They glanced up when Liam and I joined them.
“I see the changeling made it out of that insanity alive,” Alastar said before turning his eyes on me. “Do you have any idea how idiotic that was? You could have ruined our entire plan if you’d gotten yourself killed saving some damn horses.”
I bristled at his words. “They’re innocent creatures who didn’t deserve to die just because we couldn’t be bothered to get them to safety.”
“I can’t believe this is what we’re dealing with,” one of the other Hunters muttered.
“Maybe if you’d taken them to safety yourselves, instead of abandoning them, I wouldn’t have had to risk my life.”
The Hunters fell silent. An eerie, uncomfortable kind of silence that made me shift on my feet. Finally, Phelan plucked a wooden square piece from the map and held it before my eyes.
“Do you know what this is?” he asked. When I shook my head, he continued. “This is you. Doesn’t look like much, right? Just a boring old little wooden block. Well, somehow, this one pesky little block is pretty much all we have right now. The future of the Summer Court depends on this stupid little block. Hell, the future of the entire realm could depend on this block. Do you understand me?”
My heart thundered in my chest, but I couldn’t stop the next words from popping out of my mouth. “Are you calling me a stupid wooden block?”
“For the love of the forest.” Phelan threw up his hands and stalked away, shoving his hands into his thick red hair. The truth was, his words had terrified me, though I couldn’t let him see that. How could the future of the realm depend on me? Like he’d said, I was only a first-year changeling who had only just begun to grasp her powers. What the hell could I do against an entire court of devious fae?
“What Norah means is that of course she wants to help.” Liam cut his eyes toward me. “Right, Norah?”
“Of course I’ll help. Just don’t expect me to keep my mouth shut when you insult me.”
“Fine. Whatever.” Phelan stalked back toward the map and slammed the ‘stupid wooden block’ down into the center of the Autumn woods. “This here is the perimeter of the Autumn woods.”
I nodded. “Yes, I’ve been there before.”
He arched his eyebrow. “Good. Then, you’ll know that these woods are often patrolled by two opposing factions. Queen Viola’s guards, and her own personal collection of Hunters.”
“And the rebels,” I said.
He looked surprised that I could actually offer up some insight into the Autumn woods. For a second—the teensiest, tiniest of seconds—he didn’t look as though the very sight of me repulsed him. “That’s correct. According to our sources, the rebels have been keeping their heads low the past few weeks. They directly oppose Viola, but they are very calculating, and they won’t make a move unless they think it’s the right time. So, I doubt they’ll pose much of a threat during your cross into the forest. The fae you’re going to have to watch out for are the Autumn Hunters.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” I held my hands up and took a step back from the map. “I think you skipped over some important information here. Like the fact you expect me to go into the Autumn realm? And…what exactly? Try to attack the Queen? I’m all for helping. I want to do everything I can. But there’s no way I’m going to go on some kind of revenge assassination mission.”
I glanced at Liam, whose scowl was the deepest I’d ever seen it. He stared hard at the map, his eyes flicking from my wooden square to the pair of crowns that were splayed on their sides, as if someone had knocked them over, as if someone were proclaiming them as fallen.
“Is that what this is, Phelan?” Liam’s voice was a growl. “Because it’s not happening. Norah is not walking into that castle and murdering the Queen of the Autumns. You’ll have to kill me before I’ll let that happen.”
“No one is killing anyone,” Phelan countered, narrowing his eyes. “Yet.”
“So, then what is the point of all this?” I gestured at the map, at the fallen crowns. “Why do you want me to go into the Autumn woods?”
“We want you to be our spy.”
“Your spy.” I repeated the words, as if that would make them make more sense. “Wouldn’t it be better to find an Autumn fae who could do that? I highly doubt I’m going to be able to walk around in there without getting noticed.”
“Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong.” Phelan turned to Alastar and gestured for him to take over the conversation.
Alastar gave a nod and pointed to circular clearing in the midst of the free territory. “At the Feast of the Fae, you were kidnapped, were you not?”
I frowned, wrinkling my forehead. “Yes, but I don’t know what that has to do with anything.”
“I saw you.” He looked up, his eyes glittering. “I thought I was imagining things at first, but I saw you. The Autumn fae who were trying to get to you and your friend. They couldn’t, could they?”
I thought back to that night. It had all been so hazy. Fear had been pouring through my veins like molten lava, and my head had been so full of screams. I was there with Liam one instant, and then I wasn’t. The Autumn fae had shifted me halfway across the grounds. Bree was by my side, her back arched, her fingers curled into claws. Her body began to shift and change, black hairs sprouting along her arms. The Autumn fae stared at her, glanced around the clearing, and then shifted into thin air.
“They couldn’t because Bree is a Redcap. Well, kind of. She’s a cured one, so she has complete control over her body now. She only changes when she wants to. It scared them off.”
Alastar exchanged a glance with Phelan, and then met my eyes again. “I had a feeling you had no idea what you were doing. It’s often the case when it comes to these kinds of powers. Norah, the Autumn fae fled because they could no longer see you anymore. They couldn’t see Bree either. They thought you’d vanished.”
I blinked. “What?”
Liam leaned forward and braced his fist on the war table “You mean she shadowed?”
Alastar gave a nod. “For a moment, I thought she’d shifted, but there was something about the way she melted into the night that looked familiar. I saw Marin do it a few times, when I was serving in her Court. It meant she was still there in the room, quietly watching, no one the wiser. Not very many fae knew she could do that.” Suddenly, his voice went soft. “Only her mates and her closest advisors.”
“So, you’re saying those Autumn fae couldn’t see me?” I pressed my hand to my neck and swallowed hard. It had taken a long time for me to get accustomed to the fact that I could transport myself from one location to another, but this was something far beyond that, at least to me.
I could make myself invisible.
No wonder the Summer fae wanted me to be a spy.
“No one could see you,” Alastar said, dragging his stubby finger from the free territory to the castle set atop of Esari, the glittering city of the Autumn Court. “Which means you can sneak into the Autumn Court, find out as much information about their plans as you can, and then report it all back to us. Then, we would know exactly what to do in order to beat them. You’d be in and out without a single Autumn soul realizing you were ever there.”
I nodded and gazed down at the map. I could see now why they’d been so insistent about my part in this, why they’d said it could affect the future of the realm. If we knew what they were going to do ahead of time, we could prevent the Autumn Court from winning their next attack and from taking out another batch of Royals. But it was also a massive mission, one I wasn’t entirely sure I could pull off.
“You do know that I’ve only ever done this shadowing thing once,” I finally said. “And until now, I didn’t even know I’d done it.”