Failure! Everything that’s happened is my fault. Almost unquestionably. All of everything started when we got to town and Olly had that memory and I let it slip that there was more about the person in his dream-thing than met the eye.

  I knew even then I shouldn’t have said anything! But I did anyways. That moment of me being mad just set everything else in motion. Well, everything except Ayre getting jumped, I guess. Which also means that I’m not technically responsible for Olly getting kidnapped and hurt….

  But everything else!

  I continue despondently flying(I am far too downtrodden for fluttering, flitting or flapping) my way through the forest. Traveling vaguely in the direction of what I think should be home. But I’m not even certain of that! After leaving, I haven’t felt the draw and connection to home I used to.

  What was once unerring, even annoying at times, and reliable has left me because of my decision to leave on this doomed journey. Why did Father even let me go? He can’t have felt like this was a possible outcome, could he? He’s kind and gentle like Olly. He would have said something to me if he felt like this was a possibility.

  So why didn’t he? Probably the same reasons why he apparently didn't tell me all kinds of things!

  I settle on a broad branch. It’s getting late, and I’ve been going like this for the better part of two hours without any certainty that I’m even going in the right direction. The trees here are all mundane and look identical. In the Mineralis forest on our borders there were at least intermittent trees based on different pretty metals to act as landmarks. Out here it’s just “Oh, that one has an extra branch!”

  As the evening starts to darken the skies and the area around me falls into the twilit darkness of a moonless night, I feel my mood painted in the same palette, on the same canvas. The surrounding trees start to close in, seeming to loom towards me like just-so-many judgmental people mocking me for thinking I belonged out in the world.

  None of us do. Every other fae in the world knows that except for me, apparently. That’s why everyone stays at home, creating the grand tapestry of tale and song. Pure storytelling, done for its own sake, just to explore for the sake of exploration.

  But why bother? Our stories are just memories of memories of Father's near endless tales, and they are all the stories of mortals. Why recount and retell something we don’t even want to have a part in?

  But…it’s not all fae. The Court of Dreams and Desires explicitly continually gets involved with the mortal kyn. The Court of Secrets and Shadows plays active roles in cultivating the intrigue they so desire. And the Court of Blood and Rust actively wars with mortals, don’t they? Sure, that war was forced upon them initially, but they kept going.

  And there’s Father. Who, the more I think on it, the more I realize that he must have the same wanderlust as me, right? Or I have the same as him?

  Maybe I was just born into the wrong Court. Fathers principia that saw me come into being were just clearly not aligned with Tale and Song. But…I love stories. I love histories and music. I can’t have been born into the wrong court. I am those concepts just as well as anyone else.

  So why am I so dissatisfied at home? Why am I sitting here feeling this aching pain in my chest, my heart, over two mortals who I probably shouldn’t even be involved with anyways? Ayre was so mad. I’ve never seen her that mad before. She wanted me gone, like I’d worried, and I can’t even blame her.

  From her and Olly’s perspective, I did something worse than betraying them. A betrayal would have a payoff. There would be conflict to work through, maybe come to an understanding in the end: kiss and make up or go our separate ways.

  But no, what I did was say “no.” There’s no poetry in it. No narrative throughline. No tropes or trials.

  The decree of the court is just….”no”. And I can’t even say I understand why! I don’t know all of the details! I just have to abide by the rules because they’re rules! Why is that fair? If the rules hurt someone, then we have to look at them again. Exceptions happen!

  I continue on like that for a long time, every circle I trace around the outside of the topic keeps edging me closer and closer to just giving up. If I don’t belong in the Court because I’ll never be happy there, and I can’t be with my friends because I hurt them, then where does that leave me?

  I’ve heard of fae getting tired of eternity and choosing to change themselves permanently in many different ways, even going so far as to just…stop.

  That thought gives me pause, sending up a series of warning signals in my mind. A fae reaching that point means they go against everything that what we are is. I don’t…think I want that. I can change things, probably. Even worst case scenario I could always just…Transform into something mundane and live, right? Or go visit a different court and see if I fit in there?

  I feel strung out. I’ve spent hours crying off and on, so much time just staring into the distance, and I’m no closer to an answer. It’s left me just so tired.

