Lily swallowed. “Can you see them?”

Troy nodded and motioned for her to come closer. “They no longer hide.” He lowered his head, bringing his gaze level with hers, and then pointed out a crack between the blinds. “There,” he said. “Do you see?”

Lily followed the line of his finger and squinted. There, between the leaves dappled in shadows, stood a dash of color. “Is that—?” She tilted her head. The angle was very poor and she tried to take a step closer to the window to better see. Troy’s arm locked around her waist like an iron band, keeping her back. “It can’t possibly be David the gnome, right?”

“Who?” For an instant, puzzlement overrode Troy’s tight tone.

She felt foolish as soon as the words were out of her mouth. Of course he wouldn’t know silly children’s cartoons. “A gnome who lives on a tree trunk and acts as a doctor, helping out people.”

“It is not David the gnome.”

“What is it, then?”

“A gnome who lives wherever pain and sorrow have left an imprint, and he torments people, dying his cap with the lifeblood of his victims.”

“I liked mine better.”

“Indeed.”

“Okay, so what do we do? I’ll follow your orders, just tell me.”

“Now you choose to listen to me,” he said wryly.

“You’re the one who knows what we’re up against,” she admitted.

“Is there any weapon you can wield?”

“The poker?”

She felt him shake his head and his grip on her midsection relaxed. “Listen to me, Lily. This is no longer a matter of house fay going rogue, and the foe standing before us is among the cruelest you could face.”

“Worse than the bogeys?”

“Much, much worse. I want you to think very carefully now. Is there any iron in the house?”

Lily bit her lip. She would say yes, of course. What sort of house didn’t have iron somewhere? But Mackenna had been a faerie doctor, used to dealing with creatures who saw the cold metal’s mere possession as a mortal threat. The poker had been made of bronze, the cutlery was sterling silver, the kitchen pots pewter or clay.

“There’s a horseshoe hanging over the door,” she said at last.

“Nailed to it, I presume.”

“Yes.”

“Insufficient. They shall not wait quietly while we secure a means to destroy them, I fear.”

“We could look through the attic. There’s a lot of stuff up there. We might find something.”

“It is a possibility.” He squeezed her hip and gently pushed her aside. “Go and search. Do not take long.”

“What, alone? Aren’t you coming?”

“I must watch. Make sure they do not enter the house and catch us unaware.” He spared her a brief glance before focusing on the creatures outside again. “Go. It is safe.”

Lily touched her fingers to the pendant around her neck, understanding. He would know if she were in danger. The bogeys were gone, the house was secure—the only danger came from the beasts outside and he kept a close eye on those. She nodded, even though he couldn’t see her, and then rushed up the ladder.

Following some silly instinct, she checked the alphabetically-sorted shelves for a box labeled “weapons.” Of course it didn’t pan out, but it offered her a good place to start. Working from the far end toward the beginning, she opened the boxes and glanced at their contents. She wasn’t very thorough, but she hoped an iron object would jump out enough when everything surrounding it gleamed in the warm colors of bronze, copper, and a thousand shades of wood.

Nothing. Box after box was examined, a legion of spoons, pots, cauldrons, scales, candles and even swathes of cloth discarded in her wake.

Then she grabbed a box much smaller than the others. Peering inside, she found another box, tiny and filled with nails as well as a handful of pierced coins and a length of slender chain to make amulets out of them. She let out the breath she hadn’t known she was holding.

Iron. Finally. We might make it out alive, after all.

She made a dash for the ladder and went back down to Troy. “I found it,” she said, thrusting the little box out to him.

Troy jerked out of his stance and recoiled, his pale skin becoming whiter, if it were possible.

“Never come upon me armed with iron, Lily Boyd.” His eyes were hard as a bottle’s glass and just as brittle. Though he kept his voice steady, there was a steely undercurrent behind her name that made Lily shiver with echoes of fear as the command took root in her soul.

She flinched as if physically struck. “You told me to fetch it,” she stammered.

“I know.” He collected himself, but didn’t relax. “To use as last measure against them.”

“So what should I do?”

“Take your pick, hide it, and keep it on hand.”

Lily moved to the table in part to better sort through the box and in part to be less threatening to Troy. There, she grabbed the chain and hooked one of the coins to each end. She wrapped it around her wrist and closed her fist around the coins, creating a very light, very small, and hopefully very deadly version of a flail. Then, after only a moment’s hesitation, she took out two more coins and hid one in each of her pockets. The last one went into her sock, just in case, and she chose to leave the box of nails alone.

“Okay,” she said. “I’m ready.”

Troy gave her a weary glance and motioned for her to stay a little behind him. Without taking his attention from the windows and front door, he moved toward the kitchen’s unlatched door. He stopped a moment.

