Marissa shivered between the whispering woods. Those oak forests blocked the light and left the mushrooms and ferns surrounding Marissa and Simon in cold humidity. It resulted in a penumbra dark enough to be gloomy and bright enough for Marissa to see him vis-à-vis.

He seemed pretty harmless, as far as guys went. He stood without tension and watched her with a wide-eyed, inquisitive glance.

"Your arm looks bad," he said.

Marissa turned her arm away. Perhaps she should have added some clever quip about how those wounds were just paper cuts, but she preferred to stay serious.

Simon squared his shoulders until he stood straight like a pencil, shrugging off any residues of spiritual harm he suffered in the Otherworld. "I'm Simon, by the way."

Should she give him her name? If he gave her his, it was best not to be rude. "Marissa," she said.

"You look like a face I've seen in a hallway or two. Are you also a student at Whateley University?"

Marissa fidgeted with a twig between her fingers. "Just enrolled here. You missed Professor Weber's lecture today."

"That's on Friday, isn't it?"

"Friday is today."

He held his head. "Oh. I think I forgot about the time."

His eyes then darted to Siris.

Siris pretended not to notice him. He was too busy trying to get nettles out of his fur.

"Hey, is this your cat?"

Marissa twitched. He could see Siris? Was that a sign of him being a practitioner? Or was Siris now generally visible now that he had a master and all? "What if it is?"

"Just asking."

Since he didn't volunteer, she preferred not to ask about his necklace. "Do you know the way home?"

"I've been going on adventures here all my life. After me."

He lifted a low-hanging branch like he was opening a door.

As an urban kid, Marissa had yet to get used to becoming dirty like this. Especially now that they were hiking in summer where the understory was at its worst. With every step they took, another patch of tall grass, bush, or hedge stepped in their way, threatening to scratch Marissa's arm wound. She wasn't a touch-sensitive person or anything, she was just being careful. Anyone would be cautious after having faced two life-threatening situations on a single day. As if the branches were not enough, ridges and toppled-over tree-stems added to the obstacles they had to jump over.

If they only had a hiking trail.

Marissa almost slipped over a wet fern when something skittered through the shrubs. 

Just a bobcat, probably, but she could never rule out another hellhound.

Simon ripped another branch down. "Can I ask you a question?"

Marissa stopped mid-stride.

Since it took her too long to answer, Simon took the initiative. "See, I met a pretty girl. She gave me gifts and invited me to dance and, look, I'm a young man. I can't dance, but I thought it can't be so bad. The next second, I was with her," he pointed at his necklace, "without my lucky charm, and everything got groggy. When I stopped sleepwalking, you were suddenly here. What happened?"

Marissa's feet froze.  Her legs tingled as if urging her to move as far away from the danger as possible, but she wasn't having any of that. Puberty was over, she could deal with awkward questions. "Long story."

"We're alone in the woods," Simon said. "I don't know any boy scout songs and we've gotta kill time somehow."

"Would you describe yourself as normal?" she began.

"I'm the most normal guy in the world. I swear that my Mom thought about naming me 'Norman' first. Would you describe yourself as normal?"

"Would you call yourself normal?" he asked.

"Yes," she said, hoping the Veil-watchers led euphemisms slide, "and no. I'm the transitional form between normal and not normal."

"What, are you the Archaeopteryx of normality?"

Marissa laughed. It was a basic rule to always laugh at jokes, even if they weren't funny or if they went over her head, because it was a great way of relieving tension.

Her answer wasn't a joke. She caught glimpses of the weird, but with no special abilities to her name, she wasn't part of the weird herself.

He, however, seems to have understood it as a witty quip, given how he didn't follow-up on his question. He didn't even watch her at all.

His attention turned to a creature that rushed through the bushes.

Marissa jumped. At first, she thought it was another bobcat, but the whiteness of Siris' was unmistakable.

"Your cat is in a hurry," Simon said.

"He's always in a hurry," Marissa said. "Sometimes, he's like that when there's a bad guy nearby though."

