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I will not be kept from her. Curse or not, Alice is mine. I swore to protect her, and I will. She carries my young, and we will raise the Wyrmling together. Curses can be broken, and I won’t stop until I find someone in the Yeavering who can assist us.

With a roar, I push forward, and as if it were never there, the enchantment breaks. We topple out onto the grass, breathing ragged and with the scent of singed dog hair all around us.

“I amnotdoing that again, for you or for anyone,” Reavely snarls.

“I think you smell better because of it.” Warden pushes back up onto his hooves.

“Fuck you.” Reavely rolls onto his back and stares up at the sky.

“We can’t hang around.” Linton scans the horizon. “They will know we are here.”

Out of all of us, he seems the least affected by the enchantment. I dealt little with the Bluecaps when I was in the Night Lands, but there was an understanding they were almost as indestructible as me.

“Good,” I respond. “Let them come for me. I’m in the mood to destroy Faerie.”

I stride out ahead, my Wyrm form overtaking me. Here in the hills with the scent of my mate’s blood filling my senses, I am a mere vessel.

A streak of violence for her alone. No one hurts my mate. No one touches her but me.

Over our heads, a scream rings out, hollow and filled with pain. I charge ahead until something grabs hold of my tail.

“Fenrother, wait!”

“There is no wait,” I snarl, pulling myself free. “I have Faerie to kill for touching my mate.”

“It’s a trap!” Linton calls out.

“No,” I respond. “It is not. It is a killing ground. And I’m doing the killing.”

ALICE

The queen leaves me tied up in the garden, sweeping away with her courtiers without a backward glance. There’s no sign of Yarain, so it looks like I’m here for the foreseeable future.

I find my chain reaches far enough I can get to the fountain, and I’m able to wash my arm clean. Dark shapes dart out from the fountain to where my blood leaks into the water, making my shudder and withdraw my arm.

Faerie hills want to look benign, pretty even, but under the surface, there is an undercurrent of evil. Unlike the wild moors around Fenrother’s castle, I know there is nothing here I can trust.

I slide off the side of the fountain and onto the ground. My arm is still running with blood, and it drips onto the gravel and hisses.

My bloodhisses? I look closer, unable to work out what is happening.

“You are human,” a voice whispers. I look up to see Abbe peeking around from the other side of the fountain. “Your blood contains iron, something they cannot stand.”

“I thought the Faerie mated with humans?” I lean back against the cold granite of the fountain, suddenly more tired than I’ve been in my entire life.

“When the urge takes them. They might want to think they are better than all other creatures, but they have their base desires like any living thing,” Abbe says. “Their sophistication comes at a cost. Their glamour is exactly that, a shield hiding their true nature. Mating with a human causes them to lose some of their power, which is why their halflings, the witches and warlocks, have theirs.”

“So, mating with humans weakens them?” My mind is whirling with this new information.

“But creating a new life strengthens them.” Abbe sighs. “It is the way the world and the Yeavering turn.”

“I get that.” I close my eyes briefly, opening them to stare at an increasingly stormy sky. “I just wish humans had understood it too, before letting the Faerie into our world without question.”

“Survival is the driver for all life. Do not blame your fellow humans for wanting to live,” Abbe says as several large raindrops hit my dress and arms. “I have to go.”

“Wait…release me, please? It’s starting to rain.”

“I cannot.” She looks upwards. “The magic is too strong for me alone, and besides, your Wyrm is coming.”