The stairway led into the mountain and at the bottom was an iron door, which Cassian unlocked. Inside were two identical silver sports cars. The Fata shoved her inside the one on the left before he slid into the driver's seat.

Faryn rubbed at her arm, her skin red where his fingers had been. Had she just been kidnapped?

Cassian started up the engine, and as it purred to life, he made a few adjustments on the dashboard before putting it in drive. Ahead was an iron door that opened as they approached, revealing more cave instead of the night sky.

She pulled her bag off her shoulders and set it on the floor at her feet. "So, thanks for not letting me die?"

His fingers tightened on the wheel. "I don't need gratitude from an Elf."

"I'm half Elf."

His lips curled. "It's all the same when you smell like dirt."

Faryn took a deep breath. It wouldn't do to lash out while he was driving.

Ahead, a sliver of night sky appeared.

She settled back in the seat. "Do you have a plan?" Hers had been to see his mother and that clearly wasn't happening any longer.

He nodded as the car broke out under the night sky, shining with stars while mountains loomed high into the air like fortresses. "We'll go to New Corinth."

*****

Traveling four hours in a car with a Fae was a lot quieter than Faryn had imagined. Cassian was so intent on getting from Eiraacia to Venice that his only focus was the road. Never once did he turn on the radio.

While they drove, he had her use his phone to book their flight to Athens before she pulled the battery out of it. She would have used her new cell, but it was only a flip phone.

When they reached Aeroporto Marco Polo, Cassian took Faryn's bag from her and put her dagger in it to check it for the flight, but when he set it down to print off their boarding passes, she looped her bag over her shoulder and headed for the security line. He wouldn't attempt to take her bag from her in the middle of a crowded airport, right? Jack could appear around any corner, and her dagger was her only means of even attempting to protect herself. And Jack was only one Winter Court member. She'd already encountered Befana. Who knew who would crawl out of the shadows next.

Before she had entered the airport, she had made sure her ears were safely hidden behind her hair. Her hat was somewhere in a snow pile in Eiraacia.

"They won't let you through with that." Cassian's eyes landed on her bag. His Cassian's hair only covered the tips of his ears. There was no hiding the frosty tinge of his skin though Humans may write off the shade of his lips as a strange lipstick though it only took a long enough look to realize there was no wax on his lips.

She shouldn't be staring at his lips at all.

When Faryn's bag passed through the x-ray machines without triggering any alarms, Cassian stared at her sack as if he could see through to the dagger when the machines could not.

"It's enchanted," she said over her shoulder as she grabbed it.

It wasn't until they boarded the plane that Cassian learned she had selected her seat a row behind his. She didn't really feel like watching him wrinkle his nose for the whole flight. The scent of her Fae friends didn't bother her anymore. At the most, they were tolerable. But the scents of the few Fae with whom she'd come into contact since leaving Oxford irritated her nose.

Though what was far more irritating was that Cassian spent the over two-hour long flight chatting up the Human man and woman seated in his row, and she couldn't stop listening to their conversation. She wasn't about to spend the limited money she had on a pair of the airline's earbuds.

Suddenly, Cassian was the friendliest and most sickeningly charming being on the planet.

Fae didn't care she was only half-Elf. She had never met anyone who was half Elf and half Fae though she knew they existed. She couldn't even begin to imagine what that would be like—to be rejected by both parts of you.

While most Alkine hated her, the Elves she had met had never had an issue with who she was, and the Alkine only hated her because of what she symbolized. Any other half Alkine/half Elf Acurial, and there'd be no issues.

Once the plane had landed, Faryn strapped the dagger back onto her waist before they disembarked. Let Cassian try to remove it from her. She'd show him just how feral an Elf could be. He had his magic to protect him. This gift from her mother was all she had.

As they traveled through the airport, Faryn scanned faces, searching for any pointed ears that failed to be concealed. She didn't see any. Most Acurials looked Human, so it was even more difficult to spot them if they were in a crowd. Would Jack or the Winter Court have been able to guess they'd travel to New Corinth?

Even if they had, it was a Narcissus Court city. They would be hard pressed to pull them out of it, especially a Fae destined for the Midas Court.

From what else Faryn knew of New Corinth, it was a place where an Acurial could disappear. It was her world's version of the Human's Las Vegas. It was also their version of their criminal underworld. Not to be mistaken with their actual underworld where the Spirit Court's palace was. But if one really wanted to get specific, an entrance to the Spirit Court's capitol city was located in New Corinth, but that was purely coincidence and geography.

She frowned. She was considered a criminal now, wasn't she? Cassian probably thought she was going to feel right at home.

The Fata wasn't having much luck hailing a taxi standing there looking as imposing as a Frost Giant straight from Jotunheim, which as far as she knew did not exist, though most Humans would consider her mother a myth.

Adjusting her bag, Faryn stepped forward and hailed a taxi in mere moments, much to the very evident chagrin of Cassian. She smiled at him and slid into the taxi, situating her bag on her lap. There had been no opportunity for Cassian to pack a bag. Did he even have any Acurial money with him? If needed, she'd buy him a change of clothes. He might look like a walking snow globe, but his powers weren't of frost and snow. He'd sweat eventually and then even he'd have to admit he smelled terrible, and Faryn wasn't going to torture herself by making his scent worse.

Neither of them spoke Greek, but Cassian knew the Greek name for Corinth, and was able to specify he meant the ancient city.

