better.”
“Let him,” Harper said hotly. “He signed up for this creep mission, he can lie in it.”
“You *like* him,” Zia said quietly, watching Rowan. It wasn’t an accusation. Just an observation.
Rowan’s head jerked up. “I don’t.”
Zia’s lips curved, not quite a smile. “You’re…interested,” she amended. “He’s in your dreams. Now he’s in your bookstore. And he’s not…awful. That’s confusing.”
Harper made a disgusted sound. “We do not thirst after the fae kidnapper.”
“I am not *thirsting,*” Rowan said, heat climbing her neck.
“Mm,” Harper said. “You’re just noticing his ‘dramatic protagonist energy.’”
Rowan glared at her. “That was an objective description.”
“I bet he has great hands,” Harper said. “It’s always the emotionally unavailable ones. Big, veiny—”
“Harper,” Zia cut in, amused. “Focus.”
Harper sobered. “Right. Right. Serious. Okay. Listen.” She crouched in front of Rowan, taking her hands. “We’re not making any decisions tonight,” she said. “Okay? Brain spaghetti is not the mindset in which we choose multiverse-destroying destinies.”
“I don’t have *time*,” Rowan said. “Seventy-nine days, Harp. That’s…nothing.”
“It’s seventy-nine days more than ninety percent of the girls in fairy tales get,” Harper said. “They get like, ‘once upon a time’ and then bam, they’re pregnant with twins for a man they’ve met twice.”
“Cheerful,” Rowan muttered.
“We use the time,” Harper said firmly. “We gather information. We find loopholes. We figure out what ‘blood of both worlds’ actually means. We talk to Gran.”
Rowan’s throat tightened. “She’s…getting worse,” she said. “The last time I was there…”
Her voice trailed off.
Zia squeezed her shoulder. “Then we go tomorrow,” she said. “All three of us. You and Harper can ask her about bargains and birth-switches. I’ll…ward the room. As much as I can.”
Rowan blinked. “You can…?”
Zia’s mouth twisted. “I’m not a witch,” she said. “Not really. But my Tía taught me some things. Folk magic. Protection sigils, that sort of thing.” She flexed her fingers, the black ink of her tattoos shifting—moons, thorns, eyes. “Not…on their level. But it can…annoy them.”
“You’ve been holding out on me,” Harper said, half-awed.
Zia shrugged, suddenly self-conscious. “It’s usually enough to keep nosy ancestors out of my dreams,” she said. “Worth a shot on cosmic assholes.”
Emotion swelled in Rowan’s chest, messy and sharp. “Why are you—”
“Because we love you, idiot,” Harper said. “Obviously.”
Rowan’s eyes burned.
She leaned forward and let Harper hug her, Zia’s hand heavy and grounding on her back.
For a moment, the buzzing in her head quieted.
Then Mrs. Carrow’s voice floated from the front. “Rowan, dear? Could you help me with these invoices?”
Real life rushed back in.
“Yeah,” Rowan called, voice only a little wobbly. “Coming.”
She pushed to her feet.
Harper caught her sleeve. “Hey,” she said. “If he shows up again, text me.”
“And me,” Zia added.
“I can’t have you two charging in here with a butter knife and a salt shaker,” Rowan said.
“Bold of you to assume that’s all we’d bring,” Harper muttered.
“Seriously,” Zia said. “We’re not…weapons. But we’re yours. He needs to know he doesn’t just get you in a vacuum.”
Rowan nodded, throat too tight for words.
She went to help Mrs. Carrow with the invoices, half her attention on the numbers, half on the bell over the door.
Caelan didn’t come back that day.
***
She didn’t sleep that night.
Every time she closed her eyes, the forest rose up. Bruised sky. Cracking light. Silver eyes.
She lay in bed staring at the ceiling, listening to the hum of the fridge and the occasional car outside. Her phone sat on the nightstand, screen dark.
She could say his name.
She could say it with intent, whatever that meant. Draw him like a moth to a flame, like he’d promised.
“I am not summoning a man like he’s DoorDash,” she muttered.
Silence.
She rolled onto her side, blankets twisted around her waist. The shape of him—height, breadth, the weight of his presence—occupied the space beside the bed in her mind like a ghost.
“What am I supposed to do?” she whispered to the dark.
No answer came.
Eventually, exhaustion dragged her down into a shallow, uneasy doze.
For once, he didn’t come.
***
Hollybrook Manor smelled even more aggressively like boiled cabbage the next day.
