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Maewyn sat back as the mushrooms devolved into whispered rumors, lifting her chin to glance up at the darkness in the branches above. “I didn’t think of it like that,” she said, touching her chest lightly. “Maybe he’s only a prick because he’s as angry as I am.”

At her feet, there came a doubtful sound, and there Agar stood, tiny bowl lifted up and cap tipped back. “Perhaps there is an answer to be found, but first a human should eat.”

“Don’t eat that.”

The tiny bowl halted just before it reached the human’s lips, and her foxlike eyes snapped to him, immediately sharp and angry. Perhaps he should have expected that, but it sent a shiver down his spine regardless.

Roan rolled his shoulders—he wasn’t used to shivers—and then he grimaced. Oh, gods, is this what it’s going to be like? “You’ll be stuck here if you consume that, and don’t you want to go home?”

The human studied what she’d been given, face lighting up but not with more of that frosty anger she’d just blasted at him.

“Enchanted faeling food, like in the stories,” she whispered, and then a frown creased her lips as she addressed the lone mushroom who had remained when Roan arrived.

“We were just discussing why my being here is a problem, so why would you trick me into staying?”

The mykiis’s cap swiveled from one of them to the other, and he took a step back.

Roan snorted. “He said your presence is a problem ?”

“They told me you have…plans. Ones I have no intention of disrupting,” she said carefully, and then, more graciously than Roan would have, she stood and gave the mykiis a disappointed look. “But it was a ruse. Now who am I to trust?”

Roan clicked his tongue, assessing her—perhaps she would make a better co-conspirator than he thought. “Me, obviously.” He turned on his heel and left the mykiis’s estate for the depth of the forest.

The sounds of crunching leaves told him she was following behind. Humans were loud, that he was learning, and then she spoke even louder. “Why did you come back?”

He rubbed the center of his chest. “Would you rather I hadn’t?”

“A little.”

He glanced furtively over his shoulder, though he didn’t need to—he could feel her gaze boring into the back of his head.

“All right, a lot ,” she admitted, and he had to suppress a chuckle. “But I suppose if we want the same thing, you’re a better alternative to giant wolves or deceitful mushrooms. Why would they do that anyway?”

Roan hadn’t even answered her first question and yet she was asking a second, but he wasn’t going to complain. “The mykiis are old and peaceful—disturbingly so. I imagine they believe trapping you here will avoid a rather bloody war.”

“War?” And there she went, shrieking again. She’d been so much more pleasant speaking with the fungi, though that would have been a fair bit more boring if they hadn’t been discussing him.

He tugged on one of his curved ears. “You heard him, yes? Or were you too busy asking questions to listen to any of the answers? Marrying you is a law I intend to break, which will undoubtedly upset a number of powerful fae.”

“There’s quite a difference between being upset and declaring war!” The human hurried on her short legs to cut him off, hands in tight fists and her hair wild as she whipped around to glower at him.

“Well, the other courts will be angry that I do it first. Winter will be most upset, though.” He grinned deeply just imagining the look on stodgy, honorable Prince Warrin’s face.

Her eyes flared with frustrated confusion—yes, that was the look right there. “ It? ”

“Bring forth a child into this world more powerful than any being that has ever existed.”

The forest was quiet in the moment it took the human to grasp his words, and then she threw her empty hands upward, proving no grasping had been accomplished at all. “By Cerewin’s Horn, explain better, you imbecile!”

Roan snarled, but the corner of his mouth ticked up.

He shouldn’t like being called an imbecile—and for the record, he did not—but it was a little like how he also thought he should hate being questioned.

It wasn’t quite so bad when this human was doing it because, well…

she was just so prickly . Nothing at all like the tame thing that was meant to please him.

This human didn’t please him at all, but she was amusing.

Though she was also standing in his way.

Then, he supposed, explain he must.

Roan cleared his throat and put on his best impression of his father. “Every seventh generation, the heir to each court must wed a mortal to dilute our familial powers so that no one court will produce an archfae.”

Those fox eyes went as round as a doe’s. “The being destined to destroy the realms,” she said with a breathiness he was sure he’d never hear again.

“And so you spew yet another rumor. How quaint.” He pushed past her, deeper into the wood where the tree trunks thickened as he sought out the nearest eingress.

“There is no guarantee that an archfae will destroy the realms, but if you or any other human bears me a child, the opportunity of whatever my lineage could be will be wiped out for another seven generations. Sure, the courts will continue on in harmony with one another, but the loss seems totally irresponsible.”

She caught up again to give him a pointed scowl. “You think it’s irresponsible to not bring an archfae into existence?”

“There’s only the one opportunity with my firstborn, and even that isn’t absolute.” Roan laughed, turning on her fully. “My seed is rather spectacular, and I’m not wasting it on you.”

At that, her face bunched up into utter disgust. “Oh, gods, I don’t want one drop of your seed, if you can even manage to produce it.”

Shock caught in Roan’s throat like an errant bit of stew. “Excuse me,” he finally spat. “I can produce cauldrons of—”

She scoffed, shoving him out of the way and continuing on into the wood.

He glanced down at the place on his chest her hands had touched with such vitriol, and there was an unfortunate swirling of magic there, confirming the fear he’d been trying to push away. Fuck. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“Home, I guess! Now, hurry up and help me so I can be as far from here as possible when you start your asinine war.”