“Oh, so you’re talking to me now?” Griff flashed her a grin. “Your protest didn’t last long.”
“I just want to know how far we have to go.” She tried to see the house in the distance, but as they’d descended into a valley, it disappeared from view.
“We’ve only been walking for half an hour.”
“No way, it’s been longer than that.” Her foot hit a small hole in the ground, and she pitched forward.
Griff caught her before she fell. “Graceful.” He laughed. “Just what I’d expect from someone raised in the human world.”
Brea righted herself and pushed away from him. “What does that even mean? There’s only one world.”
Griff shrugged. “Maybe for those with small minds. Do you have a small mind?”
“No.” She clenched her jaw. She may not have excelled at school or basically anything else, but she wasn’t an idiot.
“All right, Brea Robinson, let’s clear something up.” His eyes locked with hers. “I will not lie to you. That is my promise. So, when I tell you something, I need you to believe it.”
His voice held such sincerity she wanted to trust him, but she’d only trusted one person in her life, and he was dead.
She shifted her eyes to her ripped jeans, focusing on the patch her mom had sewn in the knee instead of buying her a new pair. Things like that reminded her who she was--a farm girl from Ohio with a history of mental instability.
Also, a girl with nothing to go back to.
“I want to believe you,” she whispered. She wanted to believe there was more out there than the life she’d been living. “I just…”
His fingertips brushed her chin and tilted her face up. “Look at me, Brea Robinson. You have questions, and I will answer them in time. For now, I need you to know you’re not imagining this.” His touch flittered along her cheek, and she swallowed, mesmerized by his swirling eyes.
“This is real.” The words released on a breath, as if breaking free of some deeper part of her.
She lived her life in lies, but as she breathed in the fresh air of a new life, a new… world?… she hoped this was anything but.
A smile tilted his lips, different from the wide grin before when he’d laughed at her. This time, there was kindness in his expression, an openness she couldn’t help but be drawn to.
He reminded her so much of Myles.
“So,” she swallowed as she tested the next words in her mind. “Two… worlds?”
He withdrew his hand and nodded. “You’re now in the fae world. It parallels the human world you knew.”
“But… how did we get here?”
“A portal.” He winked. “Magic.”
Her mind stuttered on that word, and Griff turned to keep walking.
She ran after him. “Magic?”
Glee shone on his face. “You have no idea.”
“What is magic?”
“Why does this place look like a freaking fairytale?”
“Why is it warm here when it was so cold at home?”
“And why would you bother bringing me here? I’m nobody.”
Griff grunted and turned to face her as they crossed the fields leading up to the small stone cottage that looked like it belonged in a storybook.
“I think I liked you better when you wouldn’t talk to me.” He pursed his lips.
She’d been peppering him with questions as they walked. It was the only thing preventing her from focusing on seeing Myles hit the ground. “Is it still the same day I was arrested?”
“No. You were arrested yesterday. You spent a day and a night in your cell before Lochlan tried to intercept my plans to get you out.”
“Are you going to answer any of my other questions?” Now that she’d let herself consider he was telling the truth, she needed to know more, to know she wasn’t crazy. Maybe she never had been.
He turned and gazed up at the cottage. “Have you ever wondered why they’re called fairytales?”
Her eyes widened. “You’re a fairy?”
“Never call me that,” he growled. “I told you this was the fae world. What did you think I was?”
She shrugged. “An elf.”
“An elf?” He ran a hand through his hair in agitation.
Brea barely knew this man, but she’d seen him as jovial and calm. Riling him up was fun. She crossed the stone wall encircling a small paddock in front of a barn. Hopping up, she let her legs dangle over the side. “Do you have any dwarf friends?”
“What? Dwarves don’t exist.”
“Sure they do. If elves are real, why can’t Gimli be hanging around here somewhere?”
“I don’t know who Gimli is.” His eyes narrowed. “I told you this is the fae world. Why would you think I’m an elf?”
She shrugged. “No wings.”
“Wings?”
“In the movies fae have wings. Like tinker bell.”
He stared at her, his jaw dropping open. “Tinkerbell,” he said the name slowly.
She nodded. “She’s a fairy.”
“I know who Tinkerbell is!”
“Wait, really? Is there a TV in that house?” A Netflix night was just what she needed to ignore the hole inside her, the guilt and doubt she’d felt since she woke up that morning.
Pushing away from the wall, she barged into the house, ignoring the thud of the wood as she let the door swing back in Griff’s face.
A small room greeted her, with stone walls and a matching floor covered in sky-blue rugs. Wooden chairs faced a giant fireplace where flames lit up the room and an iron pot hung over the fire.
A door opened to her right and an older man shuffled out, stopping when he saw her.
Griff entered behind her with a chastisement she didn’t hear as she stared at the new man with his pointed ears and intensely blue eyes.
She looked from him to Griff. “It’s not just you. There are more.” She practically fell onto a bench behind the oak table, speaking to herself. “I’m not crazy. I’m not crazy. I’m not crazy.” For the first time, she started believing her mantra.
Everything she’d seen as a kid… A realization struck her. “There are more of you in the human realm.” They were the reason she’d been at the institute.
The older man raised one eyebrow before moving to the fire to stir whatever he had cooking in the pot. Her mouth watered as she realized she hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast.
She pointed to the pot. “Is that for me?”
“Brea, this is Leith, a loyal servant.” Griff lowered himself into a chair with an exhausted sigh.
Leith offered her a kind smile before spooning the stew into a ceramic bowl and setting it in front of her. “Welcome to Fargelsi, Miss Robinson.”
“Far-what-see?” And how did everyone seem to know her name?
“Fargelsi is the forest realm.” Griff leaned his head back. “We just call it Gelsi.” He took a bowl from Leith. “Thank you.”
Brea poked at the stew with her spoon, not knowing what the chunks were. She’d never been picky, eating whatever cheap food her parents put in front of her. With a shrug, she dug in, shoveling stew into her mouth like she hadn’t eaten in weeks.