  So I guess I’ll just sleep. See what tomorrow holds. “At least I won’t have my sleep interrupted!” I think, but even the joking comment reminds me that I’m alone. Probably truly alone for the first time. I just curl up in a crook of this branch, trying to be as small as I can be and wait for an annoyingly nonsensical dream to batter my unwitting consciousness.

  Nonsense dreams aren’t what comes, though. Instead a vague nightmare does. I’ve never had nightmares before. Even bad dreams, really. As much as I’ll complain about my dreams making no sense I never walk away from them feeling bad.

  This one, though, brings all kinds of negative feelings that are hard to make sense of. As it progresses, I find a repeating and acute sense of loss, dizziness, and confusion. The sensation makes it hard to focus on what exactly is making me feel that way. Interspersed are also spikes of terrible pain.

  It ends abruptly when I feel a sudden gut wrenching pain in my chest followed by the most uncanny feeling of invasion that I can imagine. Like something reaching its hands into my brain and plucking it apart with a fine comb. It’s followed shortly after by a raw temptation. Something that makes me want more than anything I’ve ever felt before. It’s so nonspecific though that I can’t really wrap my head around the feeling.

  Gratefully, as a seemingly final spike of awful pain in the right side of my chest runs it's course, I find myself awake with the morning glow just starting to paint the world. I sit up abruptly and see nothing but white in every direction except up. My mind is racing as I try to process everything alongside apparently no longer being where I was when I fell asleep. The dream felt wholly overwhelming in a way that makes me want to cry after all of the negative feelings.

  Blinking my eyes to clear the sleep haze, I realize the white is…fur. Fur that, after reaching out to examine, is soft and satiny. At my touch, it begins to move, a section on my left turning inwards to reveal an angular face with golden eyes staring down at me.

  “Princess.”

  “Slinks!”

  With a brightening expression dawning, I throw myself forward and hug the overlarge stoat, taking handfuls of his fur. The night's terrors seem to boil away with the realization that I’m not alone. “Why are you touching me like that? Hat, why is she touching me like that?” Slinks responds, utterly deadpan, but his true response shines through with him wiggling into the contact, enjoying the rubs and the hug.

  I sit back, feeling a little embarrassed at the strength of my reaction. “Sorry…I just…I had a bad night and seeing you made me feel a bit better.”

  “Hat says you aren’t supposed to be alone. It’s why we stayed. I wanted to leave, but Hat wouldn’t let me.” His golden eyes loom, interrogative, belying intelligence beyond what most people would expect from his speech patterns.

  “Oh.” I hang my head, ”I…had to leave the others.” Actually, I can talk to Slinks! He’s of the Court! The realization buoys me considerably. “Can I ask you a couple questions, Slinks?”

  His long, snakey, neck wobbles side to side in consideration before he peers upwards at the hat and then promptly sighs. “Fine. The Traveller said I’m supposed to help you when I can. Answering questions is easy help. Also, Hat wants to know what’s going on.”

  Drawing in a deep breath, I launch into an explanation of the events since we last saw one another and I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more bored expression on any creature for the duration. Slinks does seem to lean forward throughout, extending the hat to be closer to me, maybe to let the spirit hear more clearly.

  After I finish, up to waking up this morning, Slinks sits quietly for a while.

  A long while, actually. He closes his eyes even. “Slinks?” I ask, poking his cheek with a single extended finger.

  “What?”

  “Do you have anything to say?” I put my hands on my hips, feeling a little indignant at his cold response.

  “You didn’t ask me any questions. I thought you were done.” He manages to communicate a very relatable shrug despite his…being a stoat. “Hat said you needed to ‘get it off your chest’. It’s now ‘off your chest’ so I thought my part was done.” He eyes me harshly, “Questions? Or you just want my thoughts?”

  I take a second to compose myself, reminding myself that Slinks has been Awake for maybe a month and trying to mentally cut him some slack. “I wasn’t very clear. I wanted to ask what you thought of the situation and what you thought I should do.”

  “Oh. That’s easy. The situation is stupid. Everything you said means you wanted to tell the magic boy the truth. Tell the magic boy the truth. Rules are not worth you feeling bad. Rules are stupid. Simple.” He pauses for a second, looking up at the hat. “Hat says I should say that you aren’t stupid because my wording might “imply” that. Hat is wrong. I am not implying that. I am saying that. I think you are being stupid.” He abruptly winces and looks up at the hat accusingly and scrapes the hat against the bark of the tree while arguing with it for a few moments.

