Chapter 61 - f

The fire crackled in the center of the camp, but the real heat came from the arguing.

"I'm just saying," Cú Chulainn growled, pacing in uneven loops like a caged beast, "Ireland had spine before you showed up. Warriors. Champions. You took all that and wrapped it in prayer beads and shame."

Saint Patrick, seated ramrod straight on a fallen log, didn't flinch. "I gave Ireland structure. Order. Charity. A sense of higher purpose."

"You gave it taxes and priests who wouldn't know a good duel if it bit them!" Cú snarled.

"I gave them hope."

"You gave them celibacy, you cassocked eunuch!" Cú barked.

Patrick stood abruptly, eyes flashing with more divine annoyance than holiness. "And yet you drank blood like it was breakfast and called it bravery. I turned raiders into citizens."

"You turned kings into monks!"

"I saved souls."

"You neutered a nation!"

"You—"

"Okay," I said, holding up a hand. "If someone doesn't throw a punch in the next five minutes, I swear I'm making popcorn."

Not that I had popcorn. But if a bag of wind and anti-immunity mojo could fall out of the sky, maybe the Black Suns were handing out snacks next.

The saint and the hound glared at each other like they'd come to blows over a flag and a bar tab.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the fire, another storm was brewing.

"You call him just?" Morgan's voice rose like smoke. She stood with her arms crossed, glaring daggers at the Green Knight, who hadn't moved from his seat but radiated calm disapproval.

"Arthur was a good man," the knight said simply, as if that were that.

Morgan scoffed. "He was a figurehead. A puppet for the noble class who couldn't stomach the idea of a peasant uprising."

"He brought peace to the isles."

"He brought bureaucracy to murder. I watched him sign off on prima nocta, tax codes that starved towns, and decrees that let his knights steal from farmers as 'military collection.'"

The Green Knight slowly looked up from his blade. "He outlawed blood feuds. Forged unity where there was only chaos."

"He raised castles from corpses and called it order." She sneered. "Do you know what he did to my sisters? To Avalon?"

"I know you abandoned court," he replied evenly. "And threw your lot in with vipers."

"Because I'd seen the lion up close. Your 'noble king' was too busy polishing his image to notice his kingdom was rotting from the inside out."

"You twist truth into bitterness."

"And you whitewash history with poetry and prayer."

Across the fire, Cú grunted. "At least your king didn't outlaw cattle raids."

Patrick spun around. "Because your people were still drawing in caves!"

"I hope the snakes I banished come back and chew your ankles off!" He continued.

Sif rolled over with a groan and covered her ears with one paw. Thalien was meditating, eyes closed, fingers laced together like he was trying to phase into a more peaceful dimension.

I, meanwhile, sat back on my pack and just watched.

This was theater. High-stakes, myth-soaked, chaos-laced theater. Legendary warriors and mages arguing like tired roommates during finals week.

Above it all, the Bladed Tree loomed on the horizon.

The Autumn Court's capital glowed faintly under the starlight—its tower-branches spread like a clawed hand over the city, its highest chamber alight with preparations for a coronation built on lies. Carriages still trickled in along glittering roads. Flying beasts circled like slow vultures. The very roots of the castle twisted into the bedrock below, pulsing faintly with magic.

The fire had burned low. The others had quieted, lost to sleep or reflection or whatever passes for rest before you storm a throne.

I didn't expect Morgan to sit beside me. Not gently, not quietly like that. No rustle of magic, no sharp retort. Just the sound of her cloak brushing the grass.

She didn't speak at first. Just looked ahead, eyes fixed on the distant silhouette of the Bladed Tree, where torchlight flickered in its bone-white branches like lanterns hung in a gallows, even if it's eternally noon.

"I came here after Camelot fell."

Her voice wasn't sharp this time. It was soft, almost frail under the wind. Like it hadn't been used for that kind of truth in a long while.

"Everything burned after Arthur died. The court, the round table, the stories. People were screaming for order, for vengeance, for a hundred different kings. And me? They blamed."

She paused, clasping her hands in her lap, thumb nervously brushing the back of her knuckles.

"They blamed me for everything. For the betrayal. For the blood. For not dying with the rest."

A bitter breath slipped past her lips. "I thought... maybe if I came here, the Faewylds could offer me something else. A new path. A better one. I was still young enough to hope."

Her voice dropped further.

"I left behind my son."

That quiet admission knocked the air out of my chest. She didn't say the name, but it didn't matter. There was only one son a woman like her would speak of in that tone.

"Mordred. I don't even know what became of him. Whether he died at Camlann, or somewhere after... I fled."

She looked down at her hands. Pale. Trembling. Barely fingers at all in the light—they could've been shadows.

"The Baroness of Winter found me wandering the border. She didn't threaten me. Not at first. She taught. She listened. She was... kind, even."

Morgan gave a small, aching laugh.

"She became a friend. Then a patron. Then something more. I thought we were equals."

I felt the quiet twist in my gut before she said the next part.

"I didn't notice when I stopped choosing. When I stopped being allowed to say no. When her voice stopped sounding like advice and started sounding like law."

She swallowed, hard.

"I gave her my name because I thought it meant trust. She took it like a title deed."

A long silence stretched between us.

The wind shifted, carrying with it the scent of woodsmoke and wet leaves. From the edge of the hill, I could still see the Bladed Tree—looming, waiting.

"You miss him," I said.

She nodded, once.

"Every day."

I reached into my pocket and handed her one of the cider apples I'd swiped back near Spring's border. She took it without a word, staring at it like it might vanish.

"I know I've said it already," I murmured. "But I'm sorry."

She looked at me, tired but clear-eyed.

"You freed me. That's more than most would dare."

I shook my head. "I didn't do it alone."

She smirked faintly. "You're too humble for someone who plays a vihuela on the battlefield, you know you did."

I smiled.

But I could still feel the weight of her sadness hanging in the air between us.

She leaned against me, slow, her head resting lightly on my shoulder. And in that quiet—beneath the sun, beside the embers we sat.

It was still noon. It had always been noon. The sun hadn't moved an inch since we entered the Faewylds, its golden light filtering through the canopy like stained glass made of honey and lies. There were no shadows long enough to measure time here—just an endless glow, and the pressure of fate slowly winding toward detonation.

Saint Patrick knelt near a gnarled tree, hands clasped tight in prayer. Latin spilled from his lips in a steady rhythm, low and strong like the toll of a cathedral bell. I understood maybe half of it—just enough to get the gist: protection, clarity, deliverance from evil. Also, at one point, a particularly pointed "libera nos a paganis." That one landed.

Morgan crouched beside her scrying bowl—still steaming from the images she'd conjured earlier—her eyes locked in the direction of Thornhall's looming silhouette. The Bladed Tree rose like a crown of bone over the city, its highest tower glowing faintly as dignitaries continued to arrive: floating palanquins of crystal, chariots drawn by armored deer, flying whales covered in tapestries.

The guests of the Season Courts had gathered.

"It's not the queen we need to strike first," she said quietly, staring at the mist curling off the water. "It's the audience."

I glanced sideways at her. "What do you mean?"

She looked at my Bass. Her expression shifted—cunning, hungry, hopeful. "Your music. It's unlike anything they've ever heard. Jarring. Loud."

I raised a brow. "You want to replace the house band?"

She smiled, wicked and tired. "We don't just need violence. We need emotion. we thin the horde of murderous fae by breaking her control, the monarchs should follow."

"And if that doesn't work?"

Cú cracked his knuckles. "Then we put her in the ground."

Morgan nodded, brushing mist from her fingers. "But first... you play."

She laid out the plan in clear, brutal detail.

I was the key.

I'd fly into the upper tower using the Bag of Wind, triggering the wards, but Morgan would fix that, and open a Dimensional Door from inside. The spell would only carry one or two at a time, so we'd have to do it in waves. two trips, maybe three.

I'd sneak in first, find a good staging point, and open the way.

Morgan would conceal the others with glamours and fog, each group slipping in behind me while I returned to ferry the next. Once everyone was inside and hidden, we'd find the castle musicians—probably somewhere near the inner hall. Knock them out. Take their place.

Then, once the ceremony began...

I'd play.

The others would guard the stage—Cú, Patrick, and the Knight. If anything tried to silence me before the song did its work, they'd hold the line.

"Simple," I muttered.

Thalien raised an eyebrow. "Reckless."

Morgan's grin widened. "Beautiful."

I strummed a low chord, feeling the strings hum under my fingers.

"No pressure," I said. "Just revolution by way of rock and roll."

Saint Patrick crossed himself again.

Cú tightened his spear strap.

The Green Knight pulled a sharpened antler charm from a pouch and tucked it into his armor.

And Morgan stood beside me, already conjuring the first layer of magic over our forms, her voice a whisper of spells from old England.

The wind shifted, unnatural and warm, curling through the trees like it knew something was coming.

I stood at the edge of the ridge, looking out toward Thornhall, the Bladed Tree rising behind it like a crown made for a tyrant. The sun still hung overhead, locked in its eternal noonday glow, gleaming off every golden arch and tower spire like it was blessing the coronation.

Which was a load of crap.

I adjusted the Wind Bag at my belt. Thick leather, pulsing faintly with power, as if the storms inside were sleeping just under the surface—dreaming of open sky.

Thalien stepped up beside me, vines coiling from his fingers with the practiced ease of someone who'd woven spells longer than I'd been alive. He murmured something in a language I didn't understand—Fae, fluid and strange—and the vines twisted themselves around the bag's mouth and buckle, securing it to my belt like a living carabiner.

"It'll hold," he said, voice low. "Just don't open it all the way unless you want to repaint the skyline."

"Noted," I muttered.

He met my eyes for a beat. "This is madness."

"Yeah," I said, tightening the strap across my shoulder where the Bass waited, humming like it already knew the solo coming. "But it's our madness."

