At eleven-thirty, I grabbed my backpack, stuffed my swords inside, out of sight of the public eye, and turned to Annwyl.
“Ready?”
“Yes,” she replied, with a determination that reminded me of someone on the way to the gallows. Terrified but resolved to show no fear. “Let’s go find Keirran.”
Bourbon Street wasn’t far, and New Orleans glowed an eerie green and orange under the light of the full moon. It was almost surreal. We walked the couple blocks to the famous street, passing neon signs and lampposts shining feebly in the artificial haze. People wandered by, not paying any attention to either me or the faery at my side. A goblin peered at us from a narrow alley, picking his teeth with a fragment of bone, but didn’t make any move to follow.
Laffite’s Blacksmith Shop was a tiny building on the corner of St. Philip and Bourbon Street. From the outside, it looked deliberately run-down, white plaster peeling away to reveal spots of red brick. Wooden shutters and doors stood open to the night, and an old-fashioned lantern hung beside the entrance, flickering orange.
I gazed behind us to the road, watching cars cruise down Bourbon Street and people drift over the sidewalks. With the orange lights, full moon and faint strands of jazz music playing from one of the open bars, New Orleans did have a magical quality to it. I knew why this place was such a haven for the fey, and I knew they were out there, skulking between buildings and slipping invisibly through crowds. Still, I couldn’t imagine the whole street teeming with faeries, an entire marketplace of them. I hoped that dryad knew what she was talking about.
Annwyl and I crossed the street and ducked through the leftmost door of Laffite’s bar to find ourselves in a dim, old-fashioned room. Round wooden tables were scattered about a stone floor, and the bar stood against the back wall, most of the stools occupied. The only lights came from the candles set on the tables and hanging from the walls, and the flames in the huge stone fireplace in the center of the room.
Someone pushed past me from behind, jostling me with barely a grunt of apology. I stepped farther into the bar and glanced back for Annwyl, nearly lost in the shadows.
“All right,” I muttered, stepping up to the fireplace and turning to face the doors. Annwyl followed silently. “So, according to the dryads, we just have to turn widdershins three times and walk out the door on the right—left now, since we came inside—and we’ll be in the market.” I checked my watch to make sure it was 12:00 a.m. Six minutes past midnight. “On three?”
She nodded, and on my signal, we closed our eyes and spun counterclockwise in place three times, me feeling slightly ridiculous and hoping no one was watching.
On the first two circles, nothing happened. But when we completed the third, I opened my eyes to find the inside of the bar had...changed. It wasn’t full of fey. The lights and tables and patrons sat where they had always been; really nothing had moved. But everything around us was slightly out of focus. Conversations were muted, and everything seemed to be going in slow motion.
Except us. And the door a few yards away. It stood out sharply against the blurred, hazy backdrop, the opening shimmering like heat waves. That was it. Our entrance to the goblin market.
I nudged Annwyl, and together we walked across the floor, past indistinct shadows and nearly frozen candle flames, and ducked through the opening.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
SECRETS FOR SECRETS
Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore was the cheesy first thought that went through my head as we stepped out into the street.
Noise surrounded us—not the muffled sounds of cars and street traffic at night, but the louder, garbled sounds of a huge crowd. “Normal” Bourbon Street had disappeared; though I could see it was still the same stretch of pavement, the same buildings lining the sidewalks, it was definitely not the same world. Streetlamps had been replaced with torches and faery fire, orbs of blue-white flame floating overhead. There were no cars, but horse-drawn carriages glided down the road—only the horses’ hooves never touched the ground, and their eyes glowed blue in the shadows. The buildings, though they looked the same at first, appeared old and run-down on closer inspection, covered in vines and moss, as if we had stepped back in time a hundred years.
And of course, there were the fey.
They were everywhere, milling about the road in huge numbers, faeries of every shape, size and description. Short, warty goblins with beady eyes and huge ears. Hulking ogres, their thick knuckles dragging along the ground as they lumbered by. Redcaps flashing their shark-toothed grins at everyone. Rail-thin bogeys hiding in the shadows and narrow crevices. And faeries I didn’t have a name for, all wandering down Bourbon Street, looking like the world’s largest freak convention.
Oh, this was going to suck.
Shrugging off my backpack, I pulled out my swords and slipped them onto my belt. No way I was going out there unarmed. Taking out my jacket, I shrugged into it and pulled up the hood, hoping it would shield me from any curious looks. And if my luck held, hide the fact that I was human long enough to find Keirran and get out of here without trouble.
Glancing at Annwyl, who looked slightly overwhelmed as well, I grimaced. “Ready for this?”
“No,” she replied, her eyes wide. “But...lead the way.”
We slipped onto the crowded road, moving more slowly than I would’ve liked. Faeries weren’t the only thing making the street difficult to navigate. Booths and wooden tables were arranged in narrow aisles down the pavement, displaying the weirdest merchandise you’d ever see in your life: weeping fish and glass eyes and jewelry made of bones and teeth. Bird skeletons, crystal balls, shriveled hands and hats that whispered to you as you passed. A yellow-eyed woman in gypsy robes caught my eye and grinned, beckoning me toward her booth, waving a deck of cards in her long fingers. A kimono-clad girl with fox ears peeking from her hair gave me a coy smile, fluttering a fan and pointing to her table of rice cakes. I ignored them all and hurried on.