Chapter 6 Poor Human Girl
Rae
My heart thunders so hard it feels like it is trying to punch its way out of my chest. The tapping gets louder and closer. Metal on bars. Boots on stone. Voices low and smooth and carrying down the corridor before the bodies that belong to them come into view. I do not have to fake any of this. I drop into the corner farthest from Cian, tuck my knees up to my chest, and drag the basket in front of me like woven twigs and blackberries are somehow going to save my life. My whole body is already shaking by the time the footsteps stop outside the cell.
“What the…” A male voice says before I hear another set of boots stop. I peek over the rim of the basket and see one guard, then two, both staring at me through the bars.
They are beautiful in that deeply unsettling way I am quickly learning means absolutely nothing good down here. They have fine clothes, smooth faces, and bright eyes. They’re so clean and polished, like they have never known a dirty thought in their lives. I know that’s a fat lie.
“Oh God,” I whisper, shrinking back harder into the wall. “Please, no. Not more of you. Are you going to eat me, too? I’m so sorry, I stumbled. I’m not supposed to be here.” I hide behind the basket again, because if I have learned anything in the last hour, it is that being a terrified little human is my new full-time job. The guards go quiet for a second, then I hear the click of a lock, and the cell door opens.
“Hey,” one of them says, voice sickly sweet. “It’s all right. We won’t hurt you.” I shake harder, putting in the work. “We’re not monsters like these folk,” another says. These folk. Right. Keep talking, pretty prison demon. “By thorn and bloom,” the first guard mutters, stepping closer, “this poor human girl. Cian must have opened a road for her.”
Yes. That’s right. Poor human girl. Very soft. Very scared. Definitely not listening to every word you say while trying not to piss herself. I let out a tiny, broken sound and lower the basket just enough to look at them with what I hope are wide, panicked, harmless eyes. “I just want to go home,” I whisper. The first one crouches a little, like I’m a frightened animal; he is trying not to spook. His hair is golden, his eyes are green, and his smile is just this side of gentle. He looks like the sort of man who would help old ladies carry groceries and then steal their souls while they thanked him for it.
“What’s your name, little thing?”
Every rule Eiran and Saoirse just shoved into my skull flashes at once. Do not give your full name. Do not thank them. Do not promise. Do not take what they offer.
“S-s-sunny,” I say, making my voice wobble. “My name’s Sunny.” His smile softens. Good. Take the bait, fairy bastard.
“Well, Sunny,” he says, “you’re safe now.”
From behind me, I hear chains rattle a little, and the guard’s eyes flick past me toward Cian hanging in the dark, and something ugly shows under his polished expression before the softness slides back into place. “What happened?” the second guard asks. “Did he threaten you?”
Did he threaten me? The almost laugh that rises in my chest is pure hysteria. I clutch the basket tighter and dart a glance over my shoulder like I cannot bear to look at him for long. Which, to be fair, is not entirely fake. Cian, bloodied and chained and half-conscious in the dark, is still one of the more terrifying things I have ever seen. Terrifying because I can’t believe someone would do this to another person. It’s sick. “He was…” I stop and let my voice shake. “He was awake when I fell through.”
The first guard steps a little closer and crouches. “Did any of them say anything to you?”
My mind flashes to climbing Cian like a tree, and the way he looked at me like I had fallen straight out of a dream he was too broken to believe in. “No,” I lie easily, because I can do that. That would be one point for Rae. The second guard exhales slowly through his nose. “Poor little thing.”
“Please,” I whisper, because now that I’m in it, I may as well commit. “Please don’t leave me in here with them.”
The first guard glances at the second, and something silent passes between them. Oh, they are thinking. That cannot be good. “You won’t be left with them,” he says at last, still in that smooth, careful voice. “But we’ll need to ask a few questions first.” Questions. Wonderful. I tighten my arms around my knees and force myself to shrink smaller. “I didn’t mean to do anything wrong,” I say. “I was in the woods, and there were mushrooms, and I just…” I let out a weak laugh that sounds dangerously close to tears. “My grandmother used to say not to step into fairy rings, and I thought she was just being weird.”
The first guard’s brows rise. “A fairy ring.”
“Yes,” I say quickly, because apparently I am doing this now. “I didn’t know. I swear, I didn’t know. I just stepped into it, and then I was here, and he was…” My eyes flick toward Cian again, then away. “Like that.”
“Like that,” the second guard repeats, disgust curling through the words.
“He should never have been able to pull so far upward,” the first says quietly.
“So… Some roads do answer to him.”
A chill slides over my skin. Oh, Hecate. This is going to cause Cian more pain, isn’t it? Shit. I tuck my face behind the basket again before they can read that realisation in my face. “Please,” I whisper, and this time it comes out easy because fear is no longer something I have to perform. “I just want to go home.”
The first guard is silent for a long second. Then, very gently, he says, “And we will help you, Sunny.” Something in the way he says it makes every tiny hair on my body stand up. Because now I know enough to hear what sits underneath the kindness. They don’t want to help me. Not freely. Behind me, chains creak softly in the dark again, and I remember Cian’s bargain. I remember home. So I curl tighter into the corner, make my breath hitch, and let them think I am exactly what they want me to be. A frightened, foolish human girl who stumbled into the wrong hole in the world… Nanna always said the best lie was the one closest to the truth.