Morgan approached behind me, brushing a hand across my back briefly. "Aim for the northern wing," she said. "There's a glass arch just above the musicians' hall. That's your entry."

"And what if someone sees me?"

"Make it a performance," she said. "It's what you're good at."

Saint Patrick gave me a final, solemn nod, two fingers raised in a blessing. "Fly swift. Play true. And for the love of the Lord, keep your trousers on."

Cú snorted.

I took a breath. Slid my fingers around the lip of the bag. And opened it.

Just a little.

The wind screamed.

Not loud, not angry—but hungry. A blast of compressed air surged beneath me, kicking up leaves, shaking branches, scattering embers from the dying fire. My feet left the ground almost immediately.

The vines held.

The wind rose.

And then—

I was airborne.

Launched like a rocket through the amber skies of the Faewylds, wind rushing past my ears, cloak snapping behind me like a battle flag. The treetops fell away, the city of Thornhall stretched below like a map inked in gold, and the Bladed Tree loomed ahead, its twisted tower reaching for me like it expected me.

The bag hissed with every twitch of my hand, guiding me higher.

I was flying.

Rocketing through the amber sky, cloak whipping behind me, the wind surging from the bag like a controlled scream. It didn't push me—it launched me, a screaming missile with a Bass in one hand and a string looped around my pinkie, tied tight to the mouth of the wind itself.

The Bladed Tree loomed ahead.

But beneath me…

Gods.

The city of Thornhall unfolded like a dream half-remembered and painted in firelight. Curved bridges arched between bronze towers wrapped in ivy and red glass. Waterways spiraled like veins through tree roots so thick they formed streets, with golden walkways laced around them like ribbon on a crown. The buildings shimmered with enchantments—some shaped like falling leaves frozen mid-descent, others carved from living wood and stone that breathed.

It was beautiful. Unforgivably beautiful.

The kind of place that stole your breath while it slid a dagger between your ribs.

I caught a glimpse of the royal promenade, guests in masks drifting in carriages pulled by winged beasts, crystalline antlers and flame-veiled steeds, their laughter barely audible over the rush of wind and magic screaming in my ears.

I could see the stage hall, a wide domed wing beneath the highest tower—its glass roof sparkling like frozen sap. I angled toward it, tensing my fingers on the neck of the Bass, letting the runes hum against my palm.

Almost there.

The sound of the wind shifted.

Time to fall.

I gave the string on my pinkie a sharp tug.

The bag slammed shut, like a dying breath sealed in leather.

The wind stopped.

Gravity didn't.

I began to drop.

Fast.

I didn't hesitate. Fingers slid across strings in one swift, practiced motion.

"Feather Fall."

The magic caught like a parachute of music—slowing me, catching me on invisible notes, letting me drift like a falling ember.

I dropped gently toward the glass of the musicians' hall, boots touching down with barely a sound.

I was in.

Alone.

And the plan had begun.

My boots touched down on an open balcony with barely a whisper.

The glass beneath my feet gleamed like crystallized maple syrup, edged in bronze filigree shaped like twisting vines and oak leaves mid-fall. The air was thick with incense and fading harp music. Somewhere inside the hall, laughter echoed—distant, but too close for comfort.

I crouched low, pulling the bag tight to my hip and slipping the Bass back over my shoulder. The balcony curved around the edge of the musicians' hall, half-sheltered by carved stone branches that twisted like petrified antlers. The place was almost too quiet.

Empty.

I edged toward the stained-glass doors leading into the hall.

Inside, the lights were low—golden and flickering like candlelight filtered through amber. Velvet curtains, half-drawn. Ornate instruments on stands. A table with empty goblets. No musicians.

No guards, either.

I slid one door open—slow, careful, quiet.

Inside, I saw no one. Just a wide, semi-circular chamber with enough acoustics to make a whisper sound like a war drum. The stage itself was bare, but the setup was real. Sheet music, a small wine tray, a harp with strings still humming.

I moved quick.

First to the doors—big double things carved from blackwood, set with thorn motifs that made my skin itch just looking at them. I spotted the latch, twisted it, and then dropped a small bracing bar across the interior handles.

Not enough to stop a determined brute. But enough to delay. Enough to give us time.

Then I turned, breath slow, ears tuned to every creak and whisper the palace gave me.

The room was silent.

The others could come.

I stepped back toward the balcony, pulled the Bass from my shoulder, and played a few notes—low, pulsing, just enough to cast the spell again.

Dimensional Door.

The rip in space shimmered just off the floor, humming with my magic and Morgan's subtle threadwork. Just wide enough.

The gate opened.

As I finished anchoring the last sigil of the Dimensional Door, the air shifted again.

I didn't see them—but I felt them.

The Black Suns.

Two hung high above Thornhall, watching like twin gods playing dice with reality. One of them flared—brief and blinding—and then, without ceremony, something popped into existence right above me.

It landed square on my head with a fwump.

I flinched, half-expecting a cursed crown or a screaming skull.

But it was a hat.

A wide-brimmed, crooked, deep-purple thing with silver stitching that shimmered faintly when it caught the light. There was a playing card wedged into the band, blank on one side and pulsing faintly on the other. The brim curled upward slightly at the ends, and the crown slouched like it'd been worn by a lunatic or a legend. Or both.

I adjusted it slowly, glancing into the reflection off a polished cymbal nearby.

"Okay," I muttered. "I'm not even mad. This goes hard."

The look—leather and claws, bass on my back, wolf at my side, and now this unhinged carnival headpiece worked. Like a glam rock warlock crossed with a Fae nightmare. I just needed more buckles.

Thalien stepped through the Dimensional Door first, graceful and quiet as ever. He took one look at the hat, blinked once, then offered a tiny nod. "Strange. But fitting."

"Yeah, I get that a lot."

Next came Cú, rolling his neck like he was preparing to chew glass and grin through it. "You get that from one of your gods?" he asked.

"Something like that," I muttered.

Saint Patrick emerged next, blinking in the amber light of the chamber. His hand moved instinctively in the shape of the cross when he saw the tower's carvings—old oaths and thorny spirals etched into the beams.

"I don't like this place," he said, quiet.

"That makes two of us," said the Green Knight, stepping through.

He towered above us in that ever-present armor, every inch of him silent moss and silver bark, his blade sheathed across his back like a hanging judgment. He gave the room one long look, then nodded once. No words. Just presence.

Morgan was the last to step through, her cloak trailing mist, her expression already locked on the hallway beyond.

She looked at me. Then the hat. Then the Bass.

Then she smirked. "You look like a riot waiting to happen."

I tipped the brim. "Planning on it."

We huddled at the edge of the musician's chamber. Behind us, the portal flickered once and snapped shut like a trap sealing. In front of us: the rest of the castle. Gold-veined halls, arching doorways lined with twisting runes, corridors pulsing with enchanted heat and candlelight.

No one had come in yet.

No one knew we were here.

"Alright," I whispered. "Plan time."

Thalien straightened his shoulders, adjusting his cloak with the subtle arrogance of someone born to command. His voice dropped into a calm, imperious lilt.

"I'll pose as our patron. A minor court noble with his new performance ensemble. That will let us move through the halls and toward the central stage without suspicion."

"Perfect," Morgan said. "The rest of us? Play the part. Quiet. Formal. No sudden clawing unless someone earns it."

Cú grinned like someone who really hoped they earned it.

Patrick just exhaled and started whispering another Latin prayer under his breath.

The Green Knight gave a single, grave nod.

And me?

I plucked a low, warm note from the Bass and let it hang in the air like a promise.

"Let's go find the real band," I said. "Before the curtain rises."

The inside of the Bladed Tree didn't follow any sane geometry.

I stepped through the corridor and immediately lost track of what direction was "up."

Staircases spiraled into themselves like knots in the air. Balconies overlooked courtyards that were somehow above them. Hallways ran in impossible loops, one moment a wide-open marble promenade, the next a spiraling corridor of oak and iron that doubled back through itself without ever curving.

The walls pulsed faintly with golden veins—slow and rhythmic, like the heartbeat of something ancient buried deep in the wood.

I caught glimpses of movement through archways: nobles in masks gliding past, attendants floating on air currents that weren't there, one whole hallway covered in autumn leaves that never touched the ground. Everything was drenched in impossible symmetry, the elegance of madness. It was like walking through a painting that hadn't decided what it wanted to be.

"This is a nightmare," I muttered, eyes flicking from a ceiling that might've once been a floor to a chandelier made of windchimes and bones.

"It's normal," Thalien replied without looking, walking straight down a stairwell that went sideways.

"Yeah," I grumbled. "Sure. Normal like taxidermy at a baby shower."

"Focus," Morgan hissed from behind, keeping her cloak pulled tightly around her. "We need the musicians. Where would they keep them?"

"Near the performance floor," Patrick said, glancing up and crossing himself again as a window passed overhead showing a sunrise that shouldn't exist.

"They wouldn't mingle with the guests," Thalien confirmed. "But they're important enough to be close. Either below the throne floor or above the wine chambers. Possibly both, depending on who enchanted this place last."

Cú peered into a hallway that led into a door, which led into a mirror, which looked like it opened into another hallway. "Why not just ask one of them to scream and follow the echo?"

The Green Knight said nothing, but I could tell from the angle of his helmet he was watching every shadow like it owed him a duel.

"Could we hear music?" I asked. "Get a direction?"

Morgan shook her head. "The castle's enchanted to mask sound. No one hears anything until the ceremony begins. Standard fae security."

"Cool. Great. Everything's cursed."

We reached a narrow corridor that seemed to slope sideways, though we were somehow walking upright. The air smelled like cinnamon and rain-soaked parchment. Thalien paused at a split in the path.

"Left goes toward the kitchens," he said. "Right... might be the dressing hall. If the castle hasn't re-shaped again."

"How would we know?"

"We wouldn't," he said simply. "But I'm technically invited, the floor will guide me."

That didn't reassure me.

