Anger flushed hotly as my eyes met his. There wasn’t a single part of me that doubted anything he said. He had me. God, I hated to admit it, but he had me.

Pivoting on my heel, I marched to the corner of the street and then crossed it, heading towards Jackson Square. I didn’t have to look behind me to know the prince was following. I could feel him, his iciness beating upon my back.

The whole entire time, my heart raced so fast I was sure I was going to go into cardiac arrest on the sidewalk. This was insane on so many different levels. I was about to have a conversation, albeit an unwilling one, with the mother freaking prince of the Otherworld on a lazy Sunday afternoon. At any minute, he could kill a dozen people before anyone knew what he was up to. Any Order member could stumble across us, and how would that look, me being chummy with the prince?

Man, I really should’ve listened to Ren.

Then again, would the prince have stayed away if Ren were with me? Creepy Prince said he’d been waiting for me. He could’ve come anyway, and Ren would’ve gone ape shit, and his life would be in danger.

It really was a no-win situation.

All the benches were full, but the prince strode right up to the first one that was under the shade of a leafy tree. An elderly couple took one look at him and then struggled to their feet. Not a single word was exchanged. They ambled off as fast as their tired, old bodies could carry them.

“I bet you’re real useful on a crowded bus,” I remarked.

He sat down on the bench. “Sit.”

“I prefer to stand.”

Those eerie eyes locked onto mine. “And I prefer you to sit.”

My fingernails dug into my palms. “You wanted to talk, then talk.”

His eyes were no longer glimmering. They were as hard as chips of ice. “Sit, little bird.”

“Don’t call me that,” I snapped.

There wasn’t even a flicker of surprise or anything that gave a hint about what he would do next. He simply lifted a hand and crooked one finger. A second later, a horn blew and someone shouted—several people shouted.

I looked over my shoulder. “What the . . . ?” I trailed off, eyes widening as a young man, no older than me, stood in the middle of the busy street. It was the waiter who’d cursed earlier when I’d whipped around. A car door opened as the young man dropped to his knees in the middle of the street.

“Sit, or I will make sure his insides are on his outside.”

Oh my God. Heart dropping to my toes, I pressed my palm to my chest. “How did you . . . ?” I’d seen fae manipulate humans, but never like this. Never from this far away and without touching them.

“I am the prince,” he replied. “You have met no other like me. Sit.”

Holy shit.

I sat.

I sat as far away as I humanly possibly could on the bench. The prince smiled, and the young man shuddered. A look of confusion crossed his face as he looked around hastily. He rose to his feet and stumbled across the street where people surrounded him.

“The mortal realm has changed,” the prince said after a moment, and I looked over at him. He was staring at the road, dark brows knitted. “The last time I was here, horses carried people where they needed to go. There was no world wide web or TV.”

My brows inched up my forehead.

“It has taken me a few days to . . . adapt to all of the technology and people. They are everywhere. Ready to serve.” He smiled again as he stretched out his long legs. “My people will do well here.”

Pressing my lips together, I inhaled through my nose and remained silent.

“My world is dying, little bird. It is dark and dead. Nothing new is reborn.” The prince extended an arm along the back of the bench. If he touched me, I’d puke in his lap. For real. His chin tipped toward me. “The only way I can save it is to permanently open the gates.”

I knew this already. Tink had told me.

“Our food source is nearly depleted. It will not be much longer before everything is gone.”

When he spoke of the food source, I knew he didn’t mean cheeseburgers and bacon. He was talking about humans. When the fae didn’t feed, they had normal human lifespans, but when they fed from humans, they could almost become immortal. It wasn’t something any of the Order members liked to think about, because there was nothing we could do about the humans that had been snatched from our world long ago, when the fae came and went through the gateways as they pleased. From what we’d learned, they raised humans in their world like cattle.

It was repulsive.

“You’ve done this to yourself,” I said, voice surprisingly calm. “You’ve killed your own world. You’re not going to do the same to ours.”

The prince dipped his chin. “What do you know of my world, little bird? What do you know at all?”

Prickling irritation danced across my skin. “I do know I want to stab you in the eyeball every time you call me ‘little bird.’”

His lips twisted into a cruel smirk. “You do not like me.”

“No shit,” I muttered.

“Perhaps if we met under better circumstances—”

“One where you didn’t beat me within an inch of my life?”

A woman walking past us looked over at us sharply but kept going when the prince nodded. “There is that, but I do recall giving you ample opportunity to leave without injury. You chose not to. You fought me, and yes, I would’ve killed you if I had not realized what you are.”

I choked on a laugh. “Wow.”

He didn’t appear to find anything he’d said amusing. “But now I know how important you are.”