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W e only made it a few steps into the village when a shout made me freeze.

“Oy! Who’s there?” an old man barked.

I hadn’t imagined what an elderly faerie might look like, but a surprisingly energetic male bounded up to us with wings that resembled crumpled parchment.

His skin shimmered faintly under the mist, betraying a magical sheen as his long ears twitched.

Despite his hunched back and wild silver hair, there was a sharpness in his eyes that said he missed nothing.

Kai squeezed my hand before stepping ahead of me. His posture remained calm, but his body was coiled as if ready to spring into action. “Envoys from Fae Song Academy,” he called out evenly. “Emergency dispatch. We have clearance to enter under Academy protocol.”

That line slipped from his lips so smoothly that I almost believed him myself.

The old man squinted through the fog. I understood now that Kai had intended the darkness not just as a means to disguise our appearance, but to justify his story. I imagined any nighttime emergency protocol from the Academy would differ than it would in the daytime.

“Emergency, huh?” the elder faerie asked. “I didn’t hear any bells.”

Kai didn’t miss a beat as he tapped his ear.

“Magic’s flaring, citizen. It set off the alarms on our side, so here we are.

” He pointed in an arbitrary direction. “Something’s corrupting the ley lines.

You know how these things go—Fae Song Academy doesn’t wait for sunrise when the village could be at risk.

Ley lines?

Whatever that meant, it sounded important enough for the elder faerie to step back a pace.

Behind him, I caught flickers of movement. Shimmers of delicate wings fluttered as curious gazes peeked through barely lit windows. When I focused, I saw that the village wasn’t asleep.

It was holding its breath.

“Our ley lines have been broken for a while, boy,” the faerie countered, making the blood drain from my face. “Academy didn’t care about us six months ago. Not sure why they’d care now.”

We weren’t going to get away with this, were we?

Kai frowned, but the faerie waved his hand in dismissal as he continued. “No matter. The Maestro told us to send any newcomers to the tower. This way.”

Kai and I shared a look as the old man turned his back, the movement sending his crumpled wings folding awkwardly over his back.

“What now?” I whispered.

“Now,” Kai replied, his voice tight, “we find out what they’re hiding in plain sight.”

A grinding sound made Solstice hiss as the old man side-stepped, making room for a massive shape that emerged from a mist.

The lifelike statue that had to be at least seven feet tall shuffled in front of us, leaving me gaping.

Cracked stone assured me this wasn’t a living creature, but it had marblelike pulsing veins of violet light and crystalline shards jutted from its shoulders like a fashion statement.

It turned and looked directly at me with eyes that pulsed in time with a sensation I felt in my bones.

A strange tone sounded, one that didn’t sound like it belonged as it thrummed through the creature before it faded away.

“What is that,” I hissed at Kai.

“A golem,” he replied, sounding distraught, but he merely smiled at the faerie.

“Escort,” was all the elder faerie said before he patted the golem and then flitted out of sight.

Great.

The golem moved with slow, deliberate movements with power jolting through its stony limbs. I had been up against some terrifying beasts, but nothing literally made of stone.

Its heavy footfalls echoed through the mist-shrouded path as the monstrosity led us uphill toward the looming tower made of bright crystal.

It was the only object in the village that wasn’t dark, and it seemed to emanate with its own inner light, looking more ominous than peaceful, like a flickering candle at the top of a grave.

I started to follow, but a low, grinding rumble from behind made Solstice dig into my neck as she flexed around my shoulder to get a look.

Stomach dropping, I turned and spotted another golem breaking through the fog, blocking our exit.

“There’s two?” I asked Kai.

His jaw flexed. “One to lead,” he murmured, then glanced over his shoulder, “and one to make sure we don’t change our minds.”

“So, we’re not just being escorted,” I guessed.

“We’re being delivered,” Kai said.

I eyed the pulsing, purple magic thrumming through both golems. With our path blocked and nowhere else to go, I shuffled to keep up with the one in the lead.

“Those veins,” I said, eyeing the glow. “That’s not normal magic around here, is it?” Something about it felt off and wrong.

“No,” Kai confirmed. “It feels almost like… Wrath. But that doesn’t make sense.”

Pondering that, we walked in silence for a few steps, the broken crystal dust crunching under our feet.

“You mentioned something about ley lines. What does that mean?” Maybe that had some sort of connection to what was going on in this village, especially if it was some sort of protection mechanism.

Kai nodded as if he approved my train of thought.

“I just learned about this in one of my history classes. The Council of Songkeepers introduced the ley lines many years ago, right around when Wrath started infecting the land. It’s a way to funnel unfettered magic to the villages and empower the local Maestro, and therefore the people. ”

I hadn’t yet heard about a council, but it made sense there would be some type of ruling body over this realm. Although, it wasn’t a comfort that Kai had only just learned about it, a “So if the ley lines are broken…” I began.

Kai’s face took on a grim expression. “Then it’s possible everything is corrupted by Wrath here—including the Maestro.”

“That doesn’t sound good,” I whispered as I edged closer to him and eyed the dark village. Now it made sense why everything felt so off. “Your compass turned red, is that why? It sensed the corrupted Maestro?”

Kai shook his head. “A village infected by Wrath should not have been hidden this long. That villager told us the ley lines have been broken for six months.”

“And it’s not that far from the Academy,” I ventured, glancing back the way we had come. I couldn’t see the spires from here, but we had been traveling on foot. While we’d been walking most of the night, it hadn’t been far enough to require a portal. “What’s going on here?”

“I don’t know,” Kai said as he readjusted his flute in his vest pocket, ready to use it at a moment’s notice. “But we’re going to find out.”