I didn't give myself a chance to think, to panic or to doubt, to consider the consequences as I layered on tunic after tunic and bundled myself in a cloak, stuffing the knife I'd stolen into my boot. The extra clothes in the satchel would just be a burden to carry.
Aslan. Aslan had come to take me—to save me. Whatever benefits Phoebus had given my family upon my departure hadn't been too tempting, then. Hadn't been too tempting to allow Aslan to know, let him venture into the faerie lands himself. Maybe they had a ship prepared to sail far, far away—perhaps they had somehow sold the cottage and gotten enough money to set us up in a new place, a new continent.
Aslan—kind, brave Aslan had come.
A brief survey of the ground beneath my window revealed no one outside—and the silent house told me no one had spotted Aslan yet. He was still waiting by the fountain, now beckoning to me with his arms. At least Phoebus had not returned.
With a final glance at my room, listening for anyone approaching the hall, I grasped the nearby trellis of wisteria and eased down the building.
I winced at the crunch of gravel beneath my boots, but Aslan was still beckoning to me, his eyes darting between the outer gates and myself. How had he even gotten here? There had to be horses nearby, then. He was hardly wearing enough clothing for the chilly spring night that would await us once we crossed that barrier. But I'd layered on so much that I could spare him some items if need be.
Keeping my movements light and silent, carefully avoiding the light of the moon pouring from above, I hurried towards Aslan. He moved with surprising swiftness toward the shadow behind the statue of the fallen angel, continuing to wave his hand frantically.
Only a few hall candles were burning inside the house. I didn't dare breathe too loudly—didn't dare call for Aslan as he slipped deeper into the shadow. If we left now, if he indeed had horses, we could be halfway home by the time they realised I was gone. Then we'd flee—flee Phoebus, flee from the Elders' crutches, flee the attacks that could soon invade our lands.
Damn the Elders, damn their plot. I would not give up this opportunity of freedom for a plan of revenge. It was better that we had a chance to leave this wretched island entirely, to start a new life on a new continent rather than play my luck at assassinating the Imperial Lords. Let the Elders sort out their problem, let them be the pawns of their game for once.
I shot a quick look at the gates. They were already open, the dark forest beyond enticing. Aslan must have hidden the horses deeper in. He turned toward me, that familiar face drawn and tight, those brown eyes clear like always, and beckoned. Hurry, hurry, every movement of his hand seemed to shout.
My heart was a raging beat in my chest, in my throat. Only a few feet now—to him, to freedom, to a new life—
A massive hand wrapped around my arm. "Going somewhere?"
Shit, shit, shit.
Phoebus's talons poked through my layers of clothing as I looked up at him in unabashed horror.
I didn't dare move, not as his lips thinned and the muscles in his jaw quivered. Not as he opened his mouth and I glimpsed canines—long, throat-tearing canines shining like silver in the moonlight.
He was going to kill me—kill me right there, and then kill Aslan. No more loopholes, no more flattery, no more mercy. He didn't care anymore. I was as good as dead.
"Please," I breathed. "Aslan—"
"Aslan?" He lifted his gaze to the gates behind me, and his growl rumbled through me as he bared his teeth. "Why don't you look again?" He released his stone grip on my arm.
I staggered back a step, whirling, sucking in a breath to tell Aslan to run, but—
But he wasn't there. And instead there stood my father, crippled but still beckoning. My father. He hadn't been there moments before, hadn't—
He rippled, as if he were nothing but water—and then he became a pale bow and a quiver of pale arrows, propped against the gates. Another ripple—and there were my brothers, huddled together, gesturing to me to come.
My knees buckled. "What is ..." I didn't finish the question. Aslan now stood there, still worried and beckoning. A flawless rendering.
"Weren't you warned to keep your wits about you?" Phoebus snapped. "That your human senses would betray you?" He stepped beyond me and let out a snarl so vicious that whatever the thing was by the gates shimmered a pale blue light and darted out as swift as a stag through the dark.
"Fool," he said to me, turning. "If you're ever going to run away, at least do it in the daytime." He stared me down, and the canines slowly retracted. The golden talons remained. "There are worse things than the Baphomet prowling these woods at night. That thing at the gates isn't one of them—and it still would have taken a good, long while devouring you."