Rowan walked down the hallway with a plastic grocery bag looped over her wrist—lotion Gran liked, a new cardigan that had been on sale, a pack of the fancy mints she pretended weren’t just sugar.
Harper walked on one side of her, arms full of a ridiculous bouquet of sunflowers. Zia was on the other, a small messenger bag slung across her chest, fingers worrying a twist of red thread.
Sandra at the front desk waved them through with a sympathetic smile. “She’s been awake most of the morning,” she said. “Feisty, too.”
“So, normal,” Harper said.
“On a good day,” Sandra agreed.
Gran’s room was full of light. The maple tree outside had turned fully now, its leaves a riot of orange and red, pressed against the glass like a painting.
Gran herself looked even smaller. The new cardigan Rowan had bought last month hung off her like a flag. But her eyes were bright as she watched them pile in.
“Brought the whole circus today, did you?” she croaked.
Harper set the sunflowers in an empty plastic pitcher. “We come bearing flowers and gossip,” she said. “And possibly illegal questions.”
Zia nodded politely. “Hi, ma’am,” she said. “I’m Zia.”
Gran’s gaze slid over her tattoos, the shaved side of her head. “You look like my regrettable youth,” she said. “I approve.”
Rowan laughed despite herself.
She perched on the edge of the bed, taking Gran’s cool hand. “How are you feeling?”
“Old,” Gran said bluntly. “Leaky. Bored of this beige hellscape.” Her eyes sharpened. “And very irritated that a certain princeling thought he could slither into my hospital room last night and I wouldn’t notice.”
Rowan’s heart slammed. “What?”
Gran sniffed. “You think I can’t tell when the shadows in the corner don’t belong to this world?” She narrowed her eyes at the ceiling. “I told him the same thing I’m going to tell you, girl: stop hovering and do something useful.”
Harper let out a low whistle. “You chewed out a fae prince on his own home turf.”
“Not his turf,” Gran said. “This is my turf. I paid for it in diapers and overtime and swallowed pride.”
Her fingers tightened on Rowan’s. “He came,” she said. “Didn’t he?”
Rowan looked down. “Yesterday,” she said. “At the bookstore.”
Harper and Zia arranged themselves on the two cheap plastic chairs. Zia’s fingers moved absently in her lap, tracing an invisible symbol: circle, cross, three lines.
“Tell me,” Gran demanded.
Rowan did.
This time, she didn’t leave out the sharp bits. The way he’d watched her. The way he’d said *choosing you* like it cost him. The way the air had shifted when he’d stepped close.
Gran listened, her lined face unreadable.
When Rowan finished, the room fell quiet save for the steady beep of the heart monitor.
“Well,” Gran said finally. “He’s worse than I thought.”
“Worse?” Rowan echoed.
Gran’s gaze cut to her. “He’s *involved,*” she said. “That’s bad. Fae don’t do involved unless it serves them. Or unless they’re about to do something very stupid.”
“Define stupid,” Harper said.
“Bleeding on things they shouldn’t,” Gran muttered.
Zia shifted. “He said he’d…tie himself to her,” she said softly. “If she takes his bargain.”
“Of course he did,” Gran said. “That boy always did think with his oaths.”
“You know him,” Rowan said slowly. “Not just of him.”
Gran’s eyelids fluttered. “I knew *of* him,” she said. “When I walked into those woods, he was younger. Less…edges. His father kept him on a short leash. Sent him to do his dirty work in the mortal world because he was good at looking like something you’d trust.”
“Still is,” Harper muttered.
Gran’s mouth twisted. “He came to the hospital,” she said. “When your mother was…sick. Before the accident. I thought he was…a doctor. Bad suit, good smile. Said he had an experimental treatment. Didn’t say what it would cost.”
Rowan’s grip tightened. “You never told me this.”
“I didn’t know what he was then,” Gran said. “Not really. By the time I did…” She sighed. “Guilt doesn’t make for clear storytelling, girl.”
Rowan’s throat hurt. “He was there.”
“He was always there,” Gran said bitterly. “Watching us like we were…a television show. I didn’t realize until later that the whole court had eyes on us. On *you.*”
Zia leaned forward. “What about the wording of the deal?” she asked. “You said a life for a life, but…do you remember exactly how it was phrased?”
Gran squinted, thinking. “He said…‘We will give your daughter’s life back, whole and hale, in exchange for a child of her blood. One we shall choose, to be raised in our Court. In twenty-six years, the debt shall be balanced, and the child left in her place shall return to us.’”