Still, we turned right, passing under a carved archway made of what looked like intertwining ribs and wheat stalks. The torchlight here flickered strangely—casting shadows that moved the opposite direction.

I tightened the strap of my Bass and kept one hand near the Wind Bag.

Hallways rotated while we walked. Banisters moved like serpents when we weren't looking. At one point, we passed a servant walking along the ceiling, humming to herself while pushing a floating tea cart that screamed softly with every wheel turn.

We opened a door.

Immediately, sound exploded outward in a burst of cheers and drunken howling.

A wide chamber, carved into the roots of the castle, had been turned into a gladiator pit—complete with sand floor, iron rails, and high balconies stacked with finely dressed fae nobles, waving golden slips and calling out bets.

"Ten goblin souls on the tree!"

"I got five dragon farts on the horned one!"

"What odds on the minotaur exploding again?"

Down below, in a mess of blood and splinters, a lone gladiator—a minotaur, judging by the horns and sheer muscle mass—was swinging a massive axe at a towering ent, who moved with slow, groaning grace, each swing splintering bark but not stopping it. The tree-creature was winning. By a lot.

"I hate this place," I muttered.

Morgan yanked the door shut before the crowd noticed us.

We kept moving.

Stairways turned upside-down mid-stride. A hallway with thirteen doors somehow led back into itself unless you touched the left wall with your palm. The whole castle felt alive, but not in a cozy "Beauty and the Beast" way—more like a fever dream drawn by Escher during a panic attack.

Then I opened another door.

Dark.

Dead quiet.

I stepped forward, cautious—

And two massive golden eyes snapped open in the darkness.

My breath hitched.

A low rumble shook the floor. Then a flicker of flame, curling along massive fangs just past the threshold. Heat burst against my face like someone opened an oven fueled by bad decisions.

I slammed the door shut.

The wood smoked behind me.

Everyone stared.

"Nope," I said, voice dry. "Dragon. Giant. Fire-breathing. Bad mood."

Cú looked almost disappointed. "You sure?"

"Yeah. Pretty sure."

The Green Knight tilted his head slightly. "That wasn't a hallway, was it?"

"No. That was a lair."

Saint Patrick crossed himself again. "This place is an abomination."

Morgan smirked. "Welcome to the fae court."

The next door better have sheet music and some nervous performers inside. Or I was starting a band with the dragon.

We kept moving.

I swear the same hallway passed us three times, but every time the sconces were burning a different color and the tapestries had moved. One time they showed a fae wedding. The next? A man being swallowed by a giant weasel. Third time?

Inside was a massive ballroom.

No people.

Just furniture.

Moving.

Dancing.

Chairs twirling in waltz formation with lampstands, cushions swaying on invisible strings, a piano lid opening and closing in time with a phantom beat. The air pulsed with invisible rhythm.

In the center, a wardrobe and a writing desk were slow-dancing like they were in love and very drunk about it.

I shut the door before anyone else had to process it.

"I hate it here," I whispered again.

Saint Patrick muttered a psalm under his breath.

We pressed onward, deeper into the Bladed Tree.

Another hallway. Another door.

I cracked it open.

Inside, a hallway made entirely of mirrors, except… they weren't reflections.

They were watching.

Versions of us—not alternate, not distorted—just aware. Their eyes followed us. Mine smirked at me and winked.

I closed that one gently.

Thalien sighed. "It's this way," he said with a tired certainty, pointing down a corridor that curved like a nautilus shell and smelled faintly of mint.

We followed.

Through a tighter hall, across a bridge with no visible supports that shimmered like a spiderweb in moonlight, then around a corner where the shadows were too thick.

And finally…

Music.

Barely audible, but it was there.

We reached a narrow antechamber lined with red velvet and thorn-patterned gold trim. The music drifted in from a door at the far end. Soft. Classical.

Formal.

Thalien touched the door gently. "This is it."

I nodded, adjusting my hat.

Time to meet the competition. And retire them.

Inside, the musicians were busy with final preparations.

A pair of goblins adjusted the straps on a strange, antler-shaped harp. A lean fae in silver robes tuned a crystal flute. A satyr leafed through sheet music like it was made of gold, while a human man—thin, pale, eyes blank—plucked absently at a lyre from a bench, his ankle chained to the leg of a table.

They didn't notice us at first.

Too busy setting the stage for tradition.

Too bad tradition was about to get drop-kicked by modern noise.

I nodded once.

Everyone moved.

Morgan was the first to strike—hand sweeping up like she was throwing glitter, but instead? It was green fire. The flame didn't touch the velvet curtains, or the golden frame of the lute stand—it ignored matter completely. But it hit the goblin harpist dead in the chest.

He dropped screaming, rolling on the floor as his coat burned in ghostly, soundless flames.

Cú was next—fast, brutal, and grinning like it was his birthday. He went for the satyr rifling through sheet music, grabbed the back of his collar, and yeeted him across the room. The satyr slammed into the wall, groaned once, and stayed down.

The Green Knight moved with no wasted motion. He stepped forward and brought the pommel of his sword down like a divine hammer on the flute-player's shoulder. The fae didn't even have time to react before crumpling to the ground in a heap of silver robes and broken dreams.

Thalien, of course, was elegant—a flick of his wrist, a coil of vine-summoned magic ensnaring one of the goblins as if the floor itself betrayed him. The goblin tried to squeak out a note on a bone flute—but it was already too late.

Patrick, to his credit, went for the most sensible approach.

He walked calmly up to the second goblin, raised the cane like he was about to gently tap a disobedient dog—then wailed on him with righteous fury.

"The Lord is my shepherd," whack, "I shall not want," whack, "he maketh me lie down—"

whackwhackwhack.

The goblin definitely lay down.

Then there was me.

The human—the only one who hadn't moved, who hadn't even blinked. Eyes empty, fingers twitching across the strings like a marionette. Chained at the ankle, barely alive in there.

I didn't speak.

I just walked over, gripped my Bass, and slammed the flat of it into his head with a clean, practiced swing.

He slumped over like a rag doll.

Didn't even bleed. Just stopped.

Like the music was finally turned off.

And just like that, the room was silent again.

The real band?

Retired.

Our crew?

Still standing.

A little breathless. A lot smug.

I looked down at the unconscious musicians. Then at the instruments. Then at my own axe-bass.

Morgan snapped her fingers, and the candles in the room flared brighter, bathing the chamber in dramatic golden light. It was like the Faewylds themselves knew this was a wardrobe change scene and leaned into the theater of it.

"Alright, team," I said, dragging a satyr by the ankle, "let's look the part."

First came the clothes.

Not exactly a rock band's dream, but they'd work. Long robes with embroidered trim, sleeveless leather tunics, shimmering half-capes designed more for flair than function. Most of it was tailored for fae bodies, which meant we had to improvise.

Cú tried to shove his broad-shouldered barbarian frame into a tight ceremonial doublet. It tore immediately.

"Gonna wear it anyway," he grunted, strapping it over one shoulder like a sash and tying it off with a harp string.

Saint Patrick, by contrast, looked entirely disgusted by the outfit he'd been handed—a flowing green coat with embroidered vines. He stripped it of all embellishments, muttering under his breath the whole time, and somehow managed to make it look like a monastic vestment by sheer force of will.

Morgan layered a shimmering cloak over her shoulders, her natural glamour warping the shape into something sleeker. Her hair rearranged itself into a braided crown, and with a flick of her fingers, her eyeliner sharpened to near weaponized levels.

Thalien didn't need to change much. One shrug, one magical adjustment, and the clothes folded around him like they'd always belonged.

The Green Knight didn't even remove his armor. He just slung a silver scarf across his pauldron and pinned it in place with a tuning fork.

Me?

I found a goblin-sized coat, sliced off the sleeves, added some extra straps from someone's harp harness, and cinched it all up under the Bass like it was meant to be there. With the hat still on?

I looked like the leader of the weirdest battle-of-the-bands entry in history.

Meanwhile…

The bodies.

Thalien silently opened the balcony doors.

Morgan cast a silence spell on the outer railing.

And one by one, we started tossing unconscious musicians into the ether.

Cú hauled up a goblin and yeeted him with a grunt. "Hope that one lands in the wine vats."

Patrick grimaced but still managed to push the satyr over with a whispered prayer. "May he wake up… somewhere far from here."

Morgan dumped the still-smoking violinist with a casual flick of her hand. "I did him a favor. Fae fire detoxifies the soul."

The last one—the human—I carried gently. Not out of kindness. Just… a little pity. Poor guy. I laid him over the railing and gave him a gentle push.

He disappeared into the golden fog.

"Showtime," I said, straightening the collar of my stitched-together jacket.

Everyone turned to me.

The hat tilted.

The bass hummed.

And somewhere, beneath our feet but also above us, the coronation was starting.

Sorrel sat at the high table of the Bladed Tree, her fingers tracing the polished rootwood beneath her palm. The weight of the crown was hidden under a veil of glamour and poison-laced perfume, but the burden was real enough. Around her, the banquet raged on like a fever dream, a whirlwind of color, sound, and intoxication.

To her left, Titania, Summer's bloom, gestured with a chalice filled with liquid fire, her voice weaving a tale of a Summer knight who betrayed his oaths by marrying a dream. "She turned into sunlight when he kissed her," Titania said, sipping without flinching. "Now he just screams. Beautiful voice, though. We keep him in a jar."

To her right, Verdanas, Queen of Spring, had tangled herself halfway across the table, gnawing lazily on candied beetles from a silver tray shaped like a womb. Her gown was woven from breathing moss, pulsing faintly with each breath. "Did you hear," she lilted, "about the River Court's failure? They let a mortal boy drink from the Timewater. He bloomed into a tree mid-sentence. Still rooted there. Says hello whenever it rains."

Across from them sat Mab, Winter's void, unmoved and untouched, her lips pale and sharp. Her cup, full and shimmering with something that writhed, remained untouched. Sorrel noticed. She always noticed.

