Page 90 of Blood & Claw

Retrieving his slingshot from a saddle bag, Dale went hunting, leaving Ailsa to collect wood and start a fire.

Once the flames were dancing, she cast a glance at where the stranger lay on her uninjured side, a few feet back from the hearth. Moving over to the woman, she gingerly unwrapped the bandage she’d secured earlier. Time to see how that laceration was faring.

However, when the bandage fell away, her breathing caught.

Eyes widening, she gazed down at what had previously been a bloody gash. But in the space of one afternoon, it appeared to have shrunk considerably. The edges were less red too. It was healing fast.

Too fast.

Ailsa stared. Flesh wasn’t supposed to knit together so swiftly.

Her pulse lurched then. Over the past days, she’d come across far too many things that ‘shouldn’t’ be—most of them concerning herself.

The woman stirred then. She groaned, and her eyes fluttered open.

And when their gazes met, Ailsa froze.

She stared into a pair of iron-grey eyes. They had long pupils, slitted horizontally, that drank in the firelight.

Ailsa’s heart slammed against her ribs.

Cursing under her breath, she shuffled back and whipped out the iron blade in her boot.

Iron. It was an effective weapon against all faerie kind.

“Put that damn thing away,” the Shee muttered, her voice raspy and weak. “I mean you no harm.”

Ailsa didn’t believe her.

Moments slid by, and then the stranger’s nostrils flared, as if she was scenting her.

Ailsa fought the urge to shift farther back, to put some distance between her and this unnerving female.

She couldn’t believe she’d been so easily fooled. She’d heard how the Shee could glamor themselves, using their own magic to adopt the appearance of animals, or Marav. But this individual had been too injured to employ such a trick.

“My name’s Fern, by the way.” The female said finally. “Yours?”

A brittle silence followed before she answered, “Ailsa.”

Pushing herself gingerly up onto one elbow, Fern cast a glance at the wound on her side. She then pulled a face.

“It looked far worse earlier,” Ailsa said softly.

Fern’s goatlike eyes flicked up to meet hers, and her full lips twisted into a grimace. “I’m sure it did. Iron has a nasty bite.”

“You heal fast … the woundwort helped.”

One finely arched black eyebrow lifted. “Whin flowers are even better. I don’t suppose you have any?”

Ailsa’s brow furrowed as she shook her head.

Fern huffed. “Moss will do then.”

Ailsa’s moon flow had ceased a couple of days earlier, yet she still had some moss left over in her satchel. Still eyeing the Shee and keeping a firm grip on her blade with one hand, she edged over to it and dug out the moss. She then handed it over.

The snapping of twigs underfoot intruded then. Fern went rigid, while Ailsa whipped around, knife raised.

Dale emerged from the trees, a fat pheasant slung over one shoulder. However, when his gaze settled upon Fern’s face, he stopped dead.