There was nowhere to run in the house, nowhere Niall could go to escape the guilt that gnawed inside him for the horrible things he’d said, and the even worse things he’d done.

He ran anyway, up the stairs, past the doors that led to the opulent bedroom suites and the ladies drawing room. Past the gilded portraits of Aisling’s ancestors, who frowned at him from their lofty heights. You’re an intruder in our house, they seemed to be saying to him. You shouldn’t be here.

He headed for the room where the forest had been. Perfect, I’ll escape into the woods, and Aisling will never find me. But when he yanked open the door, all he saw was an ordinary bathroom, with a marble sink and pale pink towels hanging over the bath.

The Hollow had a sick sense of humor.

Niall flung open the door at the end of the hall, and ducked inside, slamming it shut behind him. He found himself in the largest bedroom in the house, containing not just an enormous four-poster bed, but a sitting room decorated in plush velvet. He remembered this room, as it was where he’d taken the cushions he’d used to make Aisling’s picnic. Was that only yesterday? It felt like a century ago, when he believed it was possible to be happy.

A long crack ran along the wall behind the velvet chaise lounge. Niall stood in front of it, and stared into the blackness. Inky tendrils of smoke curled out from the edges, and he stepped back before one of them could graze his skin. The familiar, singsong voice called to him through the crack.

Niall, come to me, Niall.

“Go away.” Niall threw himself down on the bed, his eyes finding more black cracks on the ceiling, a spiderweb of darkness ensnaring the entire room. Aisling had been right when she said that these second story rooms would be the next to be taken. No wonder they slept in the servant’s quarters, ceiling rain and all.

He didn’t understand this feeling that clenched his stomach. By all rights, he should have been ecstatic. The note he’d sent Odiana would save his brother, not to mention the whole of Scitis. When they extracted the atern from the house, overnight they would become the most powerful faction in all of the fae realm. His family’s status would be restored, and he would have his pick of officer commissions.

But all Niall wanted to do was take the letter back, to find a way to make it right with Aisling, and stop the fae from getting inside the Hollow and destroying everything she’d given her life to protect. But there was no way for him to fix it, and so he was trapped here, trapped with his guilt.

When she’d found him in the library, all that guilt had coalesced inside him, and he longed to tell her everything, to spill his awful secrets and be rid of them. But he couldn’t. The words wouldn’t come. What had come was rage. He’d watched the tears roll down Aisling’s cheeks and hated himself, but not enough to admit what he’d done.

He thought she’d made him a better person. He was wrong.

And then there was what Aisling said, about coming to the house as a child. Despite what he’d yelled at her in the library, he didn’t think she was lying. So what did that mean? How could AIsling have spent only fifteen years in the house, when the house had been on the edge of Scitis for fifty-one years?

“Meerrrw?” Two black paws landed on his chest, and a wet nose butted his chin. Niall’s hands reached instinctively for that cat, and he stroked Widdershins’ fur with the ferocity the cat loved. Widdershins dug his claws into Niall’s shoulder and started kneading, his rumbling purr shuddering through his tiny cat body.

As Niall scratched Widdershins under his chin, a thought occurred to him. Something Aisling had said to him the first day he was here, “… he doesn’t seem to age …”

If Aisling’s timeline was correct, Widdershins had to be at least twenty years old, which made him one seriously ancient cat. He should have been loping around and sleeping on all the good furniture, not chasing strings of yarn across the grand entrance.

Widdershins disappeared for days at a time. Sometimes he came back with objects that couldn’t possibly be in the house. Often, his fur was covered in wheat stalks. And he was far too healthy to be that old, especially since he hadn’t had a vet visit in more than a decade …

Niall sat up, staring into the crack again. The void was devouring the house, piece by piece. It was altering the spaces, creating rooms where there had never been rooms before, moving the bathroom around, making storage closets the size of football fields. If it could alter all that, could it not also alter time?

Niall tapped the clock on his wristband, watching the second hand swing wildly back and forth.

Was time passing inside the house in a different way? It sounded impossible, and yet … it would explain why time had passed slower inside the house than it did in Scitis. That way, the house would keep Aisling alive for longer, as its guardian.

That had to be the answer. It was the only explanation he could think of that explained everything. Odiana would be proud of his deduction.

Niall threw himself out of the bed. Wait until I tell Aisling. She won’t believe—

He was halfway to the door before he remembered. He couldn’t tell Aisling, because currently, she wasn’t talking to him. And he couldn’t blame her. He’d been cruel. He’d never been cruel to her before. When he was around her, that side of his personality – the side that was pure fae – faded into nothing.

Until he’d messed it all up. Because as much as he loved her, really loved her, he couldn’t tell her the truth. He couldn’t bear to learn what she’d think of him if she learned what he’d done.

“There’s nothing else for it.” Niall scooped up Widdershins and headed for the hall. “You and I are going to have to figure this out on our own.”