When the Woods Go Silent (Haret Chronicles: Dark Fae #1)

CHAPTER NINETEEN

K IER

Dreamwalker magic floods my senses as I make my way toward the edges of the woods, and suddenly I forget all about leaving Clearwater.

My brothers are waiting for my report - I need to tell them how the gobbelins have been burying bodies tonight, and together we’ll plan how to eradicate Torrence’s clan. It may only be a few dead humans, but Ronan’s deal was clear. Unless I can convince my brother to leave Haret and come to Earth, cleaning up his half-brother’s mess will become my responsibility.

All of that can wait, however, because I’m going to find and catch this Goddess-damned dreamwalker. Their magic is useful. Rare. And wholly out of place in the human world, where the advantage is simply too great.

I hurry to retrace my steps into the deep forest, and as soon as I’m under the canopy of branches, the whispers find me.

Help her , the trees hiss at me in the old language, startling me into a pause. Their magic has grown, or perhaps their need to speak makes them remember. Things are changing here, in this woods.

“Who is in danger? Who needs my help?” I ask them out loud in the ancient language, dragging my fingers along the bark of the nearest one. The young leaves spark with electrical signals, trying to form more words through their unpracticed magic, but the most useful information comes from the branches that sway and bend, forming a tunneled path as they point me in the direction they want.

Trusting the trees comes naturally to my earth magic, and I race along the forest floor as they sink their roots into the soil and bend their branches back, giving me a corridor built for speed. I focus my magic into my senses, reaching its power through the leaves and into the soil to find the right vibrations of sound or movement.

There.

The pale figure of a woman in white, with long black hair hanging over her face, crouches high above me, motionless on some mossy rocks that line the rising hillside. As I edge in closer, glamoring myself invisible to her, the brittle sting of ice magic collides with the embers of my fire magic, and I have to work to keep from showing myself as the magic readies itself for a fight. Ice magic can only mean gobbelins, but that’s impossible.

Gobbelins are never dreamwalkers.

My eyes narrow as I realize there could be more than one magical creature here. Maybe a mage with dreamwalker magic, working with the gobbelin. By the Goddess, I hope not - I’m not supposed to draw attention to myself here in the human world, and fighting a mage is never subtle.

Help her , the trees cry again, twigs and bits of dry leaves rattling down on my head as they grow impatient. Who is the woods so desperate to protect? Surely it isn’t this gobbelin woman.

Then I sense the human, and I’m more confused than before.

The forest takes care of itself and its animals, but the trees don’t care about human life. Why should they? All people do is ruin whatever they touch.

Still, I’m committed to the mystery now. I turn away from the gobbelin, tracking the human’s scent instead as the trees continue to use their branches like pointing fingers, whispering furiously for me to hurry. Her scent is familiar, like roses and rain, but I can’t place it yet. I’m much closer to the row of buildings when I finally spot her - the human woman steps quietly between the trees, her moonlit skin almost as pale as the gobbelin’s.

My magic flares as I recognize her - this is the human who saw me tonight, outside the gobbelin’s building. She doesn’t smell of magic, but she somehow saw straight through my fae glamor on the street. It should have been impossible.

Something is definitely changing in this town.

I watch her wander for a minute, trying to figure out why the woods have broken their silence for her. Even fully focused, I still don’t feel any magic within her. Then I notice how her hazel eyes are wide but blank, glazed over with sleep, though her feet move carefully along the ground.

She’s caught in the dreamwalker’s thrall.

The forbidden magic has planted some story into her sleeping mind, some mission she’s bound to follow as long as she’s under the spell. It’s a dangerous place to be for anyone, and much more so for a human with no magical defenses. Whatever is about to happen to this woman, the trees are right.

She needs help.

It makes more sense for me to double back and find the dreamwalker. Capture them and bring them back to Aralia with me. That would save the girl. But if I leave her alone in thrall, the gobbelin woman could snatch her, and there would be another body to bury.

Fuck it all. I’m going to have to let the dreamwalker get away this time.

Besides, I may be careless, but I’m not stupid. The woods have woken up for this woman, and I need to find out more about her. That kind of connection is never a coincidence.

As I move closer, I realize that she’s nearly naked between the trunks, a deliciously small bit of cloth covering the place between her thighs. It’s the kind of view I love best, but as she turns toward my hiding place, my eyes meet the forest floor instead of the generous curve of her naked breasts. Something about watching her like this seems... wrong. I love everything about her curves, but she didn’t choose this.

Against my normal instincts, I lock my eyes on her face instead.