"You haven't tasted the vintage," she said gently. "Pressed from poppies grown in the soil of fallen empires. Filtered through the silk of spider-priests. It tastes like remembered kisses and the moments before death."

She punctuated the words by licking the toad on her silver platter—a pale, twitching thing covered in spots that whispered obscenities. It shivered, then sagged. Her tongue came away glittering.

Mab didn't blink.

"I abstain," she said.

Sorrel tilted her head. "Still dieting, my Queen?"

Mab's hand, graceful, gloved in moonlight, settled lightly on her abdomen. "I made a trade. One of mine bartered for a rise in rank. From baroness to duchess. In exchange, she offered something… far sweeter."

Verdanas perked up. "Do tell."

"The future," Mab replied. "A firstborn, promised to me. Not yet born. Not even conceived. But sun-touched."

Titania laughed, sharp as glass breaking in honey. "Children are so last century. Refilling the ranks of the court are already too much for me. Better on my figure too. How quaint."

Verdanas giggled, rolling over herself. "Oh, I did that once, half dragon, never again."

"My court needs a new champion," Mab said, eyes cold. "It seemed fitting, sun touched for the winter court, almost poetic."

Sorrel kept smiling, but her fingers tapped once, slow and deliberate, against her goblet's stem. The air around them pulsed with magic, scent, and sin. Below, the gardens erupted with movement. Dancers whirled in impossible patterns, limbs too long, bones clicking in rhythm. One twirled with no skin, muscles wrapped in burning thread, while his partner dissolved into smoke with each step, reforming only to collapse again. A trio of veiled nobles stitched together at the spine played music through slit throats. Their song was wordless and wrong.

At the base of the terrace fae and mortal entangled with creatures that shifted between genders, shapes, and screams. All of them bleeding somewhere. None of them stopping.

Sorrel sat, smiling. The goblet in Sorrel's hand shimmered as she tilted it, but she didn't drink. Her attention wasn't on the wine. Her focus was on the bracelet—a delicate thing, coiled tight around her wrist like ivy made of starlight and intent. To the untrained eye, it looked ornamental. Decorative. A gift befitting a new queen. But to her? It was a blade.

Slowly, deliberately, her thoughts wound through it. The enchantments within reached across the gilded terrace, brushing against Titania, Verdanas, and most delicately of all—Mab. The Winter Queen flinched. It was subtle—the smallest hitch in her fingers as she reached for a silver fig. But to Sorrel, it was enough. The spell was working. One root at a time.

Mab blinked. Her eyes, just slightly softer, drifted toward Sorrel's voice.

"So tell me," Sorrel said, gently twisting the bracelet's clasp beneath the table, feeding a little more will into the spell. "When will my dear lord-husband Oberon grace us with his presence?"

Mab's expression didn't change, but Titania scoffed, swirling her cup like it contained the truth.

"When he drags himself out of the harem chambers, perhaps," she said, her voice all velvet and thorn. "Summer has need of replenishment. There are battles coming, and only I can't birth an army alone."

She raised one eyebrow, eyes sparkling with cruel humor. "Unless, of course, Sorrel, you've plans to help lighten that burden."

A few courtiers nearby laughed—low, throaty.

Verdanas sighed dreamily, stroking a vine that curled from her shoulder like a pet snake. "He used to come in Springtime, you know. When he was still curious. He brought poems and flowers. I miss him."

"Winter has no use for his warmth," Mab said flatly.

Sorrel smiled, her fingers tightening again on the bracelet. She saw Mab's brow twitch, her hand still resting lightly on her belly. The spell slid deeper—a gentle suggestion wrapped in acceptance.

"Perhaps," Sorrel said softly, "we should prepare the court for his return, then. In dignity. In order. In unity."

Mab blinked again and nodded, only once. A tiny nod. But not nothing. Progress.

Sorrel exhaled slowly, keeping her smile easy. She felt the bracelet cool slightly—like it had eaten well and was content, for now. Across the terrace, more madness bloomed: a sacrifice on fire, carried by moth-winged priests through a maze of glass walls that screamed the names of every god ever forgotten. The dancers below had begun balancing on swords and singing in reverse, their voices turning the ivy black. But none of it mattered. Not yet. Because the queens were starting to lean closer, and Sorrel was almost ready to speak in Oberon's name.

The feast melted into music, the music into dance, and the dance into a blur of limbs, spells, and sensual chaos. Fae of every rank and shape slipped into impossible patterns, some naked, others clothed in smoke or thorns or shimmering illusions. They twirled across hovering glass platforms, flew through pillars of flame, spilled wine and blood in equal measure. A spiral of motion coalesced at the center of the upper terrace—a wide circle cleared by unseen force. There, wordlessly, the next tradition began.

The call rang out from a hollow horn grown straight from the Tree's bone—a deep, echoing cry that reverberated in every soul present: "The Champion's Melee begins!"

And they came. Four figures stepped into the ring from four corners of the terrace. No fanfare. No titles. Just presence.

One radiated heat, flame curling along their blade, footsteps turning the air golden with each step—a child of Summer, furious and proud. Another arrived shrouded in silent frost, breath misting around their obsidian armor, moving with the slow certainty of inevitable death—the champion of Winter. Spring's chosen was a slippery, smiling creature, covered in curling green tattoos, wrapped in petals and pollen that pulsed with unseen magic, their eyes too wide, too bright. And the last—Autumn's—stepped forward in rust-colored plate etched with bone symbols, a cleaver in one hand, a horned helm hiding their face, gait steady and brutal like a falling harvest moon.

They didn't greet each other. They simply began. The first strike cracked like thunder. The crowd roared.

Summer and Winter clashed, flame against frost, steam rising in violent bursts. Spring darted between them, leaving illusions in their wake, giggling as if the fight were a flirtation. Autumn struck hard and slow, carving a path through chaos, blade grinding through spells and bone alike.

Above it all, the queens leaned forward, delighted.

Titania cheered every cut, her hands sticky with peach juice and blood. Verdanas had twisted herself into a seated sprawl, feeding her thigh-vines pieces of roasted boar between sips of mead. Mab watched in silence, as she always did, her expression unreadable save for the barest uptick of her lip at a particularly nasty feint. And Sorrel? Sorrel smiled. Faint. Serene. Her fingers played over the bracelet on her wrist, coaxing the spell deeper. She could feel it in the queens. The softening. The slow unraveling of resistance. Even Mab, she thought. Even her. She was winning.

The Champion of the Seasons dropped to one knee by the end, crowned in blood and bruises and flower petals. The melee had ended as it always did—in something between exhaustion and ecstasy. Autumn's champion had won, their rust-colored blade embedded in Spring's shoulder, Winter frozen in place behind them, Summer breathing smoke and curses into the dirt.

The crowd cheered. Mad, wild. Tossing thorns, coins, souls, ribbons. Some dropped to their knees and wept. A ritual complete.

Sorrel rose just slightly from her throne and gave the acknowledging nod.

Then the sun changed. No warmer. No brighter. Just… deeper. More real. It shimmered like silk catching wind. And the air froze, not with cold—but with stillness. Reverence.

The crowd went silent. Every fae noble. Every chained muse. Every howling mask-dancer. Even the dying champions on the blood-soaked circle stilled.

He was there. Oberon. No announcement. No horn. He simply walked from the highest stair and stood at the terrace's edge, and his presence silenced everything.

His hair was the color of midnight storms. His antlers branched like the world tree itself. His cloak trailed behind him like a storm cloud stitched from twilight and prophecy. He wore no crown—he was the crown. His gaze was like gravity. His expression soft, distant, and impossibly warm. And everyone—everyone—swooned.

Mab blinked and softened. Titania gasped, her smile dropping into something childlike. Verdanas pressed her palms to her cheeks like a maiden seeing her lover in a ballad. Even Sorrel inhaled, sharply, despite herself. Despite the bracelet. Despite the spell.

It was as if her lungs had forgotten what breath was for, and now remembered. Oberon didn't speak. He only smiled.

They were melting. Even Mab—Mab, who hadn't blinked in half an hour—now watched him with the softness of a frost thawing at the first brush of spring. Her breath slowed. Her gaze lingered.

Titania was already leaning forward, the neckline of her gown shifting dangerously. She tilted her head just enough for Oberon to catch the shimmer of her eyes.

Verdanas was outright sighing, palms cupping her cheeks, face flushed and dreamy. "He hasn't aged a single sunturn," she whispered to no one in particular.

Oberon stood still, hands clasped behind his back, the faintest of smiles playing at the corner of his mouth. Not arrogant. Not seductive. Just… kind. Regal. And completely, utterly disarming.

Sorrel gripped the armrest of her throne, her knuckles white beneath the glamour. This wasn't supposed to happen. She'd worked too hard. Played the long game. Subtle influence, softened wills, woven dreams. And now they were about to blush like maidens in a mortal fairy tale.

She gritted her teeth and flicked her fingers beneath the table. The bracelet pulsed. Feed. Magic flowed, invisible and thick, like syrup over silver. It slid into the queens' thoughts—subtle pressure behind their smiles, a nudge toward propriety, toward composure, toward her.

It took time. She planted suggestions. Propped up impulses. Sent thoughts fluttering like moths into their minds.

Talk to him. Compliment him. See how he regards you.

It took longer than expected—Oberon's presence resisted the spell like stone resists wind—but eventually, it clicked. Titania shifted her shoulder just so, laughing lightly, and asked him how long he'd stayed away. Mab inclined her head and murmured something about the skies over Winter—an opening, cold. Verdanas reached for his hand.

Oberon listened to each in turn, warm and unreadable. And Sorrel breathed again.

Then—music. A rumble beneath the terrace. The sound of the Tree shifting. The stage rose like a blooming scar, petals of gold-veined bark unfolding in spiraled harmony with the living root beneath the Bladed Tree. Atop it, five strangers stood. The crowd quieted.

