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“Who are you?”

“He’s coming for you.” This time, it’s a child’s voice that speaks from the darkness.

“Who?” I ask.

Karnon isdead.

Laughter echoes all around me, growing louder and louder. In it I hear the woman’s voice, the child’s, the Fauna king’s, and my stepfather’s. I hear them and so many others laughing at me.

All at once, it ceases.

“Who?” I repeat.

The air rumbles like thunder, thickening as some strong magic builds and builds, gathering power. With a crack, a booming voice breaks through the magic—

“Me.”

***

I gasp awake. My wide eyes gaze into Des’s concerned ones. His hands cup my face, his worried gaze searching my expression.

That dream felt too real. My stepfather and Karnon are both dead and gone, and yet on nights like tonight, it’s as though they never died.

I suck in air, my chest rising and falling far too fast.

Of course, those evil men only starred in a portion of the dream. There were other equally chilling presences calling out to me from the darkness. Intuitively, I know who they belong to—the sleeping women and their unnatural children.

And then there was that final voice… I don’t know what to make of it.

His brow pinched, Des kisses me fiercely. As quick as it begins, it’s over.

“You wouldn’t wake,” he says.

I shiver. It might’ve been just a dream, but the truth is that the warrior women still sleep, and the male soldiers are still missing. Karnon might be dead, but his work isn’t.

I stare into Des’s eyes. “I want to see the casket children again.”

***

For the second time in my life, I willingly visit the little monsters the sleeping soldiers birthed. I might very well be the stupidest woman out there for seeking them out again. But there’s something I have to see.

“Remind me again why I agreed to this?” Des says next to me, echoing my thoughts.

Today Des wears the T-shirt and black pants combo I’m so used to seeing him in, his hair tied back with a leather thong and his sleeve of tattoos on display. He looks broody as hell, probably because he’s not exactly thrilled to be bringing me back to the royal nursery.

“I’m helping you solve this mystery,” I say, heading down the hall.

He doesn’t say anything to that, but a muscle in his jaw tightens.

I feel it, low in my belly, the fear that whatever happened to me and those women wasn’t the end of this. Death should lift magic—even fae magic. That rule is the same both here and on earth. But it didn’t.

My thoughts shift to the dream I so recently had of the Thief—

Fee, fye, foe, fum. I’m not done, siren. Oh no, I’ve just begun.

I shiver before forcing the thoughts away. They won’t do me any good for what I’m about to do.

When we enter the nursery, a wave of déjà vu washes over me. Many of the younger children lie in cribs or beds, eerily still, and the older ones stand at the far side of the room, staring out the large windows. It’s all nearly identical to how I found them before.