“What if she comes back?” I asked as I lay down on the rock, mortified that I was naked. I hadn’t minded running through the fields with Duncan Laird or nuzzling him in deer form, but I was now all too aware that we’d only met a few hours ago.

“She won’t come back,” he said. “She’s hurt too. I speared her with my antlers.” His lips twitched into a smile at his prowess, but his eyes stayed on the wounds on my ribcage as he moved his hands over them. He was making a motion with his right hand that resembled sewing. Great, I thought, my spine had been knitted and now my ribs were being sewn up by invisible thread. I’d be a Raggedy Ann doll before long. I felt a tug on my skin and looked away, back to his face.

“She was going to kill me,” I said, trying to focus on Duncan’s face instead of what his hands were doing. It was a nice face to focus on. Without the distraction of his messy hair – plastered now to his skull – and square glasses I could admire his high forehead and the angular line of his cheekbones. “Even though I told her that I was going to try to keep the door open.”

“You can’t expect rational thinking from an undine, especially one in heat – and believe me, that one was. You said you wouldn’t let her come through the door when you met her in Faerie. That was enough for her to decide you’re trying to keep her from breeding. No matter how much you may actually be trying to help the undines she sees you as an obstacle to her breeding … hold on, this is going to pinch a little …” Duncan made one last tug that hurt like hell, then he laid both his hands on top of the wounds, closed his eyes, and uttered a few words in a language I didn’t recognize. I felt a warming sensation and then my skin went agreeably numb. Duncan opened his eyes and looked straight into mine. Against the backdrop of grey rain clouds they were a fiery gold that smoldered with the same warmth I felt in his hands. Which still lay on my bare skin.

“Are you … um … still healing me?” I asked awkwardly.

He shook his head. “I’m trying to feel if your power has been unblocked. It feels different, but still … tangled. Perhaps another transformation would work better. Another shape might be more liberating. We have to try something else. It’s more important now than ever that you gain control of your power.”

“Why?” I asked.

“To protect yourself. As long as Lorelei believes that you’re in the way of her breeding cycle, she’ll continue to try to kill you.”