Chapter 1
Aoife, Two thousand years later
Almost every day for the last two years, at least one thing made me wish I’d chosen death over being cursed.
Today, it was the sentient painting, who wouldn’t stop chattering as I tried to sign all the documents piled high on my desk.
Documents the king insisted I sign today despite the fact that I’d told him very clearly I’d planned to go swimming in the nearby creek.
I looked longingly out the window behind me at the forest that beckoned me, out of these dreary castle walls.
“And then,” Margaret said from where she stood inside the portrait of me holding a glowing golden sword, “I told Sir Arthur that there was no possible way your husband could beat you in a fight. Do you know what he said in return?”
My head snapped up. “Sir Arthur thinks Lor could win in a fight? Against me?” I pressed a hand to my chest. The suit of armor had been with me since Fairwitch first made me, and it was absurd that he actually thought my husband could beat me in combat.
Maybe I needed to attack Lor in front of Sir Arthur so he could see just how thoroughly I beat the king.
Margaret nodded, her angular dark brown eyes gleaming now that I was actually paying attention to her.
She shook her straight silky black hair behind her, so different from my coarse, thick hair that hung down my back.
“I couldn’t believe it either. I told Sir Arthur you’re Aoife the Warrior Queen.
You led an uprising against Fairwitch. You outwitted Fairwitch and turned yourself to stone before they could have you beheaded. You’re a legend.”
That mollified me a bit. I scrawled my signature across an edict to improve our single roadway that wound around the city of Fairwitch Isle, Lor’s signature underneath mine.
I hated the way he signed his documents, so precise and neat, every letter with the perfect curve and line, every signature the same.
In comparison, mine looked like a chicken got hold of the quill.
Lor just had to be perfect. In everything. In every way. It infuriated me, and I wasn’t sure why. Then again, everything about Lor tended to infuriate me from the very first moment I woke from my curse and saw his face hovering over mine, realizing what he’d done.
I signed yet another document, adding it to my “done” pile, then took a breath and stood to stretch my limbs, getting a flash of that ridiculous key tattooed on my wrist. Golden and shimmering.
Every resident of Fairwitch Isle had this key, and I’d learned it was the only way to ensure entry into the city.
If one didn’t have the key, they could not pass our border, but I hated it.
It felt like a branding, like a way to tie me to this place permanently.
My neck cracked as I bobbed it from shoulder to shoulder.
I’d been sitting in my office for far too long, and I walked behind the big wooden desk and around the small room with its maroon painted walls that matched maroon and gold stained glass windows.
I trailed my fingers over the books, tomes, and scrolls stuffed in the bookshelves, full of history and manifestos.
For mortals, that was. The faeries didn’t have a written history. The godwitches had ensured that.
We’d been forgotten about. It was almost like we’d forgotten ourselves as well. I hadn’t.
Just everyone else.
“Oh, and did you hear that Niamh is pregnant? Isn’t that wonderful news? We’re going to have a little Wolfgang baby.”
“Wonderful,” I murmured, not really caring.
I probably should have cared since Niamh was married to Lor’s brother, Wolfe.
But the truth was I’d never gotten to know the Wolfgangs.
I already couldn’t stand one of them, so no need to force myself into company with the rest. And there were so many.
Lor had three brothers, all of them married, and of course, both his parents.
A happy little family. The definition of picture perfect.
They wouldn’t know what to do with me, just like my husband didn’t know what to do with me: the orphan, the wild, emotional faerie queen with no idea how to be anything other than alone.
I continued my walk around the room, passing two velvet green chairs where I liked to sit at the end of the day and enjoy a brandy.
I drank alone, wondering how I’d gotten here, trapped again after fighting so hard for my freedom.
One enslavement traded for another. Queen of Fairwitch Isle, yet somehow still not in control of my life.
“I hope the baby has Niamh’s red hair. That would be so adorable,” Margaret said. “Just think, in less than a year, you’ll have a bouncing baby to play with.” She squealed. “Oh I can’t wait!”
The thought softened me a bit. I loved babies.
Probably because the Fair Folk had so little of them.
I shuddered, remembering how Fairwitch had forced us to reproduce, to make more slaves for them and the other godwitches.
So many Fair Folk were either created by Fairwitch or bred by them.
It was worse that we couldn’t procreate with each other—so many female slaves were raped by men to try and impregnate them.
I’d been spared from that fate, but my life had still not been an easy one.
To have a baby born of love, well that was something, and I had to admit, I yearned for it.
Not that I’d ever have it, not when I was married to a man who hated me, whom I hated.
My mood turned sour.
“What do you think they’ll name it?” Margaret said. “I’m putting in a petition for Margaret if it’s a girl. I had a big influence on Wolfe and Niamh’s relationship, you know. Did you ever hear the story of how they got together? It’s quite a tale.”
I turned, plastering a smile on my face. “Thank you, Margaret, but I need to get back to work now.” I shifted my gaze meaningfully toward my desk and walked back behind it, sitting down and staring at the document waiting for my signature.
Margaret’s hands floated to her cheeks. “Oh, of course. Before I go, do you have any messages you’d like me to send to the king? I’m going to His Majesty’s office right now.”
“No,” I said absently, distracted by what I was looking at.
My blood turned to fire as I stared at the scroll that I’d submitted for Lor’s signature. Yet the line where his signature was supposed to be was painfully empty. I couldn’t read the whole thing, but I knew what it said anyway because I’d asked my advisor to help me draft it.
Right then, the door to my office burst open, my advisor strolling in, tail flicking behind her as a pink bookwyrm followed.
“Meera,” I said to the faerie cat. “What is this?” I held up the scroll.
Morton slithered up beside Meera, his head perking up, his dragon wings flapping.