“There are several of them,” he said. “Our best hope is to exit the house, cross the yard, and gain enough of an advantage to allow me to shift. They should not be able to keep up with us for long if we make it that far.”

“Two questions. Why aren’t you shifting straight away to make a great, galloping exit, and why aren’t you sounding more confident in the plan?”

“The good doctor has certain protections in place around her home,” he explained, grudgingly. “They greatly impede our magic, and it affects something as deep as a shifting more acutely than other minor works. As far as confidence goes, I assure you I have every bit that is reasonable, given the circumstances.”

“You did magic when you rescued me before,” Lily noted. “Drowned two bogeys, right? Can’t you do that again?”

Troy gave her an angry look. “Do you not think I would do so if I could? That particular work needs time. If you recall, one bogey was caught by surprise and the other did nothing but cower for the longest moment. Believe me when I say the redcaps will not gift us any instant to spare.”

“Okay. Well, then. You lead the way and I follow?”

He nodded, took a deep breath. Then, he froze.

“What’s wrong?” Lily asked. She didn’t dare get much closer to him while she had iron, but he pointed with this chin at the backyard.

Lily got her first good look at a redcap. It was taller than David the gnome, at least three feet plus the hat. It did look like him, though. Or like a garden figurine. Everything seemed to be there: white hair, white beard, small round eyes, blue shirt and pants, pointy leather boots and a red hat. But then it came closer, away from the tree line and under the moonlight, and it was all wrong. The boots were caked in mud. The clothes were ragged, torn, and covered in darker spots that could as well be blueberry juice as they could be blood. Hair and beard were tangled in gnarls with bits of leaves and small sticks poking out of it, and his visible skin was dirty with dust and soil. The eyes were fully white and reflected little sanity. And the worse thing, by far, was the hat. It looked heavy upon its head, dyed by layer upon layer of dried blood. It was dark brown and rusty garnet and even blackened crimson, depending on how old the blood was, and in some places the coating was flaking off. It looked like it needed a fresh dipping.

She swallowed.

“Greetings, Kelpie,” he said. His voice was rich and unpleasant, earthy. It reminded Lily of manure.

“Redcap,” Troy acknowledged him. He exchanged a quick glance with Lily and she saw in his eyes that this, too, was abnormal.

Another fluke. Or something like that.

“You stand far from your domain and your power,” the redcap said. “I sense your attempts to gather whatever strength is available to you, and I smell the acrid stench of foul iron. And yet, we have no quarrel with you.”

“You are not the only one who can sense the gathering of glamour. Yours is not the stance of a friend.”

“Not your friends, but neither are we your enemies. We do serve the same forces and so there is no reason to fight amongst ourselves.”

Troy tensed when the redcap mentioned the forces they served, whatever they were. Lily saw it. His shoulders hunched—his whole body shivered. His eyes fled from the redcap he was talking to and danced about the yard, trying to locate every other redcap and to keep track of all of them at once.

“Take your leave and return unharmed to your pond, Kelpie,” the redcap went on. His mouth twisted in a parody of a smile and his teeth gleamed in the moonlight. “We need only speak with the girl.”

Lily froze. The monster just offered Troy a clear way out of a fight he didn’t think he could win for a little price. Troy’s eyes narrowed when he heard the offer. His hand reached for Lily, but then he hesitated, remembering the iron. His fingers closed into a fist and somehow she found the little gesture of anger to be reassuring.

“Troy?” she dared to ask in a thin voice.

He took a deep breath and turned to fix her with his gaze. “Parley, then,” he said, addressing the redcaps while staring at her. She saw him, cold and hard, and then something feral glimmered in his eyes. It was enough for her to understand, though she herself couldn’t say where the knowledge came from. In that instant, she knew it wasn’t safe—far from it. But she also knew he wouldn’t abandon her, even though he would play the game. She gave him a tiny nod and he turned back to the redcap.

“And then we shall be on our way,” Troy finished.

“Our matters are various and not to be discussed here. Surrender the girl to us, Kelpie, and be gone in peace.”

“No.”

And then Troy was in motion, a dark blur rushing forward. The redcap he’d been talking to staggered and fell with a gurgle before Troy had even cleared the door, and Lily realized he had used the negotiation time to weave his magic and drown his enemy, leaving the path to the forest clear for them to flee.

She broke into a run as fast as she could, following Troy, but each of his long strides forced her to take two and soon he was slipping out of reach. She grit her teeth and kept moving. Troy would need time to shift, and those few seconds would be enough for her to catch up. Then, she would jump on and they would be off.

Troy reached the edge of the forest and then the nightmare began.