Siris jumped behind his master's legs.

As she turned around, she realized he fled from something worse than the 'bad guys' she encountered so far.

A tall man stood in a clearing. He stood close enough that she recognized the checkered red scarf in his face, the wooden staff in his hand, and the leather jacket he wore. Something about him reminded her of the fairy girl. Whereas the fairy girl had soft and smooth features, his face was all rough, yet he had the same unnatural charm that she used to have. His brown eyes were noticeable even from a distance and he wore a cut-off hat that blended into his raven hair.

Marissa took a hesitant step forward, her heart quickening to the pulse of a forest. She couldn't help herself, his otherworldy presence was magnetic and drew her in.

His spell only stopped once Simon threw his iron horseshoe around her neck.

Now that she could think clearly again, Marissa saw the enigmatic stranger with different eyes. He still had the face of a fairy tale prince, sure, but he was rough and unkempt. His hair was tousled, his beard unshaved, and his steely gaze full of anger.

He walked closer.

Siris cowered behind Marissa's pants. Even before she bonded, she knew that, as a curse carrier, Siris made Otherworldly enemies that might come after her if she became his master.

She hadn't expected to run into them so soon though.

The man with the scarf strode close enough to enter speaking range. He thumped his staff onto the forest floor, its wood craved of oak so fresh it must have been ripped from the trees right around them.

"Hello," Marissa said. "Do we have a problem, sir?"

He looked at Siris' tail who was peeking out from behind Marissa's leg. "You're in my way."

"Do you maybe want to explain-"

"You're in my way."

"I think it'd be nice if you let her finish speaking," Simon said.

The man with the scarf walked over to Simon. Whereas Simon was maybe one inch below six feet, this guy was almost half-a-head taller than him.

He put his hand onto Simon's shoulder before he whispered. "You're in my way, too."

Simon bit his lip. His facial expression resembled that of a kid asked to give his lunch money who realized to his horror that he had none left.

The man with the scarf turned back to Marissa. Around his belt, he carried wands, chalices, and other items that looked like trophies he took from practitioners that crossed him the wrong way along with the holster of a gun. Didn't those usually contain iron?

He stood closer to Simon than to Marissa, even though she was the one he wanted something from, implying the horseshoe around her neck affected him. However, it did precious little to protect her from shots. Her Dad told her not to fight or provoke an armed criminal unless absolutely necessary.

"Listen," Marissa said. "I'm not looking for a fight today. Tell me what you want and maybe we can find your solution together."

"It's nothing personal," he said. "I'm just doing a job. I made stupid choices and I need to get out."

"A bit more specific? Who are you working for? What did you do?"

He folded his arm. "You're one those girls who think they can fix me, aren't you? Sorry, but I'm an asshole and proud of it. Now, get out of my way or I'll stop playing Mr. Nice Guy."

Siris peeked out from Marissa's leg. "Assume he's working for the Seelie Queen or worse. Don't discuss."

Marissa's muscles tensed. Siris was right. There wasn't any point in discussing with him. Everything, from his body language to the tone of his voice, radiated "dark triad". Was he the one who made the fairy circle? He'd have had every motivation to send the hellhound after her college, as long as Siris was there.

If she walked away and handed Siris over to him, she'd be out of this. Except there was no "out" anymore. The Veil, whatever it was, started leaking and soon, those supernatural conflicts would seep over into the mundane world. She could either face him now or walk away, forget everything, and be caught by the weird again when it was already too late.

She knew what path she'd walk. Shifting her weight onto the balls of her foot, she spread out her arms. "It's like you said. I'm in your way."

A gust of wind swept the man away before he could draw his staff.

The man with the scarf rolled onto his back. He got back to his feet with a gymnast's poise and reached for his belt. As if it had popped into existence two seconds ago, he threw a cardboard tube with a burning fuse that looked like a firecracker.

As he threw it in the air, it exploded in a cloud of smoke.

Marissa coughed. Was that capsaicin? Whatever he put in their, her eyes watered and her throat ached from the smoke.

