Ensnared (Splintered, #3)(37)

My breath hitches as I see Jeb’s back. He’s shirtless, wearing faded, ripped jeans in a room lit with a pinkish-orange sunset. The light streams through a glass ceiling. It’s like a greenhouse—a carbon copy of the art studio in the human realm where he was trapped a month ago. There’s the pattern again: Everything here is born and built of Jeb’s memories.

Paint glistens in wet smudges on his toned arms. I hold my breath, wishing for a glimpse of his face, but he won’t turn. His hair is longer now, the dark, unkempt waves just shy of touching his shoulders.

Morpheus misled me. Jeb hasn’t changed. He even has the same passions.

There are easels everywhere. Some untouched, others filled with landscapes, a few of which match the changing terrains we experienced in the midst of the looking-glass world. My brow crinkles as I try to make sense of it all.

Morpheus sits on a table in front of Jeb, dark wings draped forward and dragging on the floor. His discarded gloves lie in his lap, and he picks at one of the holes in his pant leg.

His little sprite companion, Nikki, flutters around both guys as if unsure where to perch.

Jeb lifts a paintbrush to Morpheus’s ear, accidentally stepping on the tip of a wing.

Morpheus winces and slaps Jeb’s hand away. “Ouch! Your bedside manner is sorely lacking, pseudo elf.”

Nikki hovers at the tip of Jeb’s nose, shaking a finger. After gently shooing the sprite away, he leans over Morpheus and lifts his brush again. “If you’d keep those things up on the table, there wouldn’t be an issue. Now hold still and stop acting like a little girl.”

A pulse of violet light passes from the wet bristles to Morpheus’s ear. Like magic, the wound heals. I stifle a surprised moan.

Back still turned, Jeb straightens to appraise his handiwork.

Morpheus smirks—a practiced, acerbic twist of lips. “So, is there any particular girl I remind you of?”

Nikki flutters between them, her hands clasped and head tilted in a dramatic gesture. She bats her lashes.

“You’re right, Nikki.” Dragging a fingertip through the paint on Jeb’s chest, Morpheus rubs the smudge between his thumb and finger. “He must be thinking of his girlfriend. Though I daresay, if I were Alyssa, his bedside manner would improve tremendously.”

Jeb throws his brush down and grips Morpheus by his holey lapel, every muscle in his back taut. Nikki hovers, her tinkling voice scolding them both.

“She’s my ex-girlfriend,” Jeb says. “And I don’t want to hear her name. I don’t want her haunting my subconscious.” He shoves Morpheus away. “You remember what happened when her face turned up in my paintings. We have to forget her. Just like she’s forgotten us.”

Ex-girlfriend. All warmth inside me snuffs out. He’s never sounded this discouraged, not even after fights with his dad. And it’s because he thinks I’ve abandoned them.

Morpheus swipes the paint from his thumb and finger across one of the dust rags piled next to him on the table. The look he gives Jeb is devilish delight. “A shame you have so little faith in the one you once claimed to love.” He slips his fingers into his jacket pocket and coaxes out Chessie. The furry netherling flitters his wings, rising. He smiles at Jeb, sincerely happy to see him.

Jeb totters back two steps. “Where did . . . how did he get here?”

Morpheus shrugs. “You should be asking who brought him here. That answer is much more interesting.”

Jeb shakes his head as the sprite takes Chessie’s paws in her hands so they’re dancing in midair. “Al would never . . .”

“She would,” Morpheus taunts. “She did. And she’ll soon find a way into our refuge. Unless your untimely retrieval of me caused her to be captured. In which case, she’s in danger, and it’s on your head.”

“No,” Jeb insists. “She doesn’t care enough to come.”

I want to storm inside and prove him wrong. He’s lost all faith in me. And that fact is more excruciating and unbelievable than anything I’ve faced since the time I first fell into the rabbit hole.

My limbs go numb and Dad’s dagger almost slips from my sweaty hand.

Dad! How could I have forgotten him?

A shuffling sound echoes from the darkness further down the corridor. Holding my breath, I tiptoe along the winding hallway. I haven’t made it very far when something clenches my arm from behind. One hand slaps across my mouth and another shoves me against the wall, hard enough my spine grinds into the stone.

My captor’s build is masculine. He grips my wrists with his free hand and holds them at my abdomen. My fingers tighten around Dad’s dagger, the blade pointed toward the ground.

I try to yell, but my attacker’s free hand seals my lips tight. He’s taller than me, head tilted like a curious puppy, as if trying to figure me out. There’s something so familiar about his height and form. When my eyes adjust to the dimness, I almost collapse.

It’s Jeb, from his labret to that body I know so well . . . only now I can see his face.

On the right side, red jeweled dots sparkle in a curved line from his temple to his cheekbone, matching his red labret. A closer look at his ears reveals pointed tips. He resembles an elfin knight of Ivory’s court, if not for his unshaved jaw. Even his eyes, vacant and distant, lack emotion.

A scream struggles to break loose as more gruesome details come to light. The skin under his left eye gapes open. Where there should be tissue and bones showing through, there’s nothing but a void.