Page 31 of The Shadowbound and the False God

“Something stole my glamour,” he muttered. He dropped his eyes and dug the toe of one of his boots under a stone before kicking it off to the side. A subtle movement over his shoulder drew her attention when something long and covered with short, fine fur snaked up behind him, twitching and curling.

“Holy shit,” Aisling breathed. “You have a tail?”

Rodney grimaced as if he were noticing it for the first time, too. He reached back and swatted at its tufted tip. “One of my worst characteristics. And, coincidentally, the most difficult to keep glamoured away.”

A laugh bubbled up Aisling’s throat before she could stop it. Slightly hysterical, slightly delirious. She clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle it as Rodney looked at her. She didn’t know his new face well enough yet to tell whether he was exasperated or amused by her reaction.

“I’m sorry,” she giggled from behind her palm. Trying to hold back the laughter only made it that much worse; now, her eyes were beginning to water. “I’m so sorry.”

“I don’t find it at all amusing,” he mumbled gruffly, despite the corner of his lips quirking up into a half-smile. He swiped again at his tail, which nearly made Aisling double over. She wasn’t entirely sure whether it was funny or frightening, but either wayit took several more seconds to get herself under control. Finally, she straightened up, wiping her eyes.

“Are you quite through?” His voice was teasing now. He was still Rodney.

“I’m so sorry,” Aisling apologized again breathlessly. “I just never expected…”

“This?” Rodney gestured to himself. “Me neither, to be fair.”

“Is this you? The real you?” She took a moment to study his vulpine features once more. He didn’t possess the delicate beauty of the more ethereal Fae, but he was striking in a wild, animalistic sort of way. In a way that seemed somehow older, untamed. Primal, even. Looking at him gave Aisling a similar feeling as gazing up at the towering old-growth pines that dotted the Washington coast.

Rodney nodded, fidgeting with the zipper on his jacket. “My original form. Whether or not it’s still the real me, though, I couldn’t say.”

“Should I call you something different?” she asked.

“I like Rodney,” he assured her. “It’s grown on me.”

Aisling stepped forward and wrapped her arms around his middle, hugging him fast to her like it had been years, rather than hours, since they’d seen each other. With the way time moved in Elowas, it very well could have been.

Rodney pulled her in closer and relaxed into the embrace. He rested his pointed chin on the crown of her head. “Are you okay?”

She shook her head. “Not really. You?”

“Not really,” he sighed. His low voice vibrated in his chest against her ear. “Why are you all wet?”

“There was rain,” she said. Then, after gathering the courage to speak the words out loud, she whispered, “I saw Kael.” She tightened her grip on him to ward off the chill that raked down her back when his face flashed in her mind again.

Rodney squeezed her back. “The real Kael, or a vision?”

She shrugged and swallowed hard to keep her voice from cracking. “I don’t know. I’m not sure there’s a difference.”

“I saw one, too. Not Kael—someone from my past.” He shuddered; Aisling hadn’t been the only one to suffer the horrors of Elowas. “I think this place takes memories, our worst ones, and twists them. Lyre thought they were outcomes we’d imagined before.”

Aisling pulled back a bit to glance around, then looked up at him, frowning. “Lyre’s with you?”

“I should have said, it wasn’t really Lyre. It was something playing Lyre. I’m not sure where he is.”

“And Raif?” Finally, she let go and let her arms drop back to her sides.

Rodney shook his head. “You’re the first one I’ve found. I’ve been looking for the tree line but this fucking forest…” he trailed off.

“It feels endless,” Aisling agreed.

“Which road did you come down?” Rodney turned slowly to inspect the four paths, heavy brows furrowed. His ears twitched as he moved. Facing away from her, Aisling finally got a full view of his tail. His jeans were too loose now; they hung low enough around his hips that the appendage emerged just above his waistband. It flicked at the fur on the back of his neck. She had to stifle another laugh when she realized the way the shaggy fur grew looked all too similar to a mullet.

“That one.” She pointed a thumb over her shoulder towards the road at her back.

“Then we’ve got a fifty-fifty shot between these two.” Rodney gestured to the road directly ahead, and the one immediately to the left. “One of them has to take us out of here.”

Aisling hummed. If they chose correctly, they might follow it all the way to the tree line. But that was an unknown, and she knew for certain what waited back the way she came.

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