  “Why do you say I’m being stupid? I can’t break the Court’s rules, Slinks.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m a member of the Court! I’m bound by those same decrees, the same as anyone else. Being princess doesn’t change that.” I clarify, feeling a little exasperated at the obvious explanation. Slinks really should underst-

  “No, you’ren’t. Hat says so. Hat is usually right, so you’re probably stupid. Just break the rules. Break things you don’t like. It feels good.”

  That hits me like an anvil dropped from on high. “What do you mean?”

  “I spoke clearly. You’ren’t in the Court. You left. Hat says you…” He pauses, concentration visible on his face for a second, “So many words. Hat says ‘your connection is severed, you are no longer bound by the conventions of the fae and do not belong in or to the court.’”

  The words are like a yawning pit opening up in front of me, willing me to jump in. I’m no longer part of the court? Does that mean I can’t go home? Or can I no-

  “Hat says you are panicking. Stop panicking. Hat says, “You still have an Elysian gate, and s-” Slinks stops abruptly, violently shaking his head back and forth a few times. “No, too many words. Hat says you are “free” to do what you want. That means breaking rules. Break the rules, breaking things you don’t like feels good.” Another pause. “I don’t care if it’s too simple. It's what you are saying. No, you. No. Not going to.”

  His words stop me dead in my tracks. Slinks has a…unique way with words that really manages to cut right to the quick on most things.

  “You know, Slinks? Thanks. You’ve been a big help.” The behatted stoat stares at me expectantly, eyes narrowing. “What? I said thanks?”

  “Thought you might pay me for the help.”

  All I can do is stare back at him. “You…want me to pay you? I don’t have coin. Where would I put it?” This creature is bizarre, even by Fae standards…but then again, that’s because he really isn’t much of a Fae in any way other than a technicality. He’s just a sole, singular Slinks.

  I swear, he frowns. I’ve never seen a stoat look sad, but his hangdog expression looks so pathetic that it actually hurts to look at. He even goes so far as to roll onto his side, writhing around as if in agony. Ridiculous. “Alright…fine…I’ll do…something, I guess.”

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  I conjure him a couple pieces of candy and he instantly perks back up and crunches down on one with a force that makes my teeth hurt.

  “Thanks. These are good.”

  “You’re welcome, Slinks. Thank yo—Ow! Owww!” I stagger forward, clutching at my chest, a sudden awful pain coming through it. All of those feelings from my the dream, but like they’re concentrated down into a single moment of time. It drops me to my knees and makes my eyes water with the severity, but after a few moments it passes and leaves me gasping.

  When I look up, I see Slinks has conjured up a veritable field of tiny metal fragments of varying sizes and shapes and is looking around, alert. He even wrapped himself partially around me. It’s oddly heartening to see him react so and gives me a better idea of his actual feelings, I think.

  Between ragged breaths, I pat his flank, right over where my personal crest is glowing. “It’s okay, Slinks. That was…inside. Well, mostly. I think it means something bad is happening to my friends.”

  Slinks twists in place as the fragments pop into freed essence one by one over the span of a second or so. “If you know that, Is there a fight? I will go fight. Need to practice.”

  With intense focus, I try to reach into the connection between Olly and I in order to get an idea of the direction because I am quite lost at this point. It takes the better part of ten seconds, but I get a vague idea of at least what direction to travel, but not the distance. I point in that direction.

  “To the crown? Sorry, the mountain?” Slinks sounds thoughtful. “It never gets closer. We have been going there for days.”

  “I doubt they’re at the mountains. We’ll probably hit a road and find them somewhere along it. It’s where I saw them last.” Getting to my feet is hard while the phantoms of that pain still remain, but I mostly manage aside from a stagger that Slinks intercedes in to prevent turning into a fall.

  “You should not walk. I will carry you.” Another pause, “Yes, I’m doing something nice. No, I want to fight. Yes. Yes. Get on, Lilidh.”

  I wait politely for the offer, I had hoped that he would ask. Once again, despite his quirks, Slinks doesn’t let me down. The perfect rival. Also, I always really dreamed about riding him those years he was my “rival”, so this is a dream come true. It’s a thought that lifts my spirits and helps me feel a bit more optimistic.

