But he was Ángel’s housemate for the next four years. So Ángel was just going to have to learn to live with him.

He took a fast shower, brushed his hair and teeth. Back in the bedroom he found that Lily had unpacked and hung up his few T-shirts and jeans in one corner of a walk-in closet that was nearly the size of his childhood home’s dining room. Dressed, he steeled himself and headed down to the kitchen.

He hesitated in the doorway.

The fae was perched on a stool at the granite-topped kitchen island, dressed in his black shirt and pants, eating with chopsticks. Under the electric lights of the kitchen, his face was white—not the white of a white man, but the white of fresh cream, faintly golden on his lips and under his huge, tilted eyes. His skin was poreless and faintly lustrous, more like extremely high-quality suede than human skin. His hair—translucent, fine as corn silk, streaked in shades of wheat-blond, ivory, and pale green, was shoulder-length and tucked behind ears that came to an infinitesimal point.

Oberon looked up and regarded Ángel. His eyes were large, shining, green as leaves beneath winged green brows, and utterly without expression.

Wordlessly, he gestured to a stool.

For a moment, Ángel remembered the legend: don’t eat their food or you’ll be trapped. Well, he was already trapped, and he would need to eat. Ángel climbed onto a stool. Not the one right next to Oberon. Lily handed him a bowl and a pair of chopsticks: brown rice, stir-fried vegetables, some kind of white fish. A goblet of ice water. Clumsily, Ángel managed to pick up a snow pea and bring it to his mouth. He tasted ginger, garlic, the crisp greenness of the pea pod. Lily folded a dishtowel, gave him an encouraging nod, and left the room.

He picked at his food, studying the envoy with a kind of horrified fascination. In general outline, Oberon was human: the structure of his body, the arrangement of his limbs. It was the little details that disconcerted: his hands seemed extra long, perhaps because the fingers were all the same length, straight across, pointer to pinkie. And, of course, there was that strange white skin.

The more he looked at the differences, the more his heart thumped. His skin felt tight and cold, and his stomach fluttered.

“You are shivering,” said the envoy.

After a moment, Ángel managed to reply in a shaking voice, “Sorry about that.”

The expressionless voice was polite. “Did you hurt your head when you fell?”

“No, no,” he said. “The rug is thick. So’s my skull.”

“I upset you,” said Oberon.

It was an observation, not a question. Unnerved, Ángel said, “Do you think I could use a fork? I’m not actually very good at eating with these.”