Shadow (Touched by the Fae 2)

It’s one thing for me to think that. But Carolina… how the hell does she know that?

How does she know?

How does some random patient from Black Pine know?

8

“Fae ears?” I repeat, right back on the edge of losing it again. I reach for the points of my ears, my stomach lurching when I feel how unnatural they are. I have this sudden urge to hide them. I shake my head again, knocking my hair over my shoulder, covering them up. And then I play dumb. “What’s that supposed to mean? Fae? Why would you say that?”

“Because that’s what they are.”

She says that in such a way, it leaves me wondering how she can be so sure.

Then she goes on to ask, “Are you twenty-one?,” and I’m too stunned to do anything but demand to know what that has to do with anything.

“It’s important,” she adds. “I know you were getting close to aging out of Black Pine. Almost twenty-one. Did you hit your birthday yet?”

I… I have no idea. My immediate reaction is to tell her no. I still had two weeks to go until my birthday when Nine pulled me out of the asylum. I lost a week somehow after my trip to Faerie. Who knows how much time I lost after Rys pulled his stunt with the knock-out powder and the peach?

“Depends. What’s today’s date?”

I don’t know what’s worse: the look of pity she gives me when it hits her that I’m serious, that I really don’t have any clue what the date is—or the way my legs feel like they’ve been knocked out from beneath me when she tells me that we’re halfway through October.

“No fucking way,” I breath out. “It w

as just June.”

“Um, it wasn’t. Riley, June was three months ago.” A look of understanding dawns in her dark eyes. “You’ve been to Faerie.”

I’m too rattled by everything else she’s said that she catches me off guard. Instead of denying it, like I’d normally do, all I can say is, “How did you know that? How did you know any of this?”

“Time works differently in Faerie. Depending on how you travel there and where you go, moments on the other side could pass like days or even longer here.”

That answers one question. It always bothered me about how I lost that one week after taking a pit stop inside of the Fae Queen’s garden. Nine told me once that time doesn’t work the same and Carolina just confirmed it.

Again, I have to wonder: how does she know that?

As if she can read my mind, Carolina tells me.

“I’ve been to Faerie myself a few times. I always had to explain it as I was taking a trip out of town. I’m human, so losing time is the worst thing that happens to me. If you were on the other side when you came of age… well, it might have brought your fae side out then, too. It would, uh”—she gestures nervously to my pointy ears—“it would explain what happened to your ears.”

I blink, my hands falling to my side as I pick up on what she’s saying without actually saying it.

No way.

No freaking way.

It’s… I can’t process that statement. Impossible. It was bad enough when I found out that Nine was a Dark Fae. Now this chick I barely know from the psych ward where we met is saying that I’m fae, too.

Oh, hell no.

“Wait. Hold up. Are you telling me that you think I’m fae?”

“Not fully,” she says quickly. “Half, at most. If you were a full-blood, I’d know. Over the last year, I’ve developed a keen eye when it comes to the fae. Not much help now, but I can tell the difference if I pay close enough attention. And you might not have seen me, but that just made it easy for me to watch you. You definitely are part-human.”

My jaw drops.

Carolina frowns. “What’s wrong?”