  I snag a handful of his fur and flutter my wings to hop atop him. His fur feels so soft that it actually distracts me for a second as I settle, but he cranes his neck back and looks at me upside down. The look makes me giggle, but he appears to be absolutely dead serious. It must just be an easier way to move I guess.

  “Hold on tight. You will not hurt me. If you fall off, I am not stopping and will tell Backpack to eat you so we can keep moving.” I smile and nod, taking a firm hold of his fur as he braces and hops down off the low branch we’d been on. The moment he hits the ground, he’s in motion. I’ve seen him run in the past, before he awoke, and he was always fast. But now? Enhanced with my magic and his own sorcery? I nearly fall off when he bursts into bounding motion.

  He moves with an unerring certainty, reacting to obstacles with a speed and alacrity I would struggle to match moving half this speed. It’s all I can do to just cling to him with my hands and grip with my legs. I just peer alongside his neck, my worldview constantly bouncing as things start to feel familiar. Specific stands of trees that I passed last night when Ayre and I were chasing Olly.

  I tap Slinks’s head and shout to veer right. He doesn’t respond verbally but steadily curves his trajectory. As I watch, I see a clearing coming up ahead and Slinks bursts out into it, skittering across flagstones as he comes to a stop.

  I look around once he’s stabilized and try to get my bearings on direction, but I hear an exclamation from behind us. Slowly turning in place, I see the four women from our first night in the town, loaded up for travel. “Huh. Curious question. Is that a fairy riding a weasel with a hat? Am I still poisoned?” The one in the lead says, looking unsure of herself as she gestures at us.

  I decide to take a risk, raising my voice. “Which way is town?”

  All four of them jump, seemingly shocked out of a stupor at seeing us. After a moment, a handful of them point back down the road, meaning we need to go the opposite direction. “Thanks! If I see you again I will give you a small blessing of your choosing! Slinks, that way!”

  Slinks had been crouching low with a threatening posture towards the adventurers, but he delays not at all after I give him the direction. He takes a couple leaping strides to build up momentum before shouting at his hat flatly. “Hat, motion. Hold on, princess.”

  I cling harder while smiling in anticipation. I try to keep my eyes open, though, and see motes of essence starting to emit from the backpack. Essence that looks like droplets of flowing quicksilver. His request to Hat dawns on me the moment whatever spell he was working actually activates.

  Slinks takes three loping hops to gain some height, and on the final leap, all the collecting motion essence suddenly lurches inwards and into Slinks’s body. For a brief moment, I see a lambent essencelight radiating through his body, but after a few seconds, it dissipates, and in place of the glow, Slinks’s fur has taken on the same quicksilver sheen as the essence, seeming to be vibrating with potential energy.

  When he hits the ground, I get to experience going faster than I ever have before.

  Slinks’s strides smooth out across the open road, speeding to the point that it almost seems like he’s gliding over the ground, not running. All while my hair whips and wings flutter, leaving a trail of golden dust mixing with the silver essence bleeding off the streaking stoat.

  Along the remainder of the journey I feel the occasional pang of pain or loss. But they’re mixed in with feelings of concentration, small victories. It starts to paint the picture that Olly has to be in a fight — and one where he’s taking a serious beating and seeming to give as good as he’s getting.

  We break out into more wide open plains and leave the blurred browns and greens of the forest behind us. Slinks slows fractionally and directs himself up a nearby hill with a solitary tree perched atop it. While I expect him to stop there, he just pounces once and directs his motion up the tree to a middling branch for a viewpoint. It leaves my head spinning and wondering how he’s managing to keep up this pace and still focusing well enough to go from point to point.

  “What are we looking for?” He cranes his neck back, upside down again, and gives me a quizzical look. A look that seems to be blurring just a hair from the full body vibrations he’s emitting constantly.

  I open my mouth to respond when a bright flash erupts from a mile or so down the road, around a bend. It’s hot, fiery red, and after the flash I see a plume of flames blast into the air. “Uh. There, I think.”

  “Oh. Right. The weird animal. She owes me meat. Okay.” He coils fractionally and catapults us off the branch, landing a few dozen feet down onto the roadway again. I have to assume he controls the descent with the motion essence, too, but that’ll be a question for later.

