His gaze chills my back as I hurry across the rooftop, and it doesn’t stop burning until the door to my room slams shut.
12
Morning comes too soon. Clad in everything I own, I wheeze and lunge my way down a dark, endless stairwell to another door of marble that leads to an outdoor courtyard. Someone knocked this morning to inform me that I was needed for . . . something. I’m still not sure what.
I must have been tired because I slept way past noon. I think. There are no clocks in my room, and the sun is imprisoned behind a layer of dirty winter clouds so deep I’m not even sure it’s there.
As soon as the door opens to the courtyard, cold air slaps me in the face, knocking every bit of sleep from my body along with my soul.
Lord, I hate the cold.
I inhale sharply. The space is big enough to fit two football fields. English primroses and winter jasmine decorate the grounds, crystal waters from countless fountains sparkle, frozen mid-spurt, and hedge mazes crisscross the paver stones, dusted white. Snow drizzles the many statues and forms mounds in the corners.
I barely have time to take in the place before a noise catches my attention.
“Hurry up!” a female orders in a tinkling tone.
I whip left to right, pulse pounding as I search for the voice. A ginormous magenta butterfly swoops at my head.
On instinct, I swipe at the papery, iridescent wings.
“Hey!” the voice screeches. And that’s when I realize the butterfly is not a butterfly, but a miniscule person with abnormally large lungs. She screeches at me again, the sound earsplitting, buzzing around my head so fast I can’t make out her features.
Suddenly she hovers in place, her eyes traveling over my clothes. “Fae hells. You’re a weird one.”
Curiosity gets the better of me, and I snatch the creature from the air, holding her gently around the waist. My fingers cover her entire body. She wriggles and kicks, and I can’t stop staring at the tiny clothes she wears. The shoes made out of bean pods and soft dress spun from spider silk.
She’s like the Barbies Julia plays with, only her hair isn’t colored with crayons, but a deep, beautiful magenta, and she’s warm and alive.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she demands. Her wings beat the air in a blur, sending cold puffs of wind at my face.
“What are you?” I ask.
She gives up on trying to pry my pointer finger back with her hands and glares up at me, arms crossed. “I’m a sprite, and your escort for the next four years. And if you make any Tinkerbell jokes—any at all—I will cast a spell to give you hemorrhoids so bad you’ll never sit down again.”
Well, that sounds horrible.
She bares her ruby lips, revealing razor-sharp teeth. I think I recall something about sprites carrying a toxin, so I release her before she can bite me.
The moment she’s free, she buzzes around my head, a string of curses spewing from her little mouth.
Then she says in her tinkling voice, “Follow me. We’re already late for the Shadow Selection.”
“The what?” I call. But she zooms so fast over the courtyard that I have no choice but to run to keep up. I zigzag around a statue of a faun and lunge over hedges, my boots slipping and sliding on the gravel.
Why did I ever love running?
Her sparkling form disappears through a propped open door into another building, this one tall and spiky. I follow. Those orb thingies from before spin inside delicate glass bulbs affixed to the walls, casting light over marble hallways and warming the air.
Soon I’m sweating. My hair plastered to my face and mouth hanging open in a pant.
The sprite ducks into an open door of deep mahogany, and I burst after her, swearing under my breath . . . into a giant auditorium full of people.
Crap.
Not people. Fae. Note to self. I suck at remembering that.
Hundreds of Fae eyes pin me to the spot, the air in the room heavy with a sense of magic.
I freeze, suddenly recalling my overwhelming hatred of crowds and attention. Perhaps if I hadn’t slammed the door open l could have snuck in unnoticed . . .
Shoving my fear down deep, I force my legs to move, shuffling forward.
Why can’t I breathe?
One of the Fae near the back calls out, “Who’s the fresh meat?”
My gaze darts around the crowd, the exoticness of their features spinning my heart into overdrive. Some are wild-looking, with beaks and hooves and claws. Some only come up to my waist and are strange colors. Varying shades of mauve and teal and chartreuse.
But most look like versions of us, just with pointy ears, expensively tailored clothes that are a mix between modern fashion and a renaissance fair, and like a million times the hot factor.
In contrast, my frumpy, spaghettiOs stained hoodie, clunky Salvation Army boots, and unattractive jeans feel like a prison yard uniform.
I take a few more tentative steps, scouring the room for my sprite guide, whom I’ve already developed a love/hate relationship with.
Where are you, tiny person?
Instead I find massive chandeliers in the shape of vines hanging from high, arched ceilings. Magical orbs drip from their golden branches, each orb of light a little sun that illuminates the room. A layer of shimmery frost covers the entire thing.
Wooden bleachers filled with students surround the chamber, looking down upon a marble floor that appears to be a giant map, segmented into seven distinct locations. Great leafy mosaic trees of orange and yellow and red spread across the section I stand on . . .
I suddenly get what each segment represents. The Fae Courts. This area is Autumn. The one next to it, Winter.
The crowd on the floor is smaller, less than a hundred Fae, all dressed in extravagant clothes beyond imagining. Headdresses made of gold-spun leaves; cloaks weaved from spider silk and butterfly wings; armor carved from ice.
The clothes match the theme of the floor each Fae stands on, and I quickly realize these students are split up by court, meaning everyone has their place.
Everyone but me.
Desperately, I search for an indication of where to go.
A dais of obsidian rises in the center of the room. As I take in the black pedestal and the very human, very terrified group that huddles there inside a silver cage, I answer my own question.
That’s where I belong.
A pang of dread pierces my gut.
They’re inside a cage. A Mother. Freaking. Cage.
My nostrils flare as I try to pull in air, panic tightening my chest. I don’t do well in tight, enclosed spaces.
The sprite that led me here flits over, an anxious look scrunching her face. “What are you doing, weird one? Get up there with your people.”
“No!” I didn’t plan on yelling my refusal, but the combination of acoustics and fear amplify my voice and it reverberates through the room, even echoing for dramatic affect.
Oh. My. God.
A collective gasp goes through the crowd. Hide. Where can I hide?
A few of the closest Fae gape at me, obviously not used to anyone disobeying. But most stare at me with a mixture of curiosity and disgust.
A Fae girl breaks off from the crowd on Winter’s side, her clear ice heels clacking loudly as she marches toward me, two other girls in tow. Everyone she passes cowers a little.
Great. Resident mean girl incoming.
Why am I not surprised? Mean girls tend to target me, probably because I can’t just fall in line like everyone else. It’s not in my nature. At my high school there was Mary Louise, homecoming queen and sometimes girlfriend of Cal and half the football team.