No familiar court bard. No robed harpist or glass-voiced soprano. No fanfare. Just five figures cloaked in shadow. At the front stood a man with wild blond hair and a broad-brimmed hat, resting a strange, glowing instrument against his hip. A great bass-axe, silver strings thrumming with static. His clothes were strange—layered leathers, straps, and dark glamour. The others fanned out behind him, silent.

One was wrapped in green with burning eyes, another cloaked in plate. A figure in priestly garb clutched a bag of what seemed to be salt with reverence, while a man draped in wild furs cracked his knuckles with anticipation, grinning wide.

No names were given. No titles announced. Only the herald's voice rang out, magically compelled, confusion thick in their tone: "By decree of Her Majesty Queen Sorrel of Autumn, the court is honored to present a modern sound for a new age... titled Free Bird."

Gasps rippled through the gathered nobles. "Modern?" Verdanas chuckled, her voice syrup-thick. "You naughty girl, breaking tradition already?" she purred toward Sorrel, tongue flicking behind her teeth. "Heheheh."

Sorrel did not reply. She only smiled. Her teeth creaked, this was not part of the plan, the music was carefully chosen to be boring, safe... not this. 

CP Bank:0cp

Perks earned this chapter:200cp Hatter's Hat (Wonderland No More) [Benevolence] A fashionable piece of headgear that is suitable for practically every occasion. Wearing it magically boosts your charisma and increases protection to your head (also, if a blow to your head fails to overcome the armor enhancement, the hat will protect you 100%, preventing the blow from having any effects at all on your head). You can alternatively choose a hat or other headgear you already own to receive the benefits of this purchase.

Milestones: None.457Magus exploratorApr 21, 2025View discussionThreadmarks Chapter 25- a journey's end View contentMagus exploratorApr 23, 2025 Awarded ×1#1,752Authors note: hey sorry for the delay, been stuck at work and playing a lot of EU4, so I was kinda stuck, probably will continue be for a little while. 

The air behind the curtain buzzed with tension. Everything was still, but you could feel the voltage in the bones of the stage. I adjusted the strap of my bass, fingers rolling along the strings in slow, deliberate taps. One test note hummed beneath my palm, barely audible. The Thunderbird feather twitched.

"Alright," I muttered. "One shot."

Morgan stood nearby, whispering old Sidhe words over our instruments. Her fingers glowed faint green, glyphs sliding across the strings and frets like ink under water. She finished with a breath and a snap of her fingers. The magic snapped into place, seamless.

"They'll follow your tempo now," she said, brushing her hair back. "Even if you lose you die mid-solo, the rhythm will keep."

"Reassuring," I muttered.

"Patrick?"

The priest was a few paces off, kneeling in front of the curtain. His hands moved with practice, sprinkling consecrated salt into a tight line across the edge of the stage. Latin rolled from his lips in a low, rumbling chant—half prayer, half spell.

"Just a moment longer," he called, not looking back. "In the name of the Lord, no horrors shall pass."

"And for the sides?"

Morgan raised her hand. Green light sparked between her fingers.

"I'll take care of the wings," she said. "Together, we can seal it well enough to keep the big ones out."

"'Well enough'?"

She shrugged. "This isn't an exorcism, skald. Some of the little ones—the desperate, the mad, the broken—they'll slip through."

"Then they'll find us waiting," came a deep voice behind me.

Cú cracked his knuckles, eyes gleaming, leaning lazily against a drum stand like it was a tavern counter.

"Let the bastards try."

Beside him, Thalien was calmly adjusting the tuning pegs of a borrowed flute, his eyes flicking toward every shadow like he could see time bending.

Then the Knight stepped forward—slow, methodical, like his whole existence moved to a heartbeat no one else could hear. He reached up and removed his helm. The room shifted with recognition.

"Sir Gawain," Morgan whispered, poison on her tongue. "Of the Round Table."

He nodded once, as if announcing the weather.

"I ride under no banner now," he said, "but this knight will keep the line." his sword Galuth now rested on his shoulder like he was going to strike a home run. 

Morgan turned back to me.

"You play," she said. "You keep them focused. We'll keep the fangs off your throat."

"No pressure," I muttered.

Cú grinned. "You'll do fine. Just play it loud."

Thalien added, deadpan, "And if it goes wrong, die screaming. It's more dignified."

A soft clink broke the silence. Saint Patrick, still kneeling by the salt line, reached into his vestments and pulled out a small glass bottle. Old. Cloudy. The cork looked like it hadn't been touched in decades.

"Not even I," he muttered, "will stand against giving dead man their drinks."

He turned, his face shadowed by candlelight and resolve, and held the bottle up.

"In case we meet the Lord today."

The others fell quiet. No jokes. No taunts. Even Cú stepped forward with unexpected gentleness, uncorking the bottle with his teeth and taking a long, deliberate swig. "May He laugh at our nonsense," he muttered, and passed it on.

Morgan tilted it just slightly, let a single drop fall to the floor. "For the ones who didn't get the chance."

Thalien only nodded, taking a sip without a word, his eyes flicking toward the curtain as if sensing what was on the other side.

Gawain cupped it briefly, then handed it to me without drinking. "No knight drinks before the war," he said. "But I'll toast after."

The bottle reached me last. It was heavier than I expected. I looked at the dark wine inside, swirling like blood, like memory. Then I raised it.

"To the end of the world," I said.

I drank. It burned like fire down my throat. The curtain rustled. Morgan looked at me, one brow raised.

"Showtime."

The curtains parted—

—and behind them was madness.

No other word could fit. The court before us pulsed with colors that shouldn't exist, sounds that came from nowhere. A hundred nobles twisted mid-air in impossible dances, writhing along invisible walls. A ent was on fire and laughing. A creature with too many eyes sobbed into a bowl of light. A noble couple kissed with tongues made of smoke, while a nearby jester bled wine from their eyes into goblets shaped like teeth.

And all of them turned. All of them looked.

Saint Patrick's salt barrier flickered, holding—barely. A soft golden sheen in front of us, blessed and trembling. To the sides, Morgan raised both hands, green fire curling from her wrists, weaving through the cracks of the stage into walls of shimmering force. They sealed with a snap.

"Not for long," she hissed.

Behind me, Cú cracked his neck, already bouncing on the balls of his feet.

"Let 'em come."

Thalien adjusted his cloak, flute drawn, eyes on the crowd. Gawain planted his feet, Galuth in hand, silent and still like a statue carved for stone.

And me? I gripped my bass like it was the last thing tethering me to reality. I took a breath. And then another.

"I don't care what happens," I muttered, fingers hovering over the strings, "but I'm getting to the guitar solo."

No one argued.

The lights dimmed. The stage trembled. And I played the first notes. Low. Slow. That opening riff of Free Bird.

The crowd didn't understand it—not at first. But they felt it. Heads turned. Eyes widened. Bodies froze in half-laughs and half-lust. Then cheers. Screams. Shrieks of delight and confusion. The stage became the center of gravity, the madness curling inward.

The music wrapped around the court like a net. I played through it—let it carry me forward, past fear, past the weight, into something else. Then my eyes scanned the crowd. And I saw her.

Sorrel. Seated now at the center of the high table, surrounded by wine-eyed queens. Her gown was deep red, dark as blood, woven with symbols I couldn't name. The bracelet still shimmered faintly on her wrist, feeding, pulsing, hungry.

Her skin glowed faintly golden under the enchanted lights. Her eyes were wide, lips parted just slightly in something between awe and suspicion. The spell was still holding. But it wavered. Her expression cracked—just a little—as I met her gaze. And I began to sing.

"If I leave here tomorrow… Would you still remember me?"

The words rolled out with the chord, raw and slow, echoing through a crowd that didn't know what music after the 18th century was.

The notes echoed like thunder rolled through honey—strange, sweet, and just a little wrong in a place like this. And the crowd? They were changing. At first, it was subtle—a tilt of the head, a shiver down the spine. But then the tapping started. One by one, fingers began twitching along to the beat. A dried dryad clutched her goblet like it was a lifeline. A trio of fox-masked nobles began to sway, almost mesmerized. Somewhere near the terrace, a satyr tried—and failed—to mimic the rhythm with a flute.

It was like watching a pack of caveman hearing music for the first time. I kept playing. Fingers sliding into the chords like they were carved into my bones, sweat already starting to bead under the lights. Each note sang with more static than the last—the Thunderbird feather trailing sparks now, feeding the rhythm like it was drinking from the storm inside me. And still, they listened. Not just with their ears—no, these weren't mortals. The fae heard with everything. Heartbeats. Magic. Memory. And rock was a new thing—to loud, too raw, too alive. It bit. And they loved it.

I caught a flash of Mab's lips twitching. Verdanas had stood, hands on her hips, her eyes wide with delight and confusion. Titania was tapping her foot on the table—not even realizing she was doing it. And Sorrel? Sorrel looked like she'd just seen a ghost. She was still seated, but her fingers had curled away from the bracelet. Her eyes were locked on me.

"But if I stayed here with you girl… Things just couldn't be the same…"

My voice carried through the enchantments, cutting through spells like a blade. I saw a courtier clutch their chest. Another dropped to their knees, shaking. It was working. I felt it building—in my chest, in the strings, in the air. The chords weren't just vibrating through the bass now—they were booming through the roots of the Bladed Tree itself. Each pluck of a string hit the court like a shockwave. Glasses shattered. Lights flickered. One fae in the second row straight-up collapsed, twitching like someone had unplugged their magic.

I leaned into the mic. "'Cause I'm as free as a bird now…"

My fingers slammed the strings harder—frets screaming with wild power as static arced along my arms. The Thunderbird feather lit up in a burst of blue-white electricity. The song had changed. It had teeth now. The audience had gone from enchanted to… disturbed. Sorrel rose from her throne, eyes wide, lips parted In rage. She saw it. She felt it. The spell was unraveling.