“Wait,” Harper said. “Child of *her* blood. Not your blood?”
Gran nodded. “My daughter’s.”
“So they weren’t gunning for some ancient great-great-grandwhatever gene,” Harper said. “They just wanted…any baby.”
“Any baby of her line,” Zia said. “Could have been a boy. Could have been someone else, if…” She hesitated. “…if she’d lived to have more.”
Pain flickered over Gran’s face. “She didn’t,” she said shortly.
Rowan swallowed. “And ‘return to us,’” she said. “They said the child left in her place would ‘return.’ Not ‘be taken.’”
Gran’s eyes gleamed. “Words matter,” she said. “They rely on humans being too scared and too stupid to remember them. You are neither.”
“So if she…goes willingly,” Zia said slowly, “she can…fulfill the letter of the bargain.”
“And if she doesn’t,” Harper said, “they can argue she’s breaking an agreement she didn’t even make and use that as an excuse to do whatever they want.”
“Bingo,” Gran said.
Rowan stared at the ugly wallpaper. “So his offer is…actually the least bad option,” she said. “Legally.”
“In fae terms,” Zia said.
“In human terms, ‘least bad’ is still bad,” Harper muttered.
Gran’s gaze fixed on Rowan, suddenly fierce. “He promised protection,” she said. “He promised to bleed. Make him put that in words, girl. Make him swear it properly. Not this half-spoken, moon-eyed nonsense.”
“I’m not sure ‘moon-eyed’ is accurate,” Rowan said weakly.
“Was he looking at you like you were something shiny he wanted to put in his pocket?” Gran asked.
Rowan’s face heated. “That’s not—”
“Moon-eyed,” Gran said.
Harper snorted.
“Make him swear,” Gran repeated. “On his name. On his power. On something that hurts. If he wants you as his lever, if he wants you to stand in his court and make his life more interesting, make him pay for it.”
Rowan’s stomach churned. “You…want me to go,” she said.
The words shocked her as she said them. She hadn’t let herself really *look* at that possibility in Gran’s face. Always, in her head, it had been *me dragged away, Gran alone. Me staying, Gran safe.*
But Gran was dying either way.
Gran’s fingers twitched in hers. “I want you to live,” she said roughly. “Longer than I did. Longer than your mother.” Her mouth thinned. “I want you to have *choices.* Even if they’re all terrible.”
Tears blurred Rowan’s vision. “You made a choice for me,” she said. She hated the smallness in her voice. The accusation.
Gran flinched. “I did,” she said. “And I will be sorry for that until my ashes blow away.” She took a rattling breath. “This…this is the only way I can…give a little of it back. You ask him for his terms. You make your own. You decide.”
“How am I supposed to decide?” Rowan choked. “I’m a bookseller, Gran. I don’t know how to…walk into a court of monsters and not get eaten.”
“You do it the way you’ve done everything,” Gran said. “Eyes open. Mouth sharp. Stubborn as a mule. You remember that they don’t understand you any more than you understand them.” Her grip tightened, surprisingly strong. “And you remember that you are not *theirs.* You are not mine. You are *yours.*”
Rowan bowed her head. Tears slipped hot down her cheeks.
Harper’s hand landed on her back. Zia looked away politely, jaw clenched.
Gran reached up with her free hand—shaking, papery—and cupped Rowan’s wet cheek. “Look at me, girl.”
Rowan did.
“You think I’m asking you to go because I’m tired of you,” Gran said, voice low and fierce. “I’m asking you to go because I’ve seen what happens when we try to stand still while the world changes around us. We get…crushed. Smothered. Forgotten. You were never meant to be small. Not if all those damn dreams mean anything.”
Rowan let out a shaky laugh. “Pretty sure the dreams mean my subconscious hates me.”
Gran snorted. “Your subconscious has taste. That boy’s cheekbones could cut glass.”
“Gran,” Rowan groaned.
“What?” Gran said. “I’m old, not blind.”
Harper choked on a laugh.
Zia’s lips quirked.
The moment lightened, just a fraction.
Then Gran’s gaze slid past Rowan’s shoulder. Her face sharpened.
“Now,” she said. “If you’re done eavesdropping, princeling, you can come out of that corner and make yourself useful.”
Rowan froze.
Harper’s hand tightened on her shirt. Zia’s fingers flew—even faster now—tracing a sigil in the air: circle, cross, line, twist. The air where she moved seemed to thicken, shimmer.
In the far corner of the room, where the fluorescent light didn’t quite reach and the ugly landscape painting cast a warped shadow, something shifted.
