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Kael moved regally, chest proud and chin high, still every bit the King of the Unseelie Court. Yalde followed close behind, pulling out the chair at the end of the table and guiding Kael down into its seat. Then, he pulled out the chair to Kael’s right and beckoned Aisling over.

“Come now,” he chided gently when he saw her shining eyes. “No need for tears, sweetling. Join us.”

Hurt tugged at her heart, and its pull threatened to send her thoughts back into the dark place she’d been steadily trying to claw her way out of. Resigned, she moved toward the empty chair and sat. Yalde pushed it in, then took his own seat directly across from her.

The space was staged for a banquet far grander than this.

Formal place settings were laid out at every seat, but the chalices were dry.

Ornate trays were lined up end-to-end down the center of the table, all empty save for one laden with dark, withered fruits.

Aisling’s empty stomach turned. She hadn’t thought about food since arriving in Elowas.

Yalde nodded towards the fruit. “Try one.”

Aisling shook her head, imagining what Rodney would say.

If he’d been so reticent to allow her to eat in the Wild, surely he would outright forbid it here in the god realm.

Ignoring her protest, Yalde reached out and palmed one of the fruits.

He split it open easily, then laid the halves on Aisling’s plate.

The flesh inside was ruby red and full of plump arils like a pomegranate.

It smelled sickly sweet, almost rotten. It made her mouth water.

After a moment of observing her, Yalde sat back in his chair. “You share the same sort of hunger, you and the king.”

“Do we,” Aisling said, voice flat in an effort to hide the way her breath wavered.

He hummed, then cracked a wide and wicked smile. “Very much. I smell it on you; you reek of it. The hunger to be more—more than what was put upon you. To subvert what is expected of you. The Red Woman never wanted to be the Red Woman.”

Aisling clenched her jaw. The blindfolded god seemed to see everything; she hated how right he was. But instead of agreeing, she said, “I’ve grown to appreciate the title.”

“When it benefits you.”

“It has never benefitted me,” Aisling snapped, surprising even herself with the force behind her words. She’d been at the mercy of her prophecy since the Shadowwood Mother read it to her that night in the heart of the thicket. It had already taken so much, and she had so little left to give.

Yalde was only amused by her tone. “I can offer you the chance to be that ‘more’ you so desperately want to be. As I’ve done for him.”

“You’ve made him a captive of his own shadows.” The ember that Kael’s indifference to her had doused was glowing again, coming back to life. She dug her fingers into her thighs beneath the table, hard enough to bruise despite the way they still trembled.

“I’ve done no such thing,” Yalde countered. “I’ve merely allowed him the space for his magic to reach its fullest potential.”

“You’ve fed the shadows’ hunger, not Kael’s.” Black ribbons swirled around her, agitated by their mention.

“The two are one and the same.”

Aisling bit her tongue. They weren’t. She knew they weren’t. Didn’t she? After a moment, she asked, “Why him?”

“Merak may have taken my eyes, but I still possess enough Sight to know which Fae might be powerful enough to wield the magic I give them. Most would be torn apart. Your dear Kael very nearly was.” Yalde ran a hand over the top of Kael’s head, dragging it down heavily over his hair.

“He has long been my favorite. So reverent, so pious. Never questioning my word, my will—until he met you.”

Yalde’s third arm emerged from the folds of his cloak to lift a chalice to his mouth.

He sipped from it, dark tongue darting out to lick his thin lips to capture the flavor that lingered there.

But the vessel had been empty; it still was, when he lowered it back to the table. He noticed her watching.

“Aneiydh. A touch bitter this one, though not unpalatable. I wonder if you’d enjoy the taste.”

Aisling tried to suppress the shiver that followed his casual explanation by clenching her jaw harder. Gripping her thighs tighter. It didn’t work.

“You said we could discuss a price.”

“I said we could discuss it over a meal; you’ve not touched your food. Go on,” Yalde urged teasingly, “try a bite.”

“I’m not hungry,” Aisling hissed.

“Very well. Tell me, then: what makes you, a mortal, believe you are worthy of bargaining with me, a god?” He tapped his talons against the table; the sound echoed sharply around them. The pointed tips left divots where they struck wood.

Her fury faltered once more. For this, Aisling had no answer.

She wasn’t worthy, really. Not by her estimation.

She’d orchestrated Laure’s death; she’d instigated Kael’s.

Maybe if she’d been able to let him go, it would have been his aneiydh in that chalice.

Maybe his imprisonment would have come to an end eventually.

But she hadn’t—she’d sent his body to collect, and now every part of him was trapped.

Now he had value beyond what Yalde would consider parting with.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Yalde crooned as though he’d read her mind. “If I thought you so unworthy, I would not have invited you to dine with me. As it is, I’m rather enjoying our little back-and-forth.”

“There must be something you—” Aisling began, but Yalde cut her off.

“Do you enjoy games, dear?”

“Games?” His interruption was deflating, the stark diversion in focus catching her off guard.

“Riddles,” he clarified. “It has been so very long since I’ve had a willing player. If you solve my riddle, I will entertain this discussion on Kael’s price that you are so keen to have.”

A voice in her head—that rational voice of reason that had been at odds with nearly every choice she’d made since being named the Red Woman—was screaming at her. She tuned it out. “That’s all I have to do? Just solve one riddle?”

“I wouldn’t say just , sweetling. That wouldn’t be much of a game, would it? There must be stakes. The answer to my riddle will be your escape—fail to solve it, and you will remain trapped.”

“Trapped where?” She imagined herself perhaps draped in one of those heavy stone shrouds. Unable to shed its weight, rotting away beneath until it hung suspended where her form had been like all the rest.

Yalde’s cruel smile only grew. “Do you agree to my terms?”

Aisling looked at Kael, at his black eyes and the shadows that danced in them. “Fine.”

“Excellent.” Yalde clapped his hands together, the sound sharp and startling. “My riddle is in two parts. To answer the first, you must obey the second.”

Her eyes were still trained on Kael when she nodded.

“Are you listening, Aisling? I will not repeat myself.”

With some effort, she tore her gaze away and faced Yalde. She wouldn’t cower at his challenge. She squared her shoulders, lifted her chin, and nodded.

Yalde leaned forward, propping his chin on steepled fingers, and said,

“I belong to all things—I am many; I am one.

Discarnate yet corporeal; neither flesh nor phantom.

I may be hidden, but never outrun.”

Before Aisling even had a chance to begin working through the rhyme, Yalde spoke again:

“The answer you seek, you shall find

When you consume whole the seed, the pulp, and the rind.”

This one, she was quick to comprehend. Stowing the other away in the back of her mind, she looked at the glistening fruit on her plate. It would almost have been tempting if it weren’t for its blackened, shriveled skin and the stench of rot that rose from it.

Slowly, slowly, Aisling lifted one of the fruit’s ruby arils to her lips and pushed it inside her mouth.