Page 46 of Bane Bloom

“Catherine!” I shouted.

She vanished. Like she’d never been there at all.

Elfame

The figure who approached was long limbed and graceful, her blue-black hair hanging in thick waves almost to the tops of the bluebells. She wore a draping sort of crown—strands of what looked like very small white pebbles strung on silver chains, some looping in piles, while others hung loosely alongside her face. Her features were angled and sharp. Blue-black brows slashed up like knife blades from nose bone to temple, and long, pointed ear tips protruded from her thick hair.

Her lace gown clung so closely it seemed a part of her flesh. The strange sheath shimmered between blue and green so that she was very much a part of the rich tapestry that surrounded her. It left her chest and shoulders bare, and there her flesh was marked with a loose pattern of vines and spirals.

What I’d at first taken for a cape was a set of tapered wings, their bottommost tips reaching almost to the ground. They weren’t like bird or butterfly wings, though. In place of feathers or colorful membranes, scales shone like silver pearls.

Her skin was unmarked by age, yet nothing about her suggested youth. As she drew nearer, I saw that her eyes were ultramarine and glowed as if they had candles behind them.

My gaze darted again to where the cart had waited. No cart. No Daisy. No Thomas.

This is a dream. That’s all it can be.

The woman had almost reached my perch, and I stood up, sketchbook slipping from my lap to my feet. Dream or no, I experienced a strong urge to flee. But there was only one way down, and she was now standing at the foot of it, eyes fixed on me.

“Good day to you,” I called faintly.

A smile curled her dark lips, but I wouldn’t have described it as friendly. Her eyes flashed. “Here you are at last, outlander.” Her gaze moved over me. “Trespassing through my wood.”

“I—forgive me, lady. I didn’t know.”

“That is a vast understatement.”

I swallowed, feeling as if her eyes were searing right through my skull, baring my thoughts. “May I ask . . . am I still in Cumberland? In Buttermere? I feel almost as if I’ve slipped somehow into another world.”

Her smile faded, and she seemed almost to grow taller. “This is Elfame. I am its queen.”

This brought me no nearer to understanding. When I hesitated in asking for clarification, her brows dipped lower. “I’ve felt you reaching into my world. I’ve felt your desire to know it more intimately.”

I frowned. “But how can that be? I’ve never—”

“You are not the first to covet the Elfbloom.”

Glancing out over the ground beneath the stone seat, I said, “If you mean the bluebells, I was only—”

She held up a long, slender hand with sharp-tipped fingers. A ghostlike image appeared above her palm. Faint though it was, I had no difficulty recognizing it. The Bane Bloom.

“It will grant your heart’s desire.” Then, suddenly, her face was mere inches from mine, and her voice came louder: “Does your heart desire, Cricket Gray?”

I staggered away from her—and then I was falling. Tumbling through a kaleidoscope of blues and greens for what should have been only a second or two but felt like much longer.

Where is the ground?

Abruptly, someone caught me.

“Catherine!” Thomas’s voice came urgent in my ear.

I tried to look at him, but everything in my vision was spinning. I closed my eyes and tucked my face into the crook of his neck. “Dizzy,” I muttered miserably.

“I’ve got you.” His arms squeezed me lightly against him, and I shivered. “Just rest until it passes.”

After a minute or two, it did. But I didn’t raise my head. I breathed slowly in and out, letting his sun-warmed earth scent fill me. One strong arm wrapped up around my knees, while the other circled my back, hand splaying against my ribs.

There was a shudder to his breaths.