He stepped out of it like a man leaving a doorway.
Same clothes as yesterday, though the shirt’s sleeves were buttoned to his wrists now. Same worn boots. Same careful, contained posture.
Caelan inclined his head to Gran. “You’re very perceptive for someone with one foot in the grave,” he said.
Gran bared her teeth in a parody of a smile. “You’re very impolite for someone in a lady’s sickroom,” she snapped. “Take off your glamour. It itches.”
He blinked. Then, to Rowan’s surprise, he actually did.
There was no dramatic flash. No sound. He just…shifted. The edges of him sharpened, like a lens clicking into focus. The color of his hair deepened, strands catching the light in impossible ways. His skin took on that faint, luminous quality she’d seen behind other glamours—a too-smoothness, like marble that had decided to be warm. The air around him thickened with…more.
His eyes, freed from whatever subtle dampening the glamour had been doing, flared silver-bright.
Harper sucked in a breath.
“Cool trick,” Zia said, voice steady. Her sigil hummed faintly in the corner of Rowan’s eye, a thin tracing of warmth on the air.
Caelan’s gaze flicked toward it. His mouth twitched. “Clever,” he said. “Who taught you that one?”
“My auntie,” Zia said. “She used it to keep dead relatives from nosing in when she bathed.”
Harper snorted.
Caelan’s eyes warmed briefly. “Effective,” he said. “If…messy. May I?” He extended his hand toward the sigil, not touching.
Zia hesitated, then nodded.
He traced a finger a few inches away from her lines. The air hummed. A faint, second layer of runes shimmered into being for a heartbeat, twining around Zia’s work like ivy around a fence, then sank out of sight.
“That should hold better,” he said. “You were…missing a loop.”
Zia’s eyebrows shot up. “Thanks,” she said cautiously.
He inclined his head as if she’d just given him a gift.
Harper narrowed her eyes. “Don’t think you can just stroll in here, mansplain my girlfriend’s wards, and expect us to swoon,” she said.
Caelan blinked. “I wasn’t—”
“He’s not wrong,” Zia murmured. “I did miss a loop.”
“Not the point,” Harper hissed.
Gran cleared her throat loudly. “If you’re finished measuring magical dicks,” she rasped, “we have business.”
Caelan turned back to her, something almost like respect in his expression. “We do,” he said.
Rowan’s heart hammered. Being around him in the bookstore, with shelves and customers and fluorescent lights, had been one thing. Here, in this small room that smelled like bleach and endings, with Gran watching like a hawk and her friends bristling at her sides…he felt different.
Less…theatrical. More…real.
Scarier.
“You heard what she said,” Gran said. “About your offer.”
“I did,” he said. “You have a remarkable lung capacity for someone your age.”
“Flatterer,” Gran said. “You want her to come with you. She might. Under terms. My terms. Her terms.”
Caelan’s gaze slid to Rowan. “I’m listening,” he said.
Her mouth went dry.
Gran squeezed her hand. “You will swear,” Gran said, “on your name and on your power, that if she comes with you, you will do everything in your ability to keep her alive and whole. Body and mind. You will not harm her yourself, nor allow harm by your inaction.”
Caelan’s jaw tightened. “No one can promise perfect safety,” he said. “Not in our Court. Not in yours.”
“I didn’t say ‘perfect,’” Gran said. “I said *everything in your ability.* Big difference.”
“She’s right,” Zia murmured.
Harper elbowed her. “Whose side are you on?”
“Yours,” Zia said. “And hers. Which is why I want the fae locked into as many clauses as possible.”
Caelan looked at Rowan. “If I swear that,” he said slowly, “you must understand what it means. Fae magic takes such promises…seriously. If you step into my Court and then throw yourself in front of a sword for someone else, I will be bound to try to stop you. Even if it…angers you.”
“Good,” Gran said. “She has a hero complex. She needs a leash.”
Rowan spluttered. “Gran.”
“Tell me I’m wrong,” Gran said.
Rowan clamped her mouth shut.
Caelan’s eyes glinted. “You are…very much your grandmother’s girl,” he murmured.
“I am my *own*,” Rowan shot back.
“Even better,” he said.
Gran’s fingers dug into Rowan’s. “You will also swear,” Gran said to Caelan, “that you will not force her into your bed. Or anyone else’s. No glamour, no trick words, no…potions, whatever you people are using these days.”
“‘You people,’” Harper muttered. “Rude.”