Mab had blinked, confused. Titania was gripping the table like it might float away. Verdanas was weeping, quietly, her vine-crown wilting under the weight of some long-buried memory the song must have dragged back into the light. And still—I played.

"…and this bird you cannot change…"

That was the breaking point. Sorrel stood tall at the edge of the high table, hair snapping in a phantom wind, the bracelet on her wrist glowing with desperate hunger. She raised one trembling hand—pointed directly at me.

"Stop him!" she shrieked. "By my command—bring him down!"

Every fae in the audience turned as one. Their eyes glazed. Their mouths opened in rictus grins. And they charged. It was like throwing a switch. The nobles launched themselves over chairs, through tables, over balconies. Winged fae dove from the air, glass-limbed things sprinted down the walls, beastmen leapt with spears, banshees screamed behind burning veils. A storm of madness coming straight for the stage.

Patrick's barrier flared—a wall of golden light flickering under the weight of sheer magical will. "They're coming through!" he shouted. Morgan's hands snapped up, throwing green glyphs into the crowd—a dozen fae detonated into butterflies and smoke, but more surged behind them. Cú, already laughing, launched forward like a cannonball, slamming a winged noble into a tree pillar with a crunch. Gawain's blade met the first fae to cross the line. No words. Just steel. Thalien flicked his flute once—and a burst of sonic magic blew a hole in the mob's front line. And me? I played harder. I didn't stop. Couldn't. I was in the eye of the storm.

"Lord knows I can't change…"

And with every word, every note, the air rippled harder. The stage was a battlefield. The curtains blew back as if ripped by a storm. The Faewyld Court erupted. Madness. Screaming. Rapture. And in the center of it all, we stood, encased in a dome of golden and green light—Saint Patrick's holy salt ringing the edge of the stage, Morgan's spellwork woven into every shadow. 

They came at us like a tide of nightmares. Courtiers shrieking with mouths full of thorns. Nobles with glass eyes and obsidian blades, twisted by Sorrel's will. Winged horrors dove from the rafters, clawed dancers pirouetted through the air with poisoned blades—all of them converging on us, driven by a single command: "STOP HIM NOW." And yet the barrier held. Golden light flared every time a fae hit the wall. Holy fire surged with every step closer. Morgan's green runes pulsed outward like breathing wards, shoving the worst of them back with force that cracked the marble floor.

Inside the dome, we were together. Cú Chulainn, teeth bared, fists red, crouched like a wolf between verses. Gawain, sword in hand, shield raised, silent and calm, braced like his king was watching him. Thalien, cloak snapping in the stormwinds, fingers at the ready, watching the edges. Patrick, rosary in one hand, salt burning white in the other, whispering psalms in Latin like he was laying the foundation of a siege. Morgan, arms outstretched, green flame dancing from fingertip to fingertip, her eyes locked on the crowd, muttering in a dead tongue, holding the line. And at the center? Me.

I gripped the bass with both hands. My fingers moved fast, too fast, strumming chords that shouldn't be possible, screaming sound into spell.

"Lord help me, I can't change…"

That was the moment. That was the spark. The words left my throat like a blade, and the court shook. The Bladed Tree shivered, bark groaning, branches twisting overhead like they were trying to reach the stars. The golden dome around us pulsed once—hard—as if the song had become a heartbeat, and now it was pounding in sync with something older than music.

Above it all stood Sorrel, her hands clenched into fists, the bracelet blazing with angry white light. Her face was frozen between fury and disbelief. The spell was fraying, coming apart in waves. You could see it in the queens: Titania, hunched forward, weeping. Mab, one hand rising like she didn't know why. Verdanas, mouthing a name that didn't exist anymore.

"̴̹̫̟̂̉̄L̵̞̔͌o̸̞͂̆̐͜r̵̳̱̰̀d̴̩͂͆ ̷̨͒͊̑h̶͉͕͒ĕ̸͎͝l̴͇̂p̴͚͆ ̸̡̛̈̀m̸̺̙̽͒͝e̷̠͛̋̚…̵̱̇"̷̻̩͛̈

The notes wailed. I pulled the strings with everything in me. My arms ached. My back screamed. My heart thundered with the storm, My voice touched the firmament, the realm only reserved for the very gods themselves, for a second I saw. A greek city in the sky, a mighty river bathed in darkness under our feet, a city of gold, a gigantic tree in the distance, and many many more, all overlaid before my eyes.

And then I hit the solo. My fingers screamed across the strings. Sparks burst off the bass in arcs of lightning. The Thunderbird feather ignited, blue and white bolts lashing into the sky as if the storm had come to scream with me. The notes weren't just notes—they were teeth, rage, grief, freedom. I bent the neck of the guitar, sliding into the high run like I was slicing a hole in the air itself. The court screamed. Some dropped to their knees. Some tried to flee. Some, horrifyingly, tried to dance with bones snapping out of place, unable to stop moving even as the spell broke over them.

The court had become a maelstrom of feeling. Not chaos. Not control. Emotion. And then—

CRACK.

A single lightning bolt smashed through the dome—not at us, but for us. It hit the Tree's heart, and the wood split with a sound like a cathedral collapsing. The spell shattered. You could feel it. The moment Sorrel lost them. Not all at once. But enough. Enough to know she wasn't queen of their minds anymore.

I kept playing. Because the solo wasn't over yet. And neither were we.

The solo ended on fire. I was on my knees with the bass, hair whipping in every direction, fingers blistered on the strings, each final note a scream of electric defiance. My back arched as I hit the last bend, the Thunderbird feather now a full storm tethered to my bass. The air shimmered. The roots of the Tree trembled. Somewhere in the distance, someone sobbed like they'd just remembered who they were. I was gasping. Sweat pouring down my neck. The world was silent for half a second. Then she screamed.

"ENOUGH!"

Sorrel. The glamour cracked from her voice like glass breaking inside a cathedral. Her body moved in a blur—more magic than person—and she launched herself from the royal dais. Straight for me.

"No—!" Morgan shouted, throwing up both hands, weaving spell after spell to reinforce the barrier. It was too late. Sorrel hit the holy shield like a comet. The salt burned her, the divine magic ripped through her glamour, flesh and spell igniting like paper—but she kept going. Pushing through fire, through faith, through everything we had thrown in her path. The barrier held for a moment. Just one. And then shattered. A pulse of magic detonated outward like a sun being born sideways. The entire stage exploded in white and green fire. Morgan, Cú, Gawain, Thalien—everyone was blasted backward. Patrick fell to his knees, cross glowing with blistering heat. 

I couldn't hear. Couldn't think. The world had become white. So I did the only thing I could think of. I hugged her. Arms tight. Claws retracted. Bass falling from my back, spinning away in the explosion. I wrapped her up like a brother catching a wounded sister—no rage, no fury. Just finality. Then I turned. And we fell.

Through the broken stage. Through the warped stone. Through splintering marble and shattering root-veins of the Bladed Tree. Two bodies. One blazing comet. Down. Down. Down. Like a missile. Like a prayer.

Impact.

We hit like a bomb. Stone shattered. Earth buckled. Air cracked. The courtyard of the Bladed Tree caved in where we landed, a smoking crater now smoldering in the heart of the Autumn Court. The ruins of the palace twisted above us, roots and walls curled inward like they were trying to flinch away from the force of what just happened. And we were alive. Barely.

I lay there for a second, blinking stars, blood in my teeth. My arms refused to move. My bass was gone. Everything hurt. Everything. Ligaments popped loose. I could feel my shoulder hanging wrong, my jaw dislocated, and I was pretty sure my kneecap was somewhere near my shin. My body was trying to heal, sure—but it was like welding a ship back together mid-sinking.

I coughed. Something red hit the dirt. Across from me, Sorrel rose from the wreckage. Her left side was melted—skin charred down to the bone, her gown hanging in smoking tatters. Her hair was a ruined halo, her lips split open, one eye pouring radiant magic like a leaking star. And still, the bracelet burned on her wrist. She didn't speak. Just raised one trembling hand and blasted me across the courtyard. My body hit a root-wall so hard it cracked behind me. My shoulder dislocated again on impact, and I had about half a second of silence before I roared and snapped it back into place with a sickening pop.

She limped forward, arm trembling, preparing another spell. I pushed off the wall, claws snikted out of my hands with a hiss of adamantium cutting the air. I leapt at her. She screamed, magic flaring like a firestorm. A cone of heat washed over me, burning skin, singing clothes—but my claws found her shoulder, digging in deep, sparks flying as I dragged them through her flesh and into her ribs. She shrieked. Then detonated my face again.

We went tumbling. Her: bleeding radiant ichor, her face twitching with fury. Me: ribs pulping my lungs, hands shaking, eyes burning from the inside out. We got up again. Slower. Worse. But still—up. She hurled a spear of pure light. I batted it aside with my claws, the shockwave blowing out my eardrums again. I lunged—she dodged—I bit her arm. She screamed. We collapsed into each other again—snarling, swinging, biting, clawing, burning.

She screamed something in Sidhe—a curse, a name, a god—and then her hand flared white-hot. A ray of heat slammed into my chest, and I swear I felt my skin crackle like pork rind. My jacket lit up, flesh splitting, ribs glowing red beneath the torn layers of scorched muscle. I staggered, blackened smoke riising from my chest. She stepped forward, dragging her leg, blood and purple magic pouring from the claw wounds I'd torn into her side. Her lips curled in fury, her eye bleeding streaks of gold.

"Stay. Down." she hissed, voice raw and shaking. I spat blood into the dirt. Then surged forward with a roar. Claws up. She went to dodge. Too slow. I brought my left hand down, hard and low—and lopped off her foot just above the ankle.

She screamed. Her body hit the ground with a thud that made the crater tremble. Her arms thrashed, dragging herself backward, bracelet still glowing, still trying to charge another blast. I was on fire. Literally. My chest smoked. My arms looked like cracked stone, flesh burned so deep I could see silver glints of bone under the skin. My healing factor fought, but it was crawling. Struggling. Losing.

