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Orion leans around me. “I swear I wasn’t listening in.”

Lysander rubs his face. “It’s my sister. Someone called in a report about a fight on the riverbank last night. They said it was a fairy… and there were azeroths. It’s got to be Elsabeth.”

A fight?“Is she okay?”

“No one knows.” Tension radiates from him. “Whoever reported it didn’t say anything, and Aster said there’s been no other information. I want to find her, but Syril says it’s too dangerous.”

“Maybe they have a point,” Orion says.

“I — I know they do!” Lysander pulls out of my grip. Distress makes his eyes glimmer. All I want to do is pull him back and hold him until he calms down, but that won’t help. “I’m not like her. Ihatefighting. I like frilly clothes and books. Plus I hardlyever leave The Sanctum — I don’t even know how to get around the city.”

“I can drive you,” I say automatically, and Orion groans.

“Don’t enable him!”

“He’s not an invalid,” I growl. “What’s an azeroth?”

“I can speak for myself, both of you,” Lysander interjects, and my mouth snaps shut. “The azeroths are dangerous creatures. I don’t want to put you in harm’s way.”

“Are they dangerous to me, though? I’m human. I’m immune to whatever makesyoudangerous,” I point out. “So what are they?”

“They’re a cult of magic-eaters.” Lysander’s wings shudder.

Hunted by a creepy undead cult,Orion’s voice says in my head.

“I don’t have any magic. Doesn’t that mean I’ll be fine?” I point out.

Orion snorts, flames flickering out of his mouth. “Ez, being human makes you more breakable, not less.”

I suddenly wonder if this is one of those defining opportunities where I should be smart, but instead I’m gonna do the dumbest thing possible. My jaw clenches with familiar stubbornness. “I can hold my own in a fight.”

“Not against the azeroths,” Lysander interjects. He takes a deep breath. “They’re not monsters like us. They’re something else. They used to be human nomads who traveled through the wildling valley in summer, but witchcraft turned them into something else neither human nor monster. To stay alive, they need to feed on the magic of monsters. But especially fairies.”

It sounds grim. “The azeroths used to be human? How long ago was this? Hang on, how old are you?”

“It happened thousands of years before I was born,” Lysander says reassuringly. “I’m only three hundred years old.”

I choke. “You’rewhat?”

Orion chuckles. “He’s practically a child.”

“Fairies mature slowly! I’m fully adult by our standards.” Lysander crosses his arms.

“Oh mygod,” I groan, covering my face. “You’re robbing the cradle. ButI’mthe one in the cradle! You were alive on Independence Day!”

“Think of them like dog years,” Orion says, patting my shoulder. “Where you’re the dog.”

“That’s worse,” I mutter. “Lysander is gonna live for eight hundred more years or something, and I’ll be dead by eighty.”

“Well, technically my magic will seep into you and equalize our lifespans if we spend the rest of our lives —”

Lysander stops abruptly, his eyes widening. Orion goes silent, his flaming gaze darting between us. Shocking heat blooms in my chest. Was he going to sayif we spend the rest of our lives together?

“What I mean is, that’s what happened to the azeroths,” Lysander blurts, flushing a pretty blue all over his face. I resist the urge to kiss him right then and there. Orion doesn’t need any more ammo. “They spent so much time with us, they started to absorb some of our magic. But they were greedy. A little magic wasn’t enough, they wantedallof it — enough to become immortal. Through witchcraft, they found a way to steal it. We didn’t realize they were preying on other monsters until it was too late. A Kingsmeet was called — a summit of monster kings — and they accused my great, great grandfather of being careless and allowing the cult to run wild. There was nearly a war, until he agreed to banish the azeroths and send dryads protect the other kingdoms’ territories from them.”

“Except the shadowfey. We can take care of ourselves,” Orion interjects.

”We underestimated their greed.” Lysander’s eyes drop. “Eventually, their physical bodies rotted away and they becamenothing more than hungry shadows, immortal just like they wanted, but unable to sustain themselves unless they fed on us. Whenever they found a fairy outside the borders and —” he swallows. “Drained them, the fairy’s magic would keep them sated.”