Caelan’s nostrils flared. A faint flush rose along his cheekbones, surprisingly human. “I already said—”
“Say it again,” Gran cut in. “Properly.”
His gaze flicked to Rowan. Held.
Her heartbeat stuttered.
“If you come with me,” he said, voice low but clear, “I will not touch you without your explicit consent. I will not allow others to do so. Your body will be yours.”
Heat crawled under Rowan’s skin. She hated that the words made something in her loosen with relief. Hated that the idea of his hands in *any* context made her breath hitch, promise or no.
“Say it like an oath,” Zia murmured.
He inclined his head.
“I swear,” Caelan said. The word seemed to…click. The air pressed tight for a heartbeat, then eased. “On my name, and on the power of my blood, and on the roots of my Court, that if you come with me, I will do everything in my ability to keep you alive and whole, body and mind. I will not harm you, nor allow harm by my inaction, so long as I draw breath and power. I will not touch you without your explicit consent, nor allow others to, barring only what is necessary for your safety.”
The room shivered.
The ugly wallpaper wavered, colors darkening then snapping back. The maple tree’s leaves slapped against the glass as if in a sudden gust.
Harper let out a low whistle. “Okay,” she said. “That felt…weird.”
“That was a *real* oath,” Zia said, eyes wide. “You just…nailed yourself to it.”
Caelan’s jaw was tight. “Yes,” he said. “Which means if she stabs me in my sleep, I expect you three to testify that I was a very good boy.”
Gran snorted. “Don’t tempt me.”
Rowan’s head spun. “Why?” she whispered. “Why would you…bind yourself like that? For me?”
He looked at her. Really looked. No prince, no predator, no strategic mind. Just…a man who’d made a choice and would have to live with it.
“Because you asked me to bleed for it,” he said quietly. “I intend to honor that.”
Her breath caught.
Gran blinked. “I like him,” she said grudgingly. “He’s an idiot. But he’s *our* kind of idiot.”
“Please do not adopt the fae prince,” Harper said. “We have enough chaos.”
Gran ignored her. “Your turn, girl,” she said to Rowan. “If you’re going to go, you don’t just…drift into his world on a sigh. You set your own terms.”
Rowan’s palms were damp. She wiped them on her jeans.
“What…can I even ask for?” she said shakily. “I don’t know their…rules.”
“Ask for what you need,” Zia said softly. “Let him tell you what’s possible.”
Caelan nodded once. “Within reason,” he said.
She shot him a glare. “Define ‘reason.’”
“Anything that doesn’t immediately start a war between Courts,” he said. “Yet.”
“Reassuring,” Harper muttered.
Rowan took a breath.
“I’m not promising you a yes,” she said. “Not yet. But if I *do* say yes, I want…”
She swallowed.
“One,” she said, counting on her fingers. “A way back. Some kind of…escape clause. If things go sideways. If I decide I can’t…do it. I don’t want to step into your Court and realize I’ve locked myself in forever.”
Caelan’s expression tightened. “Leaving will not be simple,” he warned. “There are…rules. Tides. The way the worlds fit together—”
“Is that a no?” she cut in.
He exhaled slowly. “No,” he said. “It’s a ‘complicated yes.’”
“Those are my favorite kind,” she muttered.
“I cannot blow a hole in the borders of our realms and call it your personal door,” he said. “That would…unravel things best left…raveled. But…” His eyes went distant for a second, calculating. “There are…objects. Anchors. Things that can…help you find your way back to a specific place, under certain conditions.”
“You’re talking about…?” Zia prompted.
“A tether,” he said. “Of a sort. If I can bind part of my power to an object that stays here—with your friend, perhaps—it could act as a…rope. If you needed to run, if you could get to a seam between worlds, you could…follow it back.”
Harper’s brows flew up. “You’d give us a…piece of you?”
His mouth curved faintly. “Don’t get excited,” he said. “It would not be…much. Enough to give you a direction. Not enough to make you…dangerous. To me.”
“Rude,” Harper said. “I could be very dangerous.”
“You have noodle arms,” Zia murmured.
“I do not—”
“Focus,” Gran rasped.
Rowan’s mind raced. “If we had that,” she said slowly, “and I…came back…what happens to the original bargain? The prophecy?”
Caelan’s eyes flickered. “If you come back alive,” he said carefully, “the debt would technically still be…balanced. You would have returned to us, for a time. The wording does not specify duration.”
Harper whistled. “So she could just…pop in for a weekend and pop back out and be like ‘thanks, debt cleared, bye’?”
