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“I’m DTF,” I said, nodding my head.

Everyone looked at me in confusion.

“I wish to stay,” I amended myself.

“EXCELLENT!” the brown speckled winged Aetheriani snapped his wings open in excitement. “Please, come with me. I am called Solarion, and I will ensure you are well taken care of.”

I glanced at Crystallo, and he nodded, so I followed after the brown speckled winged Aetheriani back into the large room I had landed in after coming through the portal. The room looked like a giant hollow in a tree if the tree had started to grow branches inside itself, with a huge hole at one side leading out into what looked like open air. The walls had perches jutting out from the smooth wooden wall at all heights, and those perches had winged people lounging on them, filling up the space with more chirping chatter than before. In the center of the floor, just behind where I had gone sprawling, was a large ornate backless throne that looked like it had grown out of the floor of the tree trunk.

Solarion stopped in front of the throne, looking up at the people on perches around us.

“Rí Túath Crystallo has granted a boon to Nora, an Agronomist trained in Sustainable Agriculture with practical work experience at the Order Academy in Operations and Implementation! She is strong and skilled and ready to serve the Aetheriani in these turbulent times!” Solarion called out. “Rejoice!”

The room erupted into gasps and chitters.

A flush rushed across my skin like a backdraft in a fire. He had just announced to the whole room that I was going to bang the King.

“This way,” Solarion said, taking my elbow and drawing me across the room to an archway. The archway had two armed guards on either side of it. On the other side were a set of stairs that curved up to the left and down to the right, smooth, unbroken wooden walls on either side. I went with Solarion up the stairs, following the curve as if we were walking up along the inside of a giant tree. By the time we stopped at another archway, Solarion was breathing hard.

“I… normally… fly,” he gasped out as he paused, his hands on his knees.

I waited for him to recover.

“Where are we going?” I asked him as he chased after his own breath.

“To prepare… clean…” he said. “Then… chambers.”

“I have just been scrubbed clean,” I said, wrinkling my nose as I thought about the way the fairy workers had gone after me with those brushes. They had been quite determined to make sure every speck of dirt was gone from my body before they shoved me into the tight-fitting dress and sent me to be eye candy for the dinner discussions.

At the thought of that, my stomach rumbled.

He stood up straight, putting his hand on his chest as he finally caught up with himself.

“You must be pampered,” he said. “It is tradition.”

“Does this pampering involve food?” I asked.

“Oh yes,” he nodded. “And a massage.”

I grinned at him, and he smiled back.

“A massage?” I asked.

Chapter

Six

CRYSTALLO

“She is prepared,” Solarion said as I landed on the balcony that led into the royal aerie. All the rooms that had been crafted into the spaces that the Sunsong Arbor provided had pathways to the outside. My people preferred to fly, even if we had walkways and passages for the land-bound people who inhabited our cities.

I had done my preening and ceremonial preparations elsewhere, leaving the royal aerie to the woman who had agreed to be my mate for a year.

I stepped toward the archway carved directly into the ancient tree, each concentric ring of bark rising like ripples under my fingertips. Tangled runes, painted carefully onto the wood, remnants of the patterns the Chaos God had left behind, spiraled upward in a silent promise of protection. Above me, the trunk widened into a vast column, its pocked surface rough and cool, flecks of amber resin glinting where sap had oozed and dried.

The entrance itself was blocked by a curtain of polished beads, smoky quartz, sun-bleached bone, and jade, strungthrough tiny brass chimes. They clinked in a lazy rhythm, a hollow, wind-borne tinkle that mingled with the distant whisper of feathered wings.

I looked back over my shoulder.