An unfamiliar need pulses through me as I realize I want to help her. Human or not, I want to get her safely home and away from both dreamwalkers and gobbelins. Fucking now.

Her body begins to sway as though the dreamwalker magic might be losing power. I take the opportunity to slip silently next to her, spreading my fae magic over her but being careful not to touch her yet. It takes concentration to hold a glamor heavy enough to mask both of us from being seen or heard, but I have plenty of strength. We should be invisible to whatever is out here now.

I just have to be careful not wake her - not while she’s in thrall. It could addle her mind forever.

Instead, I use my earth magic to help direct the forest, its vines and branches more than ready to help. Together, we coax and turn her slowly back toward the row of buildings. She must belong to one of them, but which one? How am I going to get her home without waking her?

If Ronan could see me now, being so careful with a human girl, I would never hear the end of it.

I keep her steady as the forest swells with its own magic, surrounding us and hiding our movements as much as the glamor does. The trees are scrambling to distract the gobbelin and the dreamwalker as I steal away their prey, and I feel the ice magic crackle through the air as the gobbelin woman follows us, freezing the branches and roots behind me.

She won’t give up her meal easily.

I try to move the girl a little faster, wishing I had a bit of Brigance’s air magic to simply float us along. Her legs begin to resist the retreat, her mind still working to finish whatever task was planted into her dreams. Finally, I feel the spell breaking. She makes a soft noise, and I know I don’t have long. She’ll be terrified if she wakes here, naked in the woods.

We’re nearly at the row of buildings, and I’m cursing under my breath. Which one does she belong to? I can’t go opening random doors and tossing her inside.

Thank the Goddess, the woods helps me again, sending vines to curl and point us in the direction of the bookshop, with only a single light shining dimly in an upstairs window. I look up at the familiar building in surprise. So, she’s the new owner.

Things begin to make a little more sense, as far as the woods go, anyway.

William, the old man who owned the shop before, had been a good keeper, hiding many of the older books away from the wrong kinds of humans. More than one Haretian has probably used this store to trade for lore, and I need to come back later and meet the new owner properly. Does she even know what she owns here?

Gobbelins are scavengers, taking what they find. But a dreamwalker would have a reason to risk discovery.

The ice magic at my back finally fades as I help the sleeping woman walk up the back stairs of the building. Once we’re safe on the covered porch, my thoughts turn even more to the strangeness of all of this.

Why were the woods so intent on saving a human? Plenty of humans have died or disappeared in these woods since they first sprouted, and the trees rarely care.

What’s different about this one? She’s grown, but still young. Now that we’re out of danger, I have to work a lot harder not to run my fingers over her deep curves and soft skin, her bright hair like flames licking at the night air.

But I don’t sense anything magical from her. Beautiful, but nothing a forest of idling spirits might be interested in.

Vines curl around her ankles even as I think this, tasting the girl’s bare skin, tapping at her bones and joints as though they could read the secrets trapped inside. I can almost hear their curiosity.

The woods know something I don’t know.

Maybe the dreamwalker does, too.

Maybe... but I cut the hope off at its roots. This can’t be the changeling I’ve been secretly hunting. As enchanting as she is, she has no fae magic for me to sense.

I need to come back tomorrow and talk to her, when she’s awake and not in thrall. She trudges now, her body moving slower without the pull of magic, and I’m afraid that she won’t make it into bed before waking up. I need to hurry.

Spreading my earth magic through the wooden frame of the building, I sense another human sleeping in the upstairs rooms. The girl must belong up there. I gently guide her up the stairs, and she rallies as we climb. Still not awake, but moving as though her muscles remember and her mind is giving directions even while blank. She opens a door and climbs into an empty bed, her face relaxing as she settles back beneath the covers with a little sigh.

She has no idea how much danger she’s just been in, and luckily, she’ll wake thinking it was all a strange dream.

I give in to my desire to study her now, standing over her as she sleeps peacefully, her fiery hair spread sideways on the pillow as though reaching for the trees beyond her window. I’m already imagining how I’ll charm her tomorrow when I come back to the store.

Then I notice the bottle on her bedside table. I snatch it up and sniff the swirling golden liquid, cursing under my breath.

It’s laced with gobbelin blood, which means if she drank this, gobbelin magic swirls through her veins, more addictive and hypnotizing than any drug humans can create.

The dreamwalker and the gobbelin woman really are working together, and that fucking restaurant is hiding more secrets than I thought. I tuck the bottle under my arm and hurry to leave the bookshop.

The reports to my brothers will have to wait a bit longer while I unravel this mystery.