“No,” Caelan said. “Magic is not…that easily fooled. Intent matters. The deal was for a life. A…shaping. They will not accept three days of tourism as payment.” He met Rowan’s gaze. “But if you were to spend enough time in our Court that the magic considers you…part of us, even temporarily, and then you found a way back…” He shrugged, a small, dangerous movement. “It would…confuse things.”
“And you like confusing things,” Gran said.
He smiled faintly. “It’s my hobby.”
“Okay,” Rowan said. “So. Tether. Escape clause. At least in theory.”
“In theory,” he agreed.
“Two,” she said, lifting another finger. “No…mental tricks. No dream-walking without my consent. No…digging in my head.”
His expression flickered. Guilt. “I haven’t—”
“You have,” she cut in. “For years. I just didn’t know what it was. No more. If I dream of you, it’s because I invited you.”
He flinched slightly at the word *invited.* “I can’t promise I will never see your dreams,” he said slowly. “The bond between us is…old. Frayed. But there. If you have…episodes, if your magic wakes in your sleep—”
“I didn’t say you couldn’t…notice,” she said. “I said you can’t *come in.* Like my head is your personal Airbnb. No more lurking in the corners, no more cryptic asides. You knock. I say yes or no. Those are the rules.”
His lips pressed together. “That is…fair,” he said finally. “Difficult. But fair. I swear I will not enter your dreams without your explicit invitation.”
The air tightened again, less dramatically this time. A small adjustment of invisible threads.
“Three,” Rowan said. “My friends. My…life. If I go, they’re still…” Her voice wobbled. “…mine. I don’t want you or your Court using them as…bargaining chips. Or…punishing them because of me.”
Caelan’s eyes sharpened. “I had already decided to keep them out of it,” he said. “But you are right to ask.”
“You can’t control all of your people,” Zia said quietly.
“No,” he said. “But I can mark what is…off-limits.”
He turned to Harper and Zia. For the first time, he seemed to be truly…seeing them. Not as background noise, not as extensions of Rowan, but as individuals.
“You,” he said to Harper. “Loud. Sharp. Loyal to the point of foolishness.”
“I’m taking that as admiration,” Harper said.
He inclined his head. “If she comes with me, and if I survive to continue breathing after my Court tears itself in half over it, I give you my word that no member of the Autumn Court will touch you or yours. If they do…” His eyes went winter-hard. “They answer to me.”
Harper swallowed. “Okay, that was…weirdly hot,” she muttered.
Zia elbowed her.
“And you,” Caelan said to Zia. “Carrying old wards in new ink. Dancing on the edge of things your Tía probably told you to leave alone.”
Zia’s lips quirked. “Probably,” she said.
“I cannot promise you will never be…noticed,” he said. “The mere fact that you know this much will draw some eyes. But I can promise that my people will not…recruit you. Or punish you for standing with her.”
Zia nodded slowly. “We’ll take it,” she said.
Rowan exhaled. “So that’s…it?” she said. “We just…stack oaths and hope the universe doesn’t decide to twist them into pretzels?”
Gran snorted. “Nothing about this is ‘it,’ girl,” she said. “This is the prologue.”
Caelan’s gaze slid back to Rowan. “You don’t have to answer now,” he said again. “Samhain is…weeks away. Think. Plan. Come at me with more demands when your mind is clearer.”
“It’s never clear,” she muttered.
“Then come at me with more demands anyway,” he said. “You’re very good at them.”
Harper made a choking sound.
Gran sagged back against her pillows, suddenly looking terribly old. “I’m tired,” she whispered. “All this…talk.”
Rowan’s heart clenched. “We can go,” she said. “Come back later.”
Gran’s eyes fluttered. “Stay a bit,” she murmured. “Tell me about…nothing. The…price of milk. That cat that always shits in Mrs. Pierce’s begonias. Anything but…prophecies.”
Rowan nodded, wiping at her eyes. “Okay,” she said. “We can do that.”
Harper pulled her chair closer. Zia dug a deck of cards out of her bag.
“The old lady wants to get hustled,” Zia said. “Let’s go.”
Gran’s eyes brightened. “You think you can beat me?” she rasped. “I was running poker games in the church basement before your parents learned how to kiss.”
Caelan watched them for a moment.
“I should go,” he said softly. “Your ward won’t hold if I linger. It’s not meant for longer visits.”
Zia nodded. “It’s fine,” she said. “I can…re-anchor it later.”
He inclined his head to Gran. “Thank you,” he said.
