Page 16 of Lord of the Hollow Court
“Allow me to assist you, then.” He offered her his arm. Mouth open, Katty took it. She amazed herself sometimes. She’d never been so enchanted by anyone, and he wasn’t even human. Even the crescent of pockmarks, some of them still topped by pustules from some ague, did little to diminish the primal beauty of him. No dandy in his best suit had ever been as handsome as this afflicted man.
Yet she found herself walking along with him, as though this were the most ordinary evening. Even her breath returned to an easy pace. It was as though being near him calmed her completely.
“My name is Janus,” the handsome fae said, his voice soothing and gentle. “But most folk call me Muis.”
“Mouse?” Now that she was beside him, she noted the wicked hook of his nose, and the way he dragged one foot behind him, like a mouse that had escaped a trap. “What a cruel nickname!”
He shook his head, his long hair a loose cascade. “Not at all, my dear. Muis is my family name. It’s fae custom to go by it in most courts. But you wouldn’t be familiar with that, would you?”
Blushing hotly, Katty sunk her head into her shoulders and asked, “How did you know?” The warning that shot through her mind was quiet and full.
Muis tapped his hooked nose. “Humans have a different scent. And you’re bleeding besides.”
Glancing at her scratched arms, panic remained a too distant thought. For some reason, the high color drained from her cheeks anyway. “You have to help me hide.”
Muis patted the fingers curled around his arm. “You need not fear. That another human is present will confuse them well enough. No one will look for us this far from the Hall—yet.”
“Another human?” Her eyes widened, that anxiety tugging at her from deep in her mind. “Ichabod!”
“Is that his name?” Muis chuckled. “I’ll have to chase that one from wherever he is hiding. But first, we must find a safe place for you, my dear.”
“But where?” She whimpered. “I want to go home.”
Muis shook his head, sleek hair swaying. “It is too late for that, I’m afraid. The worst thing you can do is lead them back to the human settlement.”
She gasped. “The creatures by the pantry?”
As if unafraid they would be heard, Muis laughed loudly, the sound coming from his belly. Katty found herself flinching. “No, my dear, it isn’t them you must hide from. It’s the High Fae. Vicious, base creatures who wrap themselves in jewels and silks. When given the right incentive”—he tapped his nose again—"they can be wild and bloodthirsty beasts. Even if you escape their hunt, they will not thank you for reminding them of their animal natures."
She could not help it. Katty gulped audibly. She had the feeling that when he said hunt, it was with a capital H. “How do I hide from them?”
Muis winked. “We’ll leave that to the lord of the manor.” He tilted his head back, at first, she thought, to stretch his neck. But then he said, lips parting to reveal the points of his canines as the moon peeked through the clouds, “It is that time again.”
Without warning, he pushed Katty away. She fell to the grass with a yelp, catching herself on protesting wrists. Brow furrowed peevishly, she whirled toward Muis—and found the black horse of the headless rider above her.
Chapter Eight
Cat and Mouse
As the feeling of calm vanished, Katty’s heart beat in double time. Panic flooded in, bringing a tremor to her limbs even as she called upon them to carry her away. She tried to stand and fell.
Tightened throat strangling all sound from her, Katty crawled backward, using the wall of the garden bed to get her to her feet. Her lips quivered, her mouth went dry. The horseman had found her. His stallion was before her, steam pouring from his nostrils to mix with the autumn haze.
But wherewashis rider? She searched the mist frantically as she stumbled away.
She did not make it far, colliding into a wall she hadn’t seen. But it was too warm to be a wall, bending at the collision. Arms wrapped around her, catching and lifting her with a grunt.
“Miserable human trespasser!” the owner of the arms railed. In the thick of the mist and darkness, she could make out too little of his features beyond his sneer and his sharp, pearly teeth.
Katty opened her mouth to scream.
Just as the sound began to leave her, the shape of that mouth changed and she went slack. Katty became little more than a rag doll in her attacker’s arms.
She watched as if at a distance. Another fae man appeared, slinging her over his shoulder. With the first fae in the lead, he carried her along the line of the woods, where an owl hooted and the leaves clamored like phantom applause. Katty was afraid, at first, that they’d take her deep into the woods, where no one would ever find her again. Then the leader turned, the mist parting for him as if he controlled it. The white walls of the manor rose up less suddenly this time, a place of richness that did not belong in the woods near Sleepy Hollow. It should’ve been in some glittering kingdom in Europe, some storybook place, just like him.
Distantly, Katty realized they were returning her to the very place from which she’d escaped. Hope slipped away, leaving terror and a dim sense of misery in its wake. She was powerless to stop them, her body no longer under her own control.
For the first time in her eighteen years, a true injustice was being done to her, and Katty van der Vos could not open her mouth to complain.