As the taxi drove along the low hills spotted in green, she fiddled with the buckles on her bag. "Have you been to New Corinth before?"

"A few times."

"So you've met . . ." She grappled to find the name in her memory. "Chrysanthos?"

"No." He paused. "Maybe if I had come with my mother, but I came with friends. I take it you haven't?"

She shook her head and looked out the window at the hills speckled with dark green bushes. "I had never left England until the other night." 

"You've never been to Ruhnerium?"

She gave a hoarse laugh. "You think Nick would let me in?" She scraped her nail over the leather of the buckle's strap. "You just witnessed me meeting my cousin for the first time."

"He does believe you murdered his uncle."

It was a good thing they used the Acurial language otherwise the cab driver might take them straight to the police. "It would have gone similar regardless of the circumstances."

The taxi ride lasted about an hour until the driver brought the car to a stop in the tour bus parking lot of Ancient Corinth. Tourists milled about the ruins. Some white columns were still standing. Others had fallen long ago. To the west, the sun set behind a cluster of ruins.

Faryn's body was exhausted. Her legs and arms felt as if weights had been attached to them. Sleeping in the airport and on the plane wasn't enough to recover what she had lost.

The Acurial's Corinth was built just beyond the ruins of Ancient Corinth. An illusion and magic similar to what was used in Eiraacia kept Humans from entering the city or seeing it. But the shining city of New Corinth, with its crisp white, midnight black, and sandy yellow columns and bright lights that were already twinkling ahead of the setting sun was not barred from Faryn's eyes. Not with her Acurial blood humming through her. The city swept up a hill, and its ancient Grecian style buildings would offer promises of wealth and sin to those who stepped inside them.

Cassian led Faryn through the ruins of the ancient city and around fallen columns. A few tourists threw questioning glances their way, but none stared longer than a few seconds.

They had to cut across a short stretch of grass before they stepped onto the gray cobblestone of New Corinth's streets. Overhead a white stone archway engraved with carvings of the Green Man welcomed them.

Out of taverns and bars spilled laughter. The sounds of coins clanging together rang out of gambling halls and casinos. Ahead was a fountain that rivaled the Trevvi and beyond that at the top of the hill overlooking the city was the Green Man's palace.

As they walked, it became all to evident that there were plenty of tight alleys you could lose a person in. For better or worse.

A Thorine in its Celvian form cut past them, his horn marking him as a Unicorn. A circlet of diamonds graced his forehead from where the horn protruded. Beside him was a Kelpie in her horse form, her silver bridle fixed about her neck and mouth. If one were to come into the possession of a bridle, they would gain control over the Kelpie. This one's fur was a midnight blue, and she cut an appraising eye at Faryn and Cassian but continued on, entering a bar where she shifted into her Celvian form at the door, the bridle shrinking as it shifted into a necklace. The Unicorn Thorine draped a silk robe over her body.

Faryn, not having had the occasion of seeing many Unicorns, was mesmerized, butONLYONWATTPADBENDERCassian grabbed hold of her arm and dragged her up the street.

He knew them well. That much was clear. When he'd said he'd visited New Corinth with friends, it somehow wasn't all that hard to imagine him stumbling around the streets drunk, clinging to his friends. He had to let lose at some point, right? Whether her imagination was true or not, it was an ideal way to occupy the taxi ride with a brooding Tooth Fairy heir beside her.

Cassian, though, seemed to know the streets as a tourist did who was returning years later to a city they had fallen in love with. There was an assuredness to his steps that felt forced like he wanted to think he knew the streets better than he did—to believe his memory had not faded. Regardless, he certainly didn't look like he was trying to piece together bits of memories of the streets and buildings from images left over from a blacked-out night.

He led them to a hotel whose whitewashed walls loomed high above them. Turquoise water poured from round openings into a basin she couldn't see from where they stood. The pediment positioned over the entryway was decorated with stone sculptures of the Green Man surrounded by carved vines and flowers.

Inside the hotel's lobby the marble floors gleamed, and the air had a sweet perfumed scent of citrus and flowers. A stream cut the room in half, its water just as unnaturally blue as the water that flowed from the walls outside.

It turned out Cassian did have Acurial money with him. When they'd been in the taxi, he'd said the hotel they'd stay in was not one he had ever spent the night in. He then added that the plan was not to hole up indefinitely. If Faryn wasn't actually the potential murderess he suspected she was, then New Corinth would most likely offer whispers of what really happened to Nick. Find Nick, and Cassian could clear his mom's name.

As they rode the elevator to their room, Faryn slouched against the wall. She was so close to having a bed.

When they walked into the room, he muttered, "Two hours." The two queen beds were draped in white bedspreads. Cassian threw a worried glance to a large window that opened onto a balcony. The night sky already blanketed the city. He had to be worried they were wasting time, but she needed her instincts sharp and therefore she needed sleep.

He sunk into a white leather chair. "Not a minute more."

She all but collapsed onto the bed. "I don't have to worry about waking up to find I've been tied up?"

He rested his foot against his thigh and threw her a burning look. "I'd prefer to do that to any other woman."

"Not any Elves though, you mean?"

He glared but gave no indication whether she was right or wrong.

"And what about Elves that are suspected criminals?"

He studied her, those light gray eyes shimmering with disgust. "There are other things I'd tie you to. A bed is not one of them."

The amazing JulianaTheis has made a Discord channel for Claus. If you'd like an invite, just let me know!

The next update will be on Wednesday.