“For what?” she snapped.
“For not…making this harder than it already is,” he said. “For telling her to make me bleed.”
Gran’s mouth twitched. “Don’t make me regret it, boy,” she said.
He smiled, a brief flash. Then he looked at Rowan.
“I will…stay away for a few days,” he said. “Give you space. If you need me…you know how to call.”
Her fingers tightened on the blanket. “I’m not summoning you like a pizza,” she muttered.
His smile widened, just slightly. “One day,” he said, “you’ll do it without thinking. And then we’ll both be in trouble.”
Before she could respond, he stepped back into the corner.
The shadows folded around him.
He was gone.
The air felt…thinner without him. Lighter. Colder.
Harper blew out a breath. “Okay,” she said. “So we just…negotiated with a fae prince in a nursing home.”
“Add that to the resume,” Zia said.
Gran closed her eyes, a faint smile on her lips. “Good,” she whispered. “About time we stopped letting them write all the stories.”
Rowan sat very still, her grandmother’s hand in hers, her friends at her back, oaths humming in the air like invisible strings.
She had seventy-something days.
A prince bound to her in ways she was only beginning to understand.
And a decision that could burn two worlds.
No pressure.
***
That night, when sleep finally dragged her under, the dream-forest rose around her again.
No cracked sky this time. No monsters clawing through.
Just trees. Twilight. The rustle of leaves.
And Caelan.
He stood a few paces away, hands in his pockets, looking…awkward. A little out of place with his Court-smoothed clothes and his predator’s stillness in a place that was technically *hers.*
“You knocked,” she said, surprised.
He nodded once. “You…left the door open.”
She frowned. “I didn’t mean to.”
“You thought about me,” he said. “Hard. That’s…sometimes enough.”
Her face heated. “Don’t flatter yourself,” she said. “I was mostly thinking ‘that asshole.’”
His mouth twitched. “It still counts.”
They regarded each other, the silence stretching.
“You bound yourself pretty hard today,” she said finally. “In the real world.”
“Yes,” he said.
“Regretting it?” she asked.
His gaze softened. “No,” he said. “Are you?”
She hesitated.
“Ask me when I’m standing in your murder palace,” she said.
He huffed a laugh. “We don’t *only* murder,” he said. “Sometimes we gossip.”
“Terrifying,” she said. “I can’t wait.”
He watched her face. “You don’t have to decide yet,” he repeated.
“I know,” she said. “That’s the problem. The not-deciding is…a decision. It feels like…if I wait too long, the choice will make itself. And I won’t like it.”
His jaw tightened. “I will not let them drag you,” he said. “If you refuse to come, I will…stand between you and the Hunt as long as I can.”
“And die?” she asked.
“Probably,” he said simply.
Anger flared. “Stop that,” she snapped.
“Stop what?” he asked, taken aback.
“Talking about dying like it’s…an acceptable cost,” she said. “Like it’s a line item on a budget. ‘Two cups of coffee, three dead princes.’”
He smiled faintly. “I appreciate the promotion,” he said. “But there are other heirs.”
“I don’t care,” she said. “I don’t…want your death on my conscience. I have enough.”
“You would not be the cause,” he said.
“You say that,” she said. “But I know how guilt works.”
He stared at her for a long moment.
“You are…very human,” he said softly.
“Is that an insult?” she asked.
“It’s an…observation,” he said. “We forget, sometimes, how…loud your emotions are. How you tie yourselves in knots over things we would shrug at.”
“And yet you’re the ones writing operas about who sat next to whom at dinner,” she said. “Don’t talk to me about loud emotions.”
His lips curved. “Point.”
They stood in silence for a few more breaths.
“Thank you,” she said abruptly.
He blinked. “For what?”
“For…swearing,” she said. “For letting Gran yell at you. For…not taking advantage of the fact that I’m a complete mess.”
His expression softened, edges gentling.
“I am…very familiar with mess,” he said. “I grew up in a Court that lives on it. Yours is…refreshing.”
“Stop calling me refreshing,” she said. “I’m not a beverage.”
“Disappointing,” he murmured.
She rolled her eyes.
He stepped closer.
“May I?” he asked quietly.
Her throat went dry. “May you what?”
“Touch you,” he said. “Just…” His hand lifted, hovering near her cheek like it had in the last dream. “…here.”
Her heart thudded.
She thought of his oath. Of Gran’s satisfied look. Of the way his fingers had felt gripping her shoulders as the sky cracked.