Still, I stalked forward, every breath a grind of pain, every step tearing fresh fire through my muscles. She raised a hand again—magic crackling like the last gasp of a dying star. I slapped it aside with one clawed hand and drove the other straight through her shoulder.

We collapsed into each other again, clawing, biting, burning, bleeding—two silhouettes locked in ruin, surrounded by smoke and shattered stone. There was no grace left. No elegance. Just survival. We were ash and agony. She tried to crawl away. Magic still flickered from her hand—her body jerking like it was stuck between casting another spell and losing consciousness entirely. But I was already behind her. Burned to the bone, clothes in tatters, skin split and smoking from her last blast. Didn't matter. I wrapped my arm around her throat, locked my elbow in place beneath her jaw, and pulled her back against me in a brutal chokehold. My muscles screamed. My skin tore open again just from the strain. She thrashed, gurgled, eyes wide with disbelief and panic. Her hands clawed at my wrist, nails raking lines across my skin. Then she inhaled. A deep, sharp breath and then she breathed fire.

It erupted from her mouth like a flamethrower, engulfing my arm from elbow to shoulder, turning flesh to bubbling, hissing ruin. I howled, vision going white, the smell of my own meat cooking in my nostrils. My instincts going haywire. I just dropped my head, bared my teeth—and bit into the back of her neck. Hard. Her scream was ragged, half-choked, as I sank my dagger-sharp teeth into fae flesh, tasted blood, freshly cut grass and whatever passed for divinity in her veins. She convulsed in my grip, magic flaring wild and uncontrolled, lashing into the ground around us, carving molten symbols into the dirt. My arm was fused to her now, skin and sinew melted together. I kept biting. She kept burning. Both of us half-dead. Neither of us letting go.

My arm was gone. I couldn't feel it past the elbow—just the weight of metal bones locked to her neck. She writhed once more in my grip, flailing weakly, her magic nothing but sparks now. She choked. I bit harder. And then I bit through. My jaw cracked as I forced my teeth shut, grinding bone and sinew until I felt my teeth click against each other on the other side of her throat. Sorrel made one final noise—a soft, pitiful gasp—and then went limp in my arms. Her body twitched once. And her head went rolling.

For a moment, I didn't move. The fire still burned in patches around the crater. The earth was blackened. My body was pulped, skin charred and flaking, the only thing keeping me breathing was that stubborn, a sliver of healing pulsing beneath my ribs like a dying heartbeat. I let go. Let her headless body fall beside me in the dirt, her one remaining eye open, staring at nothing.

I stared up at the ceiling of wrong sky, let the heat bleed out of my quickly healing chest cavity, and whispered: "…Ow."

I don't know how long I stayed there. Long enough for the healing to finish. My skin reknitting in patches. The worst of the burns flaking off. My muscles remembering where they went. Eventually, I rolled onto my side. And looked at her head—a crown. It looked like root and amber, twisted together, grown into her skull like roots digging into bone. It wasn't ornamental. It was ownership. Her authority. Her anchor to the Court.

I crawled over. Reached out with my good hand. And gripped it. It resisted at first. Like trying to pull a nail from an ancient tree. Then with a crack—sharp, wet, wrong—it came free in my hand. Root and bone. Her crown. My loot. I stared at it—blood-slick and humming with power. Then leaned back against the dirt wall of the crater, crown in one hand, blood still on my lips.

I sat there a moment longer, crown in hand, chest heaving. The Faewylds above were quiet now—or maybe my eardrums aren't back yet. Either way, the silence felt earned. I looked up. The walls of the crater rose around me like the inside of a broken tooth—sheer, jagged, still flickering with residual magic. Somewhere far above, the shattered underside of the Bladed Tree's throne room swayed in the heat haze, glowing with residual embers.

I limped toward a corner, finding my bass embedded into the ground, with a wordless scream I pulled it free, and into my back it went.

I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, spat blood and pieces of fae stuck in my teeth, and slid the root-crown into my bicep, where it pulsed like a second heartbeat. Then I reached behind me with both arms—and let the adamantium claws slide out. With a grunt, I jammed them into the stone. Skrrk. They held. I pulled myself up—one heaving motion at a time. Fingers aching. Arms trembling. Blood and dirt trailing behind me like a smear of battlefield ink.

No divine wings. No miracle lift. Just claws and willpower. Up. Up. Up. Toward the edge of the crater and then to where the coronation was being held. Because the job wasn't finished yet. The stone rim scraped under my claws as I dragged myself over the edge. I collapsed to one knee, breath ragged, hand still braced on the lip of the shattered throne room. Around me, the court had gone silent. Not just quiet. Silent. Like the world had forgotten how to speak. Fae nobles stood frozen mid-step, blood still drying on their hands. Dancers held their poses. The queens of Summer, Winter, and Spring sat wide-eyed on their thrones, crowns slightly tilted, like they'd been caught watching the wrong myth unfold.

The Bladed Tree groaned overhead—bark split down its trunk seeping sap to the world, roots twitching in the stone. Smoke curled upward from the crater behind me like a burned offering.

"She's gone," I rasped, voice like gravel and thunder.

Cú whistled low. Patrick made the sign of the cross, slower this time. Morgan laughed, once—the sound like a blade pulled from a velvet sheath. Gawain simply nodded, arms full of gore folded like he was looking at a man returned from war. Thalien moved to my side without a word, steadying me with one hand, the other already watching the reactions in the crowd. Still—no one spoke. No one moved. Until I turned to the high table, and without breaking eye contact with the three remaining queens, I said:

"I'm keeping the crown."

And none of them argued. Because whatever they'd thought I was before—mortal, nuisance, now they knew. I was the one who killed their queen. And walked out with her crown. From the far end of the shattered throne room, a shadow stirred—quiet, but absolute. He didn't walk. He arrived. Oberon. King of Faerie. The First Crown. He stepped from behind the Bladed Tree as if he had always been there—just hidden between the world, behind the heartbeat of the world. Hair like twilight. Eyes like still water. Robes of living shadow and red-gold flame.

He looked at me. And smiled. Not wide. Not cruel. Just... curious. Behind him, the three queens rose from their thrones, Titania, radiant and wilting at once, stepped forward first.

"Such a storm you've made," she said, voice a breath and a blade. "We had just finished polishing the floors." Her smile didn't reach her eyes. "But you play beautifully, little sun. All that light, and yet you know how to use it to burn." She dipped her head the barest fraction. "Summer will remembers its debts."

Next was Verdanas of the Spring—barefoot in vines and blush-petal armor, her green eyes soft and sharp all at once. "You've trampled my garden," she said, expression unreadable. "Uprooted my order. Shattered the peace I'd just finished sewing shut." Then she smiled. "I adore you for it. Spring owes you a bloom." Last was Mab. Mab of Winter. Unmoving. Unsmiling. Frost still clinging to her veil. She looked at me like she was memorizing my soul for later dissection. "When the time comes," she said, "and the snow is deep enough to swallow memory, I'll remember you." A pause. "I hope you do not expect thanks. We do not thank wildfires. We survive them." But even she gave a nod. And then Oberon stepped forward, arms folded behind his back, his voice impossibly smooth, like silk.

"You've broken one of my queens," he said, "in her own court no less." He smiled again. "Glorious. Wasteful. Divine." He tilted his head. "You have brought war to our banquet. Ruin to our rituals. Fire to our law. You have bled on our roots and howled at our sky, and still you wear her crown." He took a breath. Then said—softly, clearly: "All the Courts of Faerie… owe you a debt." The silence that followed was total. Then Titania laughed. A bright, poisonous thing. "Not that we'll ever let you forget it." Oberon's words drifted across the court like the final line of an ancient riddle: "The Courts are in your debt."

They began with my companions. Saint Patrick stood stiff as a church pillar, his hands folded tight, chin high, like he expected to be struck instead of rewarded. Mab stepped forward from the rest. Just a single gesture—and from a velvet box, she lifted something wrapped in blood-red silk. She handed it to him. He opened it slowly. Inside: a nail. Rusty. Ancient. Bent from use.

"The left nail," Mab said, voice like a frostbitten whisper. "Taken after it hit divine flesh. Saved by a witch who saw what mortals couldn't."

Patrick's lips parted. But no words came. He clutched the nail to his chest, sank to one knee, and wept.

Next was Cú Chulainn. Titania didn't bother with pageantry. She snapped her fingers and a battered canteen thunked at his feet. He raised an eyebrow, opened it, and sniffed. His pupils dilated like he'd just seen the heavens.

"Whiskey," she said, "from the first still ever made. Poured by one of your gods. It never runs dry. You probably will wish it did."

He raised it high, grinning like a lunatic. "I'll die happy then."

Gawain stepped forward next. Verdanas smiled gently and handed him a scroll, sealed with red wax and a sigil. He unrolled it slowly. Sir Galahad's handwriting. A map. 

"Last known location of the Grail," Verdanas said. "Assuming your faith is stronger than your pride."

Gawain whispered, "Always."

Morgan received hers from Winter—a small black mirror in a silver locket, no bigger than a coin. She flipped it open. Pages fluttered in the reflection. Books. Thousands. Spells shifting like stars behind glass.

"Every word the Courts have ever written," Mab said. "Even the ones they swore never to speak again."

Morgan snapped the locket shut and tucked it in her sleeve. "I'm keeping that," she muttered. "Forever."

Thalien stood silent, watching it all—until Spring stepped close and touched his shoulder. A mark bloomed there, made of ivy and roses.

"You're a Lord now," Verdanas said. "Spring answers your call."

He bowed deeply. Then they all turned to me. Oberon conjured a long, narrow chest—oiled wood, rings of gold, locks that sighed open without touch. Inside were two things, a greek sword of flawless bronze.