Once the smoke from that homemade bomb cleared, she realized that the scarf man had disappeared. His glamour probably made the "ninja smoke escape" trick easier than it would have been otherwise.

"Are you okay?" a female voice asked from behind.

Four robed figures, two male, two female, strode through the understory on the way to the two missing souls. Most of them wore black robes, although their leader, an older white man with sideburns and a receding hairline, was clad in purple.

Marissa already had a clue that this gust of wind had not been natural. Not only was it awfully convenient, natural wind would have blown her and Simon away along with the scarf man.

Now those four came and they had something wizard-like about them. All of them carried staves like the one the man with the scarf had carried, though this was where the resemblances ended. Their faces did not look like they had been painted by an artist. Just the opposite was the case. They looked tired with puffy eyes that were only kept open through an active focus on their duty.

One of the four walked faster than the others. She was a black young woman only a few years older than Simon who didn't care about how much dirt she got on her robe to get to them. She had a short, stocky frame and held herself with grace even as she got twigs into her hair. Luckily, she had a red hairband to tie those locs back along with a stylish blue bracelet around her wrist.
Simon lowered his gaze when he recognized her.

The woman looked at the iron horseshoe Marissa was wearing and turned back to Simon. "If you only kept that one, we wouldn't have had to search for you for days."

"Well, you found me rather quickly, didn't you?" he asked.

"That's why I keep hairs of you, idiot. Now save your excuses for Dad! Gus and Nora can show you the way home!"

Simon walked over to the other two people with the black robes. Marissa noticed that those two - apparently called Gus and Nora - didn't wear robes like the one the woman who talked to Simon like she was his sister wore. They didn't wear "robes" in the strictest sense at all. Rather than being made from a single piece of cloth, their garments consisted of hundreds of ribbon-like pieces sewn together at the shoulders and across the chest. Around their chests, they wore blue stoles with sword insignia patterned all over them like they were supernatural police badges.

Simon walked away with the two.

When she turned back to the other two, Marissa saw that the older man also wore a blue stole. The purple rather than black robe presumably signified his seniority. All those others looked like in their twenties and he could have passed as their father or uncle. His cloak, much like theirs, was separated into ribbons below the chest.

Siris hadn't come out from his cover yet, although he relaxed visibly once the man with the scarf was gone. He tensed slightly, but only because Mr. Purple Cloak had spotted him.

"Oh, is this yours?" he asked.

"How did you find us?" she asked back.

"Well," the woman said. "I always keep hairs of my brother and I make sure they're recent. That way, I can track his location and even tell if he's feeling well. I can't do that when I'm in a different town, but I just moved back to Summer Hill to see my family and someone's gotta babysit him. Who are you? Are you a friend of Simon?"

"We go to the same college," she said. She considered introducing herself, but she wouldn't do that before these two went first.

"That's cool! I also considered going there before my life went into different directions. I'm Darcy, by the way," she said and stretched out her hand. The family resemblance between her and Simon became more and more visible the more Marissa looked at her. The two had similarly round faces, although she was a tad shorter and more cushy than her skinny brother.

Simon must have been what Marissa was before she met Siris; a non-magical member of a practitioner family. He knew enough to ward fairies off and too little to avoid being outwitted by them.

After a moment of hesitation, Marissa stretched her hand out, too. "Marissa," she said.

The purple-robed man walked between them. "You should have someone see after that wound, kid. Barghest claws can be nasty."

"I can do that," Darcy said.

"Good," the purple-robed man said before he turned to Marissa. "And you will tell me everything about how you got this wound and how you came here, understood?"

Marissa turned over to Siris, but the tomcat only pressed his forehead against her leg.

"Just talk," Siris muttered into fabric of her pants. "Not like you can run from a senior Hunter."

Hunter. It should have been clear that she was dealing with the magical military police here. Unfortunately, Marissa had no idea what this guy expected to hear, what he thought of Siris, or if they had anything resembling Miranda rights in this world. He seemed friendly, at least.

Marissa faced him. "Can we sit down somewhere first?"