This is just another game within a game, but it doesn’t stop me from asking anyway.

I glance around. “Is this a real place?”

“It’s real enough.”

I have a feeling that sideways answers like this one are the best I’m going to get out of him.

“Where are we?”

“Three guesses,” he says.

I step closer to him. I don’t really want to. I’m not an idiot; this thing that’s after me is about as evil as they come, but my siren is oddly intrigued. He makes me want to sharpen my claws and finger-paint with his blood.

“You’re sitting on a throne …”

“I am.”

I’ve now visited all the kingdoms and seen all the palaces. This looks like none of them.

“Are you a king?” I ask.

“A king?” he scoffs. “Come now, enchantress, let’s think bigger than kings.”

This dude is such a megalomaniac.

“What is your real name?”

The Thief of Souls cocks his head. “And if I tell you, what then? Will you come storming my castle, seeking to batter down my doors as my soldiers did yours?”

Yes.

He glances away from me, his muscles tensing as he looks off in the distance. The corner of his mouth curls up in amusement.

The Thief relaxes and faces me once more.

“One day I’ll tell you my name,” he says. “When it’s too late.”

Again the Thief’s attention is drawn away. His fingers resume tapping on his armrest. “Someone’s trying to get in,” the Thief says idly. “Why don’t we invite them inside?”

For a moment I see him, like a mirage on the horizon.

“Malaki?”

The general’s form wavers as his gaze moves in my direction. He stares blindly about.

“Callypso? Are you alright?” he asks.

“She was, until now.”

One instant the Thief is sitting on his throne, and in the next he’s in front of me, lifting me by the throat.

“Callypso!” I hear the slide of steel as Malaki unsheathes his sword.

I kick out at the Thief, my claws extending. I don’t bother trying to shred apart the hand choking me; instead I swipe at the Thief’s eyes, ready to gouge them out. My nails sink into soft skin, and warm, black blood begins to pour out.

Cursing, the Thief tosses me aside.

I laugh, and I’m not ashamed to admit that it sounds creepy as fuck with my glamour riding it.

“The Thief’s hurting worse than I am,” I call out to Malaki, who seems blind to us both.

“You’re going to pay for that,” the Thief says, and the surety in his voice should scare me witless.

Whatever wits I had, they’re long gone now.

I get up, my skin aglow. The siren is riding me hard, and God how we’ve wanted this moment.

Sword brandished, Malaki moves towards me, his eyes still unseeing. “You’ll have to go through me to get to Callypso,” he says to the room.

I get up as the Thief begins to approach Malaki.

“Dreamweaver,” the Thief says, “this is no place for you. Your sentiments might be sweet, but you cannot possibly protect your precious queen. You don’t even know where she is.”

My wings come out and my golden scales ripple to life across my forearms. I’m as Otherworldly as I ever get.

With a powerful beat of my wings, I leap into the sky, and when I land, it’s in front of the general.

I flare my wings wide, blocking him from the Thief. “This is our game,” I say, getting a little thrill at the sight of the Thief’s bloody face. “Leave him out of it.”

“I intend to,” the Thief says. There’s malicious glee in his expression, and I can see that whatever suffering he tends to inflict, it’s all for me.

“Are you trying to protect me, Callypso?” Malaki asks. I feel the brush of a hand against my wings. “Step aside. Let me gut this monster.”

The Thief laughs. “And how might you do that? You are blind to us, and it is by my grace alone that you’re uninjured.”

As I watch, the Thief’s eye repairs itself.

Jesus. How am I supposed to kill this thing if he can heal that fast?

“To think they call you Lord of Dreams,” the Thief continues, his gaze focused on Malaki. “Your bloodlines are weak these days.”

Behind me, the general says, “You will—”

Like a candle snuffing out, Malaki’s presence is suddenly gone.

It feels colder here. I hadn’t realized that even in dreams, the Thief’s magic carries traces of his depravity.

“He was getting tedious, I’m afraid.” The Thief dabs at his face, his fingers coming away bloody. “You got me in a mood. Don’t think I’ll forget this, Callypso.”

“I hope you don’t.”

I want him to remember how I hurt him.

He turns from me, heading back to his throne. When he sits and faces me again, the strange, black blood is gone, all evidence of my aggression wiped away like it never was.

I fold my wings behind me and approach him once more.

“You are either very foolish or very brave to come so close to me.”

Aetherial had said something similar to me once … back when we were this man’s prisoner.

“What do you want?” I ask, my skin dimming. “I mean, what do you really want?”

The Thief lounges in his chair. “What does any creature want? To live.”

Forgive me if I state the obvious, but—

“You are living.”

He shakes his head. “No-no-no, enchantress, I am surviving.”

If all the carnage he’s wrought is his version of surviving, then I cannot imagine what living entails. Only that it simply cannot happen.

I eye the Thief up and down. He appears normal enough, but he’s an oddity even amongst fae.

“Where are you from?”

He gives me an enigmatic smile. “Far, far away, enchantress. Far, far away.”

When I wake up, Des is gone.

I sit up in bed, my hair cascading around me. For a moment, I can’t place where I am. Earth or Otherworld? My house, or Des’s?

It’s only when I catch sight of the arched windows that I remember we came back to Somnia. A balmy evening breeze blows in from outside, carrying with it the scent of flowers.

My hand slides over the empty space next to me.

“Des?” I call out.

The lamps are dimmed. I don’t have a clock to go by, but I’m pretty sure this is the Witching Hour, a time when good little supernaturals are all fast asleep.

Probably why I’m not asleep.

I get up, slipping on one of the least elaborate dresses I can find. Moving from room to room, I look for the Bargainer in our chambers, playing with my wedding ring as I do so. He’s nowhere to be found.

I could simply call on him. I know the words.

Bargainer, I would like to make a deal.

He’d be here in an instant.

But I don’t necessarily want to pull him away from whatever he’s doing.

At least, that’s what I tell myself. I ignore the ball of worry that sits in the pit of my stomach.

I’m imagining things. This is what I always do when life gets too sweet. I assume the worst—and rightfully so, the way my life’s been so far.

Closing my eyes, I focus inward. Right where my heart is, I can feel the glow of my bond. It’s the magical tether that connects me to Des, the thing that physically makes us soulmates. I’ve pulled his power through our connection, but I’ve never tried to simply find him through it. I know enough about supernaturals to know that it can be done.