She thought of how long it had been since anyone touched her without wanting something she didn’t give. How much she missed simple contact that wasn’t tinged with fear.
“Dream-touches count?” she asked, stalling.
“In some ways, more,” he said. “But the oath applies here too. I will not…take. I will only…ask.”
She exhaled.
“Yes,” she said. It came out almost inaudible.
His hand moved.
Warm.
Calloused.
He cupped her cheek, thumb resting just under her eye. The feel of him was—improbably—gentle. No iron-burn. No sting. Just warmth and a faint buzz, as if someone had turned a low-voltage current on under her skin.
Her breath stuttered.
He watched her closely. “If you want me to stop—”
“Don’t,” she said.
Something flared in his eyes.
He stepped closer, until there was only a breath of air between their bodies. The forest around them seemed to hush, leaning in.
“This is…” He swallowed. “Unwise.”
“Story of my life,” she whispered.
His thumb stroked the line of her cheekbone, feather-light. The sensation arrowed straight down her spine.
“You feel…different here,” he murmured. “Sharper. More…you.”
“This is my head,” she said. “Of course I’m more me.”
“Mm,” he said. “Your head is very stubborn.”
“You’ve been trespassing in it for years,” she said. “You would know.”
He flinched. “I am—”
“Don’t apologize,” she said. “You’re allergic to it.”
He laughed softly. The sound rumbled under her skin where his hand touched her.
Her own hands twitched. Before she could overthink it, she lifted them and rested them lightly on his chest.
Solid.
Warm.
His shirt was softer than it looked. The muscle under it was not soft at all.
He inhaled sharply.
“Careful,” he said, voice rougher. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“I think I do,” she said.
“You don’t,” he insisted. “I am not…safe.”
“Neither am I,” she said.
His eyes darkened. “You have no idea.”
He stepped even closer. Their bodies brushed. Her breath caught.
Everything in her screamed *danger.*
Everything in her *also* screamed *more.*
“Rowan,” he said, her name a warning and a plea.
She rose on her toes.
For a second, she thought—stupidly, wildly—that he would meet her halfway. That his mouth would find hers and all this humming, aching, miserable tension would break.
He pulled back.
Just a fraction.
Enough that their lips didn’t touch. Enough that she felt the absence like a physical pain.
“No,” he whispered. His thumb traced the corner of her mouth, not quite a caress. “Not like this.”
Heat flooded her—first embarrassment, then anger.
“Because of your oath?” she asked. “Or because I’m…what? A project?”
His gaze snapped to hers, fierce. “Because if I kiss you here,” he said, voice ragged, “I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop when we’re not dreaming.”
Her pulse stuttered.
Silence stretched, hot and charged.
“I need you clear,” he said quietly. “If you come with me. I need you making choices because you chose them, not because you’re tangled up in…this.”
“This being…?” she asked, trying for flippant and landing somewhere near desperate.
He smiled, small and raw. “Whatever this is,” he said.
Her hands curled in his shirt. “You think I’m…not clear now?” she asked. “You think I don’t know the difference between attraction and…logic?”
He huffed. “You are the most logical person I have ever met who also wants to set my Court on fire,” he said. “It is confusing.”
“Good,” she said. “Let’s keep you on your toes.”
He laughed, but there was an edge to it.
He leaned in—so close his breath brushed her lips—and pressed a kiss to her forehead.
It was chaste.
It was also the most intimate thing anyone had done to her in a very long time.
Her eyes burned.
He pulled back, slowly. His hand left her cheek with visible effort.
“You should wake up,” he said. “Your friend is making coffee.”
“How do you know?” she asked, dazed.
He smiled crookedly. “She’s very loud, even in sleep. The smell follows her.”
She snorted. “Fair.”
He stepped back again, into the shadows under the trees.
“When you’re ready to…talk more,” he said, “call me. Or throw a book at the seam. That works too.”
“Is that…fae humor?” she asked.
“Tragically,” he said.
The dream-forest blurred.
She woke with the ghost of his touch on her skin and the taste of almost on her tongue.
In the kitchen, Harper swore as she burned her hand on the kettle. “Stupid metal,” she yelped.
Rowan lay there, heart thundering, and realized—with a mix of dread and something that felt treacherously like excitement—that she was going to say yes.
Not today.
Not tomorrow.
But soon.
Samhain.
The word curled around her like smoke.
And somewhere, in a palace that bled twilight and gold, a prince stared out at a dark forest and pressed his fingers to his lips, as if he could still feel the shape of her almost-kiss.
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