  He rockets down the road once he makes contact and I set about preparing what I can.

  [Guardian blade, gifted by grace, guide my hand!]

  I call upon my rapier and hold it tight. I never got a chance to repair or replace my shield, so it’ll have to do.

  Slinks rounds the bend without slowing, just swinging to the outer edge of the road and taking the turn as tightly as he can and when we complete the turn it’s feels like time stops for a brief moment. The scene before me looks really bad.

  They’re fighting on a section of the roadway that has been torn up by magical blasts and physical impacts, flagstones are torn up and thrown around. Many magical spines are sticking out of random sections of the terrain and slowly dissipating into freed essence. There was some structure over behind the two of my companions but it’s fallen into rubble. And at seeming random, there’s a handful of actively burning trees.

  Both Olly and Ayre look battered, but in different ways. Olly looks broken — laying down on the ground, struggling to get to his feet in apparently agonizing pain. Ayre has the odd cut here and there and it’s leading to a fair bit of her steaming blood dripping down on the ground from her. Worse than that, one of her wings looks entirely ruined: blackened with char with most of the leathery bits burned away. She is still standing strong, but she looks exhausted.

  Opposite them is something I can only assume is one of the monsters that Vari was talking about and that OIly has been dreaming of. Its form is distinctly purple and crystalline like Olly’s arm, but its features are hazy and indistinct. Like I’m looking at a lens that’s out of focus and smudged. Whenever I focus on a specific detail, that one just gets less clear. Viewed as a whole I have the impression of a stretched human woman, but with more monstrous proportions and features. The creature is stalking towards them and appears no worse for wear after however many rounds with them it has gone.

  Before I can say anything, Slinks speaks and acts. Apparently having better battle instincts than me and wanting to take advantage of nobody knowing we’re here yet.. “Hat, metal. Get off, I need to move.” As metal fragments materialize around the stoat he tilts his head only a hair to indicate my moving. The moment I’m mostly off his back, he makes two loping strides to get back up to speed with his metal fléchettes — heading directly at the massive, blurry monster that’s menacing my friends.

  My eyes are stuck to him like a magnet. He takes a wider path in order to arrive behind the monster, his steps carrying effectively no noise other than the slight whistle of his crowd of metal escorts.

  The creature is starting to push onto Ayre, who is fighting defensively to buy Olly time to move. Ayre notices the quicksilver blur and misses a block because of it — the monster laying open her off-arm — and I feel terrible, but I hope Slinks has a plan.

  Reaching whatever specifications he needs: distance, speed, and any number of other factors, he fires himself at the creature from behind by expending all of the remaining motion essence in his body, right in its blind spot. He collides with the creature, landing deftly and opening his mouth wide —wider than it has any right to be opening — and sinks spell-enhanced teeth into the base of the creatures neck while his projectiles arrive with a series of wet shnk shnk shnk pops into the things back, centering along its spine.

  The monster starts to turn just a fraction of a second before Slinks’s impact knocks it creature forward towards Ayre, who steps to the side to get out of the way and grabbing Olly and dragging him off to the side. When he sinks his bite into the creature I hear the crunch. It sounds disgustingly similar to the noise he makes when he bites into hard candies — a connection that makes me feel immediately ill to think about. But it also causes the creature to convulse and faceplant forward as its legs seemingly fall out from under it, only for it to let out an extended hiss of pain when a swarm of metal fragments bury themselves inside its spine.

  With the monster thoroughly distracted by a snarling and snapping stoat, I dart in the direction of my companions, flapping with all of my might. Ayre spots my movement, and I see the biggest smile she’s ever had grow across her face. It’s a little marred by the blood she’s covered in, but it’s still the most beautiful thing I’ve seen all day. Olly has a more restrained reaction of rolling on the ground in crippling pain, groaning and wheezing wetly.

  I rise with a final zip up and incant with a flourish.

  [Stretch and shift my shape and size, let me see through mortal eyes!]

