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ALTERNATIVE USES FOR DESKS

T hey packed in haste, knowing the hunting spell might return at any moment and that they were running out of hours of daylight, even with the long summer evenings. Gisele stowed phials of ingredients in her pack and was startled to find her dagger already inside.

“Thank you,” she said to Skymallow, although she hoped very much not to need it.

If she did, it would be because Avern had somehow found them or something in Isshia had gone horribly wrong.

Everything was happening too quickly. I can’t go home yet , she wanted to protest, except that was what she was supposed to have wanted all along.

She ought to be glad. But she’d never imagined returning home like this, neither triumphant nor despairing.

And then they were taking their leave.

“You’ll be back, though, won’t you?” Nissa asked, in a manner that suggested she wasn’t bothered either way but which didn’t fool Gisele at all.

It slammed into her: if this worked, she would no longer belong here. She couldn’t speak past the lump in her throat as she tried to find the words to farewell the meadow folk.

Mal put a hand on her shoulder. “You will always be welcome at Skymallow.”

The knot eased. “I’ll see you again,” she promised the meadow folk.

“I don’t know why you needed him to say you’re welcome,” Nissa said scornfully. “Anyone can see that he’s smitten with you.”

Apfela shot her a quelling look, which Nissa ignored.

Mal slung his satchel over one shoulder. It contained a grumbling Zingiber, his furry head poking out from under the flap. “We should go.”

Nissa’s remark lingered between them as they walked.

“What Nissa said—” Gisele began, unsure exactly what the rest of the question was. “You said I was welcome, but you haven’t asked me to come back.”

Mal’s stride hitched. “You are welcome. But I don’t think I can ask for more than that. It’s not fair while there’s magic between us. You owe me nothing.”

That was… both logical and not what she wanted to hear. Ask me to stay anyway , she wanted to say, but how would she even answer if he did? Something of this clearly transmitted through the bond, because he drew to a halt.

“Gisele—” His voice suddenly ached with emotion.

“No, you’re right; it’s not fair to discuss it now.” She kept pace. “How far exactly is this waypoint?”

His ears flicked unhappily. “We’re nearly there.”

When they stood beneath a walnut tree not ten minutes later, Gisele couldn’t help saying drily, “I walked for two days to get to Skymallow, you know, even though the hawthorn tree I used was only an hour away from the palace.”

“Faerie does not map itself to the Mortal world like a simple sheet of paper,” Mal said loftily.

“Geography is of far less concern than sympathetic resonance. I planted this tree from a seed I took from the one in Mortal; of course I put it in a convenient location.” He laid his hand against the trunk and began to murmur the portal spell to it.

It was similar in essence to the one she’d used, though with the addition of what she’d begun mentally calling ‘fae flourishes’.

A portal between realms wasn’t merely a doorway but a summoning of like-for-like, she now understood.

Mal was calling for the place that most resonated with this one.

Resonance also depended on the person doing the calling.

Her own mixed feelings about seeking her nemesis had likely influenced the location of her original portal—close enough to find him; far enough to require several days travel.

Which was a rather lowering realisation to have in hindsight.

The portal flickered into being, alongside the memory of the last time she’d stepped through one.

It felt like only yesterday and simultaneously a thousand years ago.

She was really going back. What would she find on the other side?

Her heart began to pound, and she suddenly felt very selfish for the fact that she’d barely thought of Isshia’s troubles at all.

Had the gold stopped degrading to wood? She’d assumed her leaving would fix it, but she hadn’t let herself think of what the state of Isshia might be by now if it hadn’t. Her family…

She stepped through the waypoint behind Mal, and between one breath and the next, she was back in her private garden in the palace of Isshia.

The change from the wild Faerie forest couldn’t have been starker, even though this was a green space too.

For a moment, the well-maintained garden beds looked wrong , too tidy and too ordinary without dinner-plate-sized butterflies or strange flowers that sparkled with mystical lights.

They snapped back into familiarity after a few blinks. The Leafling Sisters—or someone, at least— had taken care of the plants. A little knot of guilt she hadn’t realised she was carrying eased, even as a part of her thought, Not even my garden needed me here .

