Dorian grinned and brandished his knife.
But suddenly, Cale stood between me and Dorian, back in his human form again.
"She will give you her blood in fox form," Cale said.
Dorian frowned. "That wasn't the terms of our agreement."
Cale stared at him steadily. "Neither was the need for her to be human. Aurora evaded you by taking her fox form, thus cursing Faye. Let us end this by sealing the circle. Faye will be fox, and the curse will be fulfilled at long last."
I opened my mouth, unsure what I even planned to say, but the expression on Cale's face made me shut it again. He must have some plan...or was I hoping too much? I had no fox skin anymore...was that how he was hoping to get me out of the deal? But wait...I did still have a pelt, technically. Quentin had it. My brain struggled to keep up with what Cale was planning.
Dorian didn't seem pleased by the change. He also seemed to be trying to figure out if this was a way out of the deal. But finally, he irritably agreed.
Cale thrust a fox pelt into my hands, and while it felt familiar, it was still foreign. It had been so long since I had worn my fox form that I stood there frozen, just staring at it. "Faye, put on your pelt over there. Privacy."
Cale gave me a little shove to the shadows. I tripped forward obediently, but it wasn't until I was obscured in the darkness, about to wrap the pelt around my shoulders, that I realized he had given me the wrong skin. This was Cale's skin. I had worn it a few times as a child, so that was why it felt familiar—and because Cale himself felt familiar to me—but it wasn't mine.
As I turned to correct it, a different fox—me as a fox—trotted out from the shadows and approached Dorian. My eyes followed the animal trotting over, and I couldn't move out of fear and, shamefully, relief for what was happening.
Why Quentin was taking my place?
******************
Image credit: https://pixabay.com/photos/fox-redfox-wildlife-animal-urban-7989833/
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Paying the Piper
Teen FictionDeals with the devil are always tricky, especially when it was someone else who sold your soul to the devil. Faye Wulfgaar has always had bad luck. She figured it worked like a genetic trait: red hair, shy, conscientious, and unlucky. She never t...