  After the flash and uncomfortable stretching, I land in a crouch next to the two of them. “First I really want to say I’m sor-”

  “Not now, Lilly. I can’t leave Slinks alone.” Ayre sharply cuts me off. “That thing hit Olly with something that I think is burrowing in his skin to mess with his regeneration. Do what you can for him.” Ayre reaches down to her phial case and takes out her last one and quickly tosses it in her mouth and bites down. She swallows once, and I see some fire come back to her eyes. With a last glance my way, she spins her glaive with a flourish into a ready position and breaks into a brief run to join the fight.

  I watch for a second longer, trying to get an idea of how Slinks is doing. At some point he dismounted the creature and is keeping its back to us by darting side to side and peppering it with fléchettes at every opportunity. Ayre will be there soon — I see her drawing Ignia to her, even, as the area around her path frosts over with her passage — and that should be in hand for a little while at least.

  Looking down, I see Olly’s new outfit is doing okay — a good purchase I guess — except for a couple spots where it looks like he got run through by a fence post. One on the right side of his chest near the top, exactly where I’d felt that shared crippling pain, and the other in his stomach, looking much more recent. As I look there, I see what Ayre meant, his skin is moving unnaturally there in a uniquely-uncomfortable-to-look-at way. What did that thing do to him?

  I begin a simple incantation to try to disrupt the ongoing effect so I can heal Olly properly but struggle to focus so I just speak my desires in as singsong a voice as I can manage. The World will understand the extenuating circumstances.

  [Please just make all of those awful worm things go away forever, Olly really deserves better than whatever this is and we really, really have to be getting onto fighting a monster!]

  And when I finish it, I see that section under his skin slowly stop moving before coming to a full halt and then seemingly breaking down into a purple flash of essence beneath his skin. Olly instantly relaxes for a second, before immediately trying to look everywhere at once, actually making eye contact with me for the first time. “Sorry about earlier, Lilly.” His voice is beyond strained, sounding equal parts exhausted and depressed. “I need to get back to it.”

  “No, you idiot, I’m going to heal you and then we’re going together. We’re never doing something this stupid alone ever again. Sit still.” I put my rapier point down in the ground within reach and focus, trying to drown out the whoosh of Ayre’s flames mixed with the constant patter of Slinks’s projectiles.

  [Make this one hearty, keep this one hale, guard, please, his body, and help him prevail]

  Golden light suffuses Olly’s body, rushing forth from my wings. He gets a hazy, distant look for a second — something that almost always happens when I use my magic on him — but he refocuses with a smile as I watch the wounds on his belly and chest dissipate quickly and hear the disconcerting sounds of bones resetting themselves.

  “Alright. Are you good to move, Olly?” I stand and extend both of my hands down to him. He extends his left and I lean back hard to haul him up. People are heavy!

  “Yeah. Let’s see if we can’t put an end to this.” His statement is punctuated by a sudden bang, a high pitch squeal of pain, and then a wet sounding thud. I turn and see Slinks lying prone, charred and smoking, at the base of a large tree. He doesn’t move afterwards, and I feel a wealth of emotions come screaming into my brain as I pull my rapier from the ground and begin to incant one of the few combat oriented spells of Court of Tale and Song. One my father spoke into being while fighting a terrible beast with eyes of flame that has remained with us since — for the rare times we have to defend ourselves.

  I brace myself for the effect — causing deliberate harm is something anathemic to the fae. Sometimes it's necessary, though. As the spell begins to settle, I feel my vision shift as Elysia washes out from me in waves, pouring forth from the damaged gate my father gave me at the time of my creation to highlight the points of weaknesses in everything around. Glowing like lighthouses in my vision and causing my rapier to twitch in my hand as the incantation fills it with a killing urge.

  In Ayre, I see her heart, brain, wings, and an ephemeral haze that I've understand represents her uncertainties.

  In Olly, I see no visible weaknesses except for the welt of potent essence in his arm. None of his organs read as vital to the magic.

  In the monster, though, I see multiple blindingly bright points that shift around, moving away from threats whenever Slinks or Ayre threaten it.

  Those are my targets.

  I finish the incantation with a snap of power that sees the air around me ripple and crack — words of power wrought by the essence of Creation to protect its denizens slipping from my mouth in a voice that feels almost unfamiliar to my ears as I stride forward alongside Olly.

  [One, two!]

  [One, two!]

  [And through and through!]

  [This vorpal blade goes snicker-snack!]