It had still been daylight in Faerie, but the sun had already set, here. Her heart sank; she knew enough of fae magic now to know that time of day was important, and the ritual they’d used before had been a daylight spell.

The waypoint emerged next to the loveseat, its back to the spot where the old walnut had once grown.

The loveseat was positioned so one could contemplate the small fishpond.

The space behind it was full of flowers.

Her gaze fell on the dramatic scarlet blooms of the love-lies-bleeding.

Not an omen, I hope , she thought and then froze.

She hadn’t let her mind so much as whisper the word before.

She certainly wasn’t going to now, at the sticking place.

“Gisele?” Mal asked, a thread of concern in his tone. “What’s wrong?”

It was beyond strange to see him in such a familiar place, like one of her dreams. His tail moved uncertainly.

Gisele gave herself a shake. “Nothing,” she said. “It’s just rather startling, travelling from place to place so abruptly.”

Mal was scowling at the flowerbed. “Where is the stump?”

“They pulled it out and burnt what couldn’t be used for ought else. Is that going to matter?”

“It might change the location the original bargain considers to be the tree at the heart of the palace. I need to check my calculations again. We have time—we’ll have to wait for dawn in any case,” he said, confirming her own suspicions.

Zingiber chose this moment to stick his head out of the bag and demand to be released.

“You’re not to go wandering off,” Gisele admonished him, undoing the flap so he could get out.

Can’t get lost. This is my old hunting ground , Zingiber said dismissively. He proceeded to do a thorough scent inspection of the loveseat, muttering to himself about upstart kittens marking in his territory.

Distantly, the bells marking sunset on Sawelday began to ring.

Mal’s head came up at the sound. “Do we need to worry about being interrupted?”

She shook her head. “Unlikely. The Leafling Sisters may have been caring for this, but they wouldn’t come at this hour.”

But even as she spoke, the gate began to creak open.

They exchanged panicked looks. Or at least Gisele’s look was panicked; Mal’s was more inquiring. What did she want them to do?

“Hide,” she said urgently, pulling him in the opposite direction. She wasn’t ready for confrontation yet. There were only so many crises a person could cope with at once.

Mal scooped up a protesting Zingiber and returned him to his satchel.

Zingiber muttered about it damaging his reputation to be seen like this, but he subsided and pulled his head under the flap when Mal’s insignia swirled around them.

The misdirectional glamour wouldn’t conceal them if they called attention to themselves, he told her, but it should make people overlook them otherwise.

They took shelter in the shadows behind the Efanese rose trellis.

Gisele recognised the voices even before the king and queen appeared. She froze, half in fascination, half in dread. Eavesdroppers never hear anything good about themselves.

They were alone, her father carrying a lantern for the queen.

What were they doing here? Her mother led the way, stopping next to the fishpond.

Her father set the lantern down and put an arm around his wife.

It was clearly a private moment, and Gisele itched at witnessing it. Mal’s hand found hers and squeezed.

“Did you notice Maryna feeding ceremonial wafers to the ducks?” her mother said eventually, as if continuing an earlier conversation. As if this was a perfectly usual place for the pair of them to be.

Her father replied, “I thought it best for poor Alwine’s peace of mind to pretend not to. She was already in a flutter about her moving all those pebbles from the rock garden earlier.”

The queen let out a breath of laughter. “Yes. She’s so like Boern at that age. As much mischief as child.”

Her father chuckled. “I don’t remember you letting Boern get away with half as much as you let that child take you for.”

“The prerogative of a grandparent,” the queen said loftily.

“It’s not Boern she reminds me of,” the king said after a pause. His tone was careful, fully conscious that he’d chosen a dangerous subject to broach.

Gisele could only catch the edges of her mother’s expression in the lantern light. She seemed pensive rather than angry.

“No, it’s not Boern she reminds me of,” the queen agreed eventually, and the king’s shoulders relaxed. She let go of her husband’s hand to pull a pouch from her skirts, and Gisele held her breath as gold glittered in the lantern light.

“They’re all gold?” the king asked quietly.

“I inspected the Treasury myself, yesterday. Pure gold, every coin. Everything except that last bale.”

“And was it worth it?”

The queen looked at the king sharply. “It has to be, doesn’t it?”

Her father’s sigh was long. “I suppose it does.”