Gretta swayed as she stood up, gripping the table for balance. “I really should…” She blinked, her vision swimming. “Where am I?”

  Dorian smiled. “You’ve had a bit much to drink. Maybe I should drive you?”

  She stared at the wine glass, her mind struggling to process it. “I don’t—” She took a step and stumbled. “—drink.”

  The room lurched sideways, then righted itself. The paintings on the walls dragged behind reality, like a delayed afterimage, before snapping back into place.

  “By my count,” Dorian said smoothly, “you’ve had at least a dozen glasses. You aren’t safe to drive.”

  Gretta gripped the backrest of her chair as the room continued to tilt. “I don’t…” Her gaze dropped to the mostly empty wine glass. A thin layer of red remained at the bottom, dark and taunting.

  That wasn’t right.

  She wouldn’t have had alcohol.

  A gentle melody played in the background, wrapping around her thoughts, pulling her under. She needed to lie down. No—she needed to get to her car.

  Dorian stepped closer, offering his arm. “I’ll guide you.”

  She hesitated, blinking at him. How had she gotten drunk? She had only had water. Hadn’t she?

  “Take my arm,” he murmured, voice warm and insistent.

  His words washed over her, and she took his arm. It wasn’t so bad. He was handsome, and while thin, he was fit, and he smelled of rosemary. She leaned against him as they walked, her eyes half-lidded, and she sighed.

  “Rowan is such an ass,” she mumbled. “He’d never…” She opened her eyes a little. “Where are we going?” Her words were slurred.

  “There’s a lovely pond in the garden,” Dorian said. “You can rest on one of the benches while you regain your strength.”

  “I need to go home,” Gretta whispered.

  Dorian nodded. “Just through here,” he said as he urged her through a hedge and into a private lush grass area with a pond in the middle.

  The stars were reflected in the pool, but as she stared at them, she realized that the stars were not of the Arizona night sky. She looked up and the sky above was still purple with no visible stars, yet, there were clearly stars in the pond.

  “Sit here,” Dorian said and gestured to a reclined bench. “This is a perfect place to watch the stars while I prepare.”

  “P-prepare for what?” she asked, aware that her words were slurring worse than ever.

  “A journey,” he said. “It won’t take me long.”

  He helped her sit, and she had to hold on to the bench arm not to slip off. She had never been drunk in her life. She had sworn that she’d never drink. Something was wrong.

  Dorian began pacing a slow circle around the pond, and with each step, the air thickened with energy. A magic she had never experienced before, but undeniably magic. With each pass that Dorian made, he faded from sight slightly.

  A tickle brushed her wrist. Gretta blearily glanced down and found a black feather resting there.

  “Stupid feather,” she muttered.

  The moment she spoke, something shifted. A pulse of magic flared—chaotic and wild, surging through her like a live wire. It wasn’t her magic, but it wasn’t hostile either. It crackled along her skin, untamed and electric, like the kind of thing Rowan would leave in his wake.

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  The enchantment wrapped around her mind wavered, unraveling in its presence. Something else—another spell, softer, more insidious—shuddered and began to come apart, as if its grip had been loosened just enough for her to push back.

  Gretta seized the moment. She reached inward, grasping at her own magic—slippery and faint but still hers. With a sharp inhale, she forced it forward, tapping into her regenerative power. Not to heal, but to burn through the lingering alcohol, to sharpen her thoughts, to wake up.

  The final strands of magic tugging at her will snapped. The haze lifted. The chaotic rush ebbed.

  The feather was gone.

  Dorian, ethereal and distant, despite being yards away—as halfway to the astral—seemed to sense the change. He reversed course, walking the opposite direction around the pond, and with each step, he became more solid.

  Gretta had no idea what magic Dorian had, but a fight against an unknown foe made no sense. She stood, finding her feet steady, and ran through the hedge maze away from the pond.

  The farther she got from the pond, the louder the music from the dining area became, and she felt a soothing sensation—and unnatural peace that she knew not to trust. This whole place was magic, and she needed to get out, but she was only getting more lost with every turn.

  She reached for her magic and it felt foreign—chaotic—but she still found her astral self. She pulled on her tiger form to shift. One moment she was human, and the next, she was a two-ton beast with wings.

  She glanced down—not at paws, but at razor-sharp talons, curved and golden like an eagle’s. Her maw felt wrong too, her usual feline fangs replaced by something harder, sharper. A hooked beak?

  There was something in the chaos that had altered her form. She let out a mighty, guttural cry—somewhere between a lion’s roar and a bird’s shriek—and leapt into the air.

  She folded her wings and dove on pure instinct. She had never had a shape that could fly, but it felt exhilarating and natural—and she had been accustomed to massive fangs and claws, so as she impacted the asphalt with a ground-fracturing boom, she snapped her beak open in warning, the sound sharp and alien.

  The valet attendants ran. Gretta pulled on magic again, and shifted. She prayed to the Wild Mother that her human form wouldn’t have tentacles or gills, and found that she was her normal self.

  Without wasting a moment, she dashed over to the box with hanging keys, found hers on the board, and then ran for her car.

  There was commotion coming from the diners, and she worried that Dorian would be close behind. She doubted he was a magic-user from her pantheon, but the idea that he could enthrall her again—or worse, start throwing balls of fire—was enough motivation to go faster.

  In moments, she was in her car and pulling away.

  She still felt chaos magic shifting through her, and wondered what Rowan had done. And how did that stupid feather play into it? Did the feather help her through some weird interaction with whatever magic Dorian was doing? Dorian definitely was doing some sort of magic.

  Then she started thinking back to the painting at dinner. If there was magic there, maybe she had seen her mother in that painting and maybe it had moved. Was this the first lead she’d had in 15 years?

  She slowed down. The map app showed only a residence where she had found a restaurant. What if this was her last chance to track the lead to her mother’s disappearance? What if he packed up and left? He said he was going on a journey—was he trying to kidnap her? The painting had fairies. What did she know about fairies?

  The fairies she knew from childhood books had wings, fit in a lantern, and died if you said you didn’t believe in them.

  “I don’t believe in you, Dorian,” she said out loud, just in case there was something to that last bit.

  She didn’t spot wings, which were certainly bigger than a lantern, but there was magic there, maybe in the music and food? And that pond. It was like Dorian was slowly walking into the Astral.

  She pulled over into a 24-hour grocery store parking lot. She was going to have to go back. She was tired from the shift and whatever enchantment Dorian had put on her, but this might be her last chance to figure out what happened to her mother, and she wasn’t going to let that pass.

  Weren’t fairies afraid of house cats? That might have just been a thing because the fairies in the books were only four inches tall. Anything that small should be afraid of house cats. Still, a house cat might be stealthy enough for her to sneak up on Dorian.

  She prayed to the Wild Mother for aid and reached for her house cat form, willing herself into something small, quiet, and agile.

  Magic surged. Her human body flickered into the astral, and her perception shifted.

  She was low to the ground.

  Gretta blinked at the bright night lights. Her wings—wait, wings?—fluttered in response. She looked down, talons gripping the asphalt. Not paws. Talons.

  She flexed, her head swiveling a full 180 degrees before she could stop it.

  Oh no.

  She let out a small, indignant hoot.

  A pygmy owl. Chaos had turned her into a pygmy owl.

  She didn’t know how this was Rowan’s fault, but it was definitely Rowan’s fault.