"Alexander's," Oberon said. "Lost on the shores of Aegypt, traded for immortality. He didn't understand the deal.

A scroll in golden waxed leather—a collection of Plato's lost philosophies, scribbled not in ink, but in charcoal, faded from memory before the Parthenon ever fell.

The praises came quick and flowing. Cheers echoed through the Autumn Court—golden music, crystalline voices, petals raining from the rafters of the Bladed Tree like ash. Faeries danced in spirals, sang songs. Names were woven into verse, praises painted in light:

Lucas of the Sun.

Breaker of Queens.

Singer of Storms.

Bearer of the Autumn Crown.

The Dog, the Knight, the Saint, the Sorceress, the Springborn. Victors of the Court Eternal.

It would've felt like a hero's farewell. But they were obviously trying to shove us out the door. "Oh, do take this parting blessing," cooed one fae noble, slipping an invisible ribbon into Sif's collar, having been brought from the clearing where we left her, "and perhaps a path back to your quaint little world?"

"You must return before the stars shift," said another, eyes sharp despite her smile, "the borders are so unreliable this time of year."

Mab herself rose from her throne, regal and ice-pale. "It would be… unwise to linger. The Wild Magic bends around your kind. And you've bent quite enough."

Titania chimed in with honeyed laughter, "We do so adore guests. Brief ones. Victorious ones. Departing ones."

Even Oberon, calm and still as a mountain in mist, gave a single nod toward a spiraling arch of branches and gold now pulsing at the edge of the room. A door back to the mortal world.

"Your tale has changed us," he said, "and the telling is not over. But the Faewylds are no place for mortals to loiter."

Morgan muttered under her breath, "That's the fae version of get the hell out."

Cú was already half-drunkenly swaying. "They're throwing us a party and the boot. I kind of love it."

Patrick crossed himself for the fiftieth time and said something about Babylon.

And me? I looked back. At the shattered throne. At the crater we left behind. At the Autumn Crown strapped to my side. And I smiled.

"Alright then," I said, voice rough with smoke and victory. "Let's go before they start singing again."

We turned as one. And walked out.

We stepped through the portal—

And reality hit us. Hard. Gone was the honeygold air, the humming trees, the timeless twilight of the Faewylds. Instead? Wet stone. Rot. A sewer. The stench punched me in the teeth. Hot, humid, like old rain soaked in rat piss and crushed tourist food. It was the smell of New York. My boots splashed down into ankle-deep runoff, warm and oily. Sif whimpered beside me, fur slick and miserable, ears pinned back like she was ready to bolt back through the portal. Morgan muttered a curse in four dead languages, wiping sewer slime from her dress. 

Cú just howled with laughter.

"This," he said, clapping me on the back, "this is what being a hero gets you!"

Patrick crossed himself for the hundredth time. "Deliver us from this mortal filth, Lord."

Gawain stared up at the manhole like it was the pearly gates.

I turned around, half-expecting to see Thalien sighing beside me, a clever remark on his lips, some fae-flavored complaint about mortal plumbing. But he wasn't there. The portal flickered behind us. He stood just past its edge—in the Faewylds still. Framed by golden light, with spring blossoms swirling faintly around his shoulders.

He didn't speak. Just smiled. Small. Sad.

I stepped toward him. "You're not coming?"

He shook his head. "This is my court now. My world. I'm a Lord of Spring, remember?"

He hesitated. Looked past me at the others, then back.

I nodded. Didn't trust myself to speak.

He raised a hand in farewell—

And the portal closed. Gone. Just sewer stone now. Just rust and wet and the echo of dripping water.

We stood there in the quiet.

Then I looked up at the manhole. Sunlight bled through the cracks above. I started to climb. "Let's go, heroes," I said, voice low, almost reverent. The manhole creaked open with a rusty groan. I shoved it aside and hoisted myself into sunlight. Warm. Honest. Blinding.

I blinked a few times, eyes adjusting. Birds chirped. A lawn sprinkler hissed in the distance. I was standing in the middle of a quiet suburban street—one of those neighborhoods where all the houses looked like they were printed from the same IKEA catalog, painted in different shades of slightly hopeful beige.

Behind me, the rest of the crew climbed out in various states of exhaustion and trauma. Cú was still laughing. Gawain looked like he wanted to lie down on the pavement and never move again. Morgan wrinkled her nose and conjured a gust of wind to blow sewer air away from her robes. Saint Patrick muttered a prayer and kissed his nail. Cú pulled Sif out of the hole, fur still matted, just plopped down on the grass with a groan.

I took a breath. Looked left. Looked right. And saw it. Across the street. In all its low-rent, neon-lit, glorious modernity—a TGI Friday's. The sign out front flickered in the daylight, as if it, too, had seen war. JELLY SHOTS - BUY ONE GET ONE.

The gods wept.

I grinned. "Alright," I said, slinging the bass-axe back over my shoulder and adjusting the Autumn Crown now digging into my armpit. "We've saved the realms, dethroned a queen, and crawled through literal shit to get here." I turned to them. "To hell with destiny. Let's go get hammered."

Morgan and Gawain sighed. Patrick made the sign of the cross. Cú raised his flask in salute. And together—bloodstained, burned, myth-soaked and barely functional—we crossed the street.

We were already seated by the time the shock set in. The reality of our surroundings hit like a punch to the gut. Red vinyl booths squeaked under our weight, and plastic menus covered in high-gloss photographs of food that looked just greasy enough to be divine lay in front of us. The lights were too bright, the music too soft, and somewhere in the back, someone was microwaving something that might legally be called cheese.

Across from me sat a motley crew of heroes, each lost in their own world of wonder and bewilderment.

Cú, the ancient Irish warrior, was grinning like a lunatic, polishing off a plate of loaded nachos with his bare hands. Cheese dripped down his chin, and he licked his fingers with relish, eyes closed in pure bliss.

Gawain, the Knight of the Round Table, stared in awe at a milkshake the size of a toddler. He dipped his finger into the whipped cream, then licked it clean, his expression one of pure fascination.

And beneath the table, Sif, the wolf, slept soundly, a half eaten rack of ribs beside her like a tribute to her heroism.

Morgan licked buffalo sauce off her fingers, her eyes widening with each taste. "This is... intense," she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

I grinned, picking up a fry drenched in bacon and jalapeño goo. "Welcome to the mortal world," I said. "We gotten quite good at cooking, just watch the waistline."

Patrick sniffed a mozzarella stick, his nose wrinkling in disapproval. "I've fought heresy with less sin than this," he repeated, shaking his head.

I chuckled. "It's cheese. Deep-fried. With marinara. You are looking at the apex of human civilization."

Gawain muttered something about decadence, marveling at his third side of ranch. Cú, meanwhile, tore into a cheeseburger like it owed him money. "This is glorious. We should conquer this place." he declared, his mouth full. 

I leaned back, arms stretched across the booth, nodding at the platter in front of me. "You realize, the sheer amount of spice and grease in this one basket could probably kill someone from your time, right?"

Morgan blinked, her eyes widening. "This has... multiple spices?"

I nodded. "Thirteen. That I know of. The sauce alone is made with four peppers."

She looked at the plate like it had just offered to duel her. Patrick muttered something about Sodom and shook his head, his expression one of pure disdain.

Across the restaurant, the bartender set down a tray of neon jelly shots. Cú saw it and grinned, his eyes lighting up with mischief.

"I love the modern world," he said, raising his glass in a toast.

Gawain followed suit, raising his milkshake. "To our bard," he said, his voice filled with admiration. "

I raised my own glass, a smile spreading across my face. "To jelly shots," I said. 

Morgan had a trick up her sleeve. She enchanted the waitress, who floated from table to table in a daze, smiling like she was stuck in a really chill dream. Her arms were loaded with sampler platters, steak skewers, strawberry lemonades, shrimp cocktails, and a deep-fried cheesecake that radiated sinful energy.

Morgan just twirled her fingers under the table and whispered, "All of it."

And so we were feasting. 

Cú was the first to speak, his eyes distant, glass raised. "I'm going back," he said. "To the Éire. Somehow. She's changed, I know. But so have I. Maybe I'll find a place that remembers me."

"Do you... know how to get there?" I asked, my voice soft.

He shrugged. "Walk long enough. Swim, maybe. Fight the sea. Ireland always calls back eventually."

Morgan leaned back in her seat, her expression thoughtful then she looked at me with questionable eyes. "I wonder if Circe is still around," she said. "We used to write each other—pen pals in the art of turning men into pigs. Good times."

I gave her a look, raising an eyebrow. "Just because I'm a Greek demigod, I'm supposed to know her?"

She blinked, completely serious. "You don't, she is one of the mightiest sorceress on your side of the world?"

Patrick finally spoke, his arms crossed, eyes on his root beer float like it was heresy in dairy form. "I should head toward the papal states," he muttered. "See what's left of the faith."

I grinned, the warmth of the moment spreading through me. "Oh, I cannot wait to see your face when someone tells you about the Protestants."

He blinked, confusion written all over his face. "The what?"

I chuckled. "Don't worry. It's a long story. Starts around the time someone nailed a letter to a door."

Gawain finished his last rib, wiped his hands with a napkin, and exhaled deeply. "I'll seek the Grail again," he said quietly. "It's out there. It always is."

"Any idea where?" I asked, my curiosity piqued.

He nodded, his expression serious. "The last rumor placed it in the pyramid of Memphis, but not of the Saracens but in some place call Ten-e-see, probably near Cathay."

I blinked, confusion written all over my face. "Tennessee?"

He nodded, deadly serious. "Aye. The home of the Great Pharaoh Bass Pro Shop."

Cú just muttered, "Madness. Absolute madness."

And me? I leaned back in my seat, stomach full, laughter screaming out of my lungs. 

CP Bank:1000cp

Perks earned this chapter: none.

Milestones: Quest end: Dethrone a seasonal queen: 1000cp.