“I can eat it, if you’d like,” he said.
I inhaled deeply.
“Please don’t,” Meera said, round green eyes flicking toward the bookwyrm.
He huffed. “You’ve known me for nearly four years now. You’d think you’d be used to my magic.”
Magic left by the godwitches. Gifts for the mortals upon their departure from our world.
Morton was a little worm with a dragon’s head and wings. He also ate books, likely a gift left by the godwitch of knowledge. I’d always hated them. Every time they visited Fairwitch, they’d sneer at all the slaves, acting so much better than us.
“Well I haven’t gotten used to it,” Meera said, “and if you eat that bloody scroll in front of me, I’m going to vomit.”
Morton raised his head, glassy black eyes blinking. “I have to watch you spit up furballs, but you can’t handle me eating a book or a scroll? You do know that many value my magic.”
“Enough.” I rubbed my temples. “I don’t need you to eat this, Morton.
I know its contents.” I swallowed back the reminder that Fair Folk weren’t taught to read, weren’t allowed, but Morton had been coming to give me lessons since I’d woken up two years ago.
I’d made a lot of progress but not enough to read a complex document like this, but I did know enough to see the blank line where Lor had not signed his name.
I held it up and showed it to Meera. “Why didn’t Lor sign this?”
“Uh oh,” Margaret said from the painting while Morton’s tongue flicked out like he was nervous.
“You’d have to ask His Majesty,” Meera said in her lazy tone. I’d gone through five different advisors before finally finding Meera, who’d been with me for six months now.
The cat wasn’t afraid of me, not like all my other advisors, tiptoeing around, not really telling me what they thought. A little bit like Morton, who was currently frozen, staring at me with wide eyes like I might shoot fire out of my mouth at any moment.
Margaret still stood in the painting, arching her neck, no doubt wanting to see exactly what was on that scroll.
I stood from my desk and started pacing in front of the windows, already feeling that familiar prickle of anger on the back of my neck, once again because of something Lor had done.
“Why wouldn’t he sign this? It’s not like I’m asking him to give up his crown.
All I want is for our schedules to be rearranged. ”
“Rearranged so that you no longer have to see His Majesty?” Meera asked, though she damn well knew the answer.
She’d drafted this thing for me. She’d been taught to read and write at some point, like all the Fair Folk. Except me. I still remembered the mortifying moment I’d found out I was the only one who didn’t know how to read.
At a council meeting, full of both mortals and Fair Folk, all of them reviewing a document that I didn’t understand.
As I watched the Fair Folk in the room look at the parchment that outlined the duties set forth for me as queen, I realized they’d learned, and no one had thought to even offer me lessons, to tell me this pivotal piece of information.
So I’d sought out the bookwyrm on my own, asked him to teach me.
It was a painfully slow process, but I was improving.
I thought the king would agree to my plan. He didn’t want to see me any more than I wanted to see him. It was not the first time Lor had proven himself to be an utter arse.
I held it up, crumpling it in my fist. “And? What’s so bad about that?
We don’t have to attend every single function and event and meeting together.
We can do these things separately and communicate through all of you.
” I swept my hand toward Meera and Morton.
“Why do I have to check the magical barrier around Fairwitch Isle with him by my side? I am capable of looking at the barrier to see if there’s any weak spots all on my own.
Lor can come when it’s convenient for him. ”
“That’s why I’m here actually,” Meera said. “You’re late, Your Majesty.” She flashed her teeth.
I held up the scroll. “Not according to this schedule. According to this schedule I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be, having my reading lessons with Morton.”
“Do you mean to tell me this hasn’t been approved by His Majesty?” Morton asked. “Am I breaking the rules by being here?”
“No,” I snapped at the same time as Meera said, “Technically, yes.”
The pink bookwyrm let out a squeak, wings fluttering.
“Lor didn’t sign off and approve that schedule change,” Meera said.
“I don’t care.” I turned to stare out the windows, at the magnificent view of the little town of Fairwitch Isle. Faeries and mortals filled the cobblestone road that wound around our castle, milling about, darting in and out of our many businesses.
Dark green canopies stretched as far as the eye could see, sloping downward. It was a lovely view, one that I was thankful for. This view meant I was alive, no longer stone.
I turned abruptly.
“It’s better I don’t go to the border with Lor. That way I won’t have to resist the urge to shove him right through the bloody barrier and out of Fairwitch Isle.”
Meera snorted, and Morton gasped in horror.
“I’m not speaking for His Majesty,” Meera said slowly, “but if I were, I imagine he would not agree to something like that because it would not be in the best interest of your people for their rulers to be so separate.”
Of course. That’s all Lor ever cared about. Certainly not what was in the best interest of his wife.
Fire heated my blood. “What’s in the best interest of our people is not being subject to the constant bickering of their king and queen.”
“Her Majesty does have a point,” Margaret said.
“You wouldn’t bicker all the time if you would try to see his point of view,” Meera said evenly.
I rolled my eyes. “Not you too. Why doesn’t he try to see my point of view? Why is he always right?”
Meera jumped up onto my desk, her black fur silken and shimmering under the sun that streamed through the windows. “Would you like to know what I think?”
“Not particularly.”
She gave me a pointed stare. “I think that you’re so afraid of being controlled that you push His Majesty away to protect yourself. But if you were open to it, you and His Majesty could be partners, could complement each other.”
I scoffed. Except for the fact that Lor loved controlling every part of my life. Just like my former master.
“Margaret.” I turned toward the painting, ignoring my adviser. The painting froze now that my attention was on her.
“Yes?”
I smiled, thinking of the look on Lor’s face when I didn’t show up to his precious little border check. “I have a message for you to send to His Majesty after all.”