Somehow, my mouth began working again. And of all the things to say, I blurted, "Can you blame me? My lover appears beneath my window, and you think I'm not going to run for him? Did you actually think I'd stay here forever, even if you'd taken care of my family, all for some Covenant of Peace that had nothing to do with me and allows your kind to slaughter humans as you see fit?"
He flexed his fingers as if trying to get the talons back in, but they remained out, ready to slice through flesh and bone. "What do you want, Eleena?"
"I want to go home!"
"Home to what, exactly? You'd prefer that miserable human existence to this?"
"I made a promise," I said, my breathing ragged. "To myself, a long while ago. That I'd look after my family. That I'd take care of them. All I have done, every single day, every hour, every second of my existence has been for that vow. And just because I was hunting to save my family, to put food in their bellies, I'm now forced to break it."
He stalked toward the house, and I gave him a wide berth before falling into step behind him. His claws slowly, slowly retracted. He didn't look at me as he said, "You are not breaking your vow—you are fulfilling it, and then some, by staying here. Your family is better cared for now than they were when you were there."
Those chipped, miscoloured paintings inside the cottage flashed in my vision. Perhaps they would forget who had even painted them in the first place. Insignificant—that's what all those years I'd given them would be, as insignificant as I was to these Seelie Faeries, even Unseelie ones. And that dream I'd had, of one day living with Aslan, with enough food and money and paint and charcoal ... it had been my dream—no one else's.
I rubbed at my chest. "I can't just give up on it, on them. No matter what you say."
Even if I had been a fool—a stupid, human fool—to believe Aslan, my father or my brothers would ever actually come for me.
Phoebus eyed me sidelong. "You're not giving up on them."
"Living in luxury, stuffing myself with food? How is that not—"
"They are cared for—they are fed and comfortable."
Fed and comfortable. If he couldn't lie, if it was true, then ... then it was beyond anything I'd ever dared hope for.
Then ... my vow to myself was fulfilled.
It stunned me enough that I didn't say anything for a moment as we walked.
My life was now owned by the Covenant of Peace, but ... perhaps I'd been freed in another sort of way.
We neared the sweeping stairs that led into the manor, and I finally asked, "Kallistê goes on border patrol, Oberon is the commander for Elanor's armies, and you've mentioned other sentries—yet I've never seen one here. Where are they all?"
"At the border," he said, as if that were a suitable answer. Then he added, "We don't need sentries if I'm here."
Because he was deadly enough. I tried not to think about it, but still I asked, "Were you trained as a warrior, then?"
"Yes." When I didn't reply, he added, "I spent most of my life in my father's war-band on the borders, training as a warrior to one day serve him—or others. Running these lands ... was not supposed to fall on me." The flatness with which he said it told me enough about how he felt about his current title, about why the presence of his silver-tongued or brute warrior friends was necessary.
But it was too personal, too demanding, to ask what had occurred to change his circumstances so greatly. So I cleared my throat and said, "What manner of faerie prowl the woods beyond this gate if the Baphomet isn't the worst of them? What was that thing?"
What I'd meant to ask was, What would have tormented and then eaten me? Who are you to be so powerful that they pose no threat to you?
He paused on the bottom step, waiting for me to catch up. "A Water Eidolon. They use your own desires to lure you to some remote lake or body of water. Then they eat you. Slowly. It probably smelled your human scent in the woods and followed it to the house." I shivered and didn't bother to hide it. Phoebus went on. "These lands used to be well guarded. The deadlier faeries were contained within the borders of their native territories, monitored by the local Fae lords, or driven into hiding. Creatures like the Water Eidolons never would have dared set foot here. But now, the attacks that were inflicted on Asteria has weakened the wards that kept them out."
A long pause, like the words were choked out of him. "Things are different now. It's not safe to travel alone at night—especially if you're human."
Because humans were defenceless as babes compared to natural-born predators like Kallistê and Oberon—and Phoebus, who didn't need weapons to hunt. I glanced at his hands but found no trace of the talons. Only tanned, callused skin.
"What else is different now?" I asked, trailing him up the marble front steps.
He didn't stop this time, didn't look over his shoulder to see me as he said, "Everything."
It seemed slaughtering the Imperial Lords was the only solution to my freedom after all.