She fell between stars and fragments of worlds fell with her. Galbaric’s coat dragged at her, pulling her arms backward, fighting to escape. She’d been warned not to take it back to the Middle World, warned it would be ‘bad’ in the same way Galbaric had been described as ‘very dangerous’. But just as Steel’s words hadn’t conveyed the terrifying actuality of Galbaric’s temper, so did ‘bad’ not even approach the pain and horror of the coat trying to escape and consume her at the same time.

Hunching her shoulders, kicking her feet for purchase on nothing, she pulled her strained arms free of the coat and wrapped them around herself. The coat vanished and she hoped it’d find its way back to Galbaric. Then the darkness blew wildly around her and she once again smelled the fresh green of Artemisia.

Pliant tree branches slapped at her skin and then she crashed into the ground hard enough to knock the breath out of her. Before she had time to consciously think, she scrambled to her feet and stumbled a few steps before pausing to gasp for breath.

It was night, wherever she was. In a forest near Artemisia, she felt certain, but that covered a lot of ground. And oh how had she come back? She remembered what had happened at the end in Shell, but not in a way that made sense. She’d done things she didn’t even have words for, and she knew from the spill of the shattered moon that those things had not been right things.

But the flickering, invisible monster with the fangs would have caught her otherwise—

—and now she was back in the Middle World, where Tyler and his werewolves were. Even if she could find Zoë and her mothers and convince them all to flee town, she’d still lost Jim. The sudden stab of guilt and shame squeezed her chest as she remembered his sprawled body, and poor savaged Sarge. She’d left them all behind with a monster.

Panic clutched cold fingers around her heart. She couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe; she’d wanted to escape but she couldn’t escape her own thoughts.

Except she’d done that too, hadn’t she? What had she left behind in her lost memories?

A darkness beyond mere lightlessness swirled at the edge of her vision: the breath of the beast of amnesia, ready to serve her again. She gasped, teetering on the brink of hysteria.

The air shifted and ozone and musk tickled her nose. Something snarled above and then hit the ground with a thud. The distraction crackled through her. As the wind picked up, carrying a familiar scent to her nose, Ainsel whimpered, instinctively understanding what had happened and quivering with the effort of containing her desire to flee.

Remy rose to his feet, his form rippling in the moonlight. His eyes, painfully blue, fixed on her. The madness in him curled her fingers into her palms. He’d come after her, he’d chased her down again—

The curse, it’s the curse, I can help, I can help. Her thoughts ran impossibly fast and in circles, driving away awareness of her own body. But she didn’t have to hold herself long before Remy lunged toward her.

His weight carried her to the ground, his big hand curving around her head but the impact knocking her breath out of her. She gasped, blinking. When her mind partially cleared, he filled her senses: his musky scent, the warmth radiating from his body as he pinned her down. His hair tickled her cheek as he pressed his face against the join of her neck and shoulder. His breath rasped and she felt the scrape of his teeth and the slide of his tongue.

The fear she knew as an old friend squeezed her chest, but it ebbed against the rise of an odd kind of excitement. He could have torn her throat out between two heartbeats once he’d knocked her down.

She put her hands on the sides of his head and let her magic flow through them. The curse, no stronger now than it had been before, receded slowly but steadily, leaving behind the emotional wreckage she could feel but not fix. Even with the scarring it felt like a magical moment: she’d stayed to fight the curse, for herself and for him, and she’d won.

Then he lifted his head from her neck and her fingers slid down to his shoulders. His blue eyes, still intense, had regained something the curse swallowed. She recognized him. Not quite the hungry teenager, not the prince, not the warrrior. Something… else. Something that saw her, knew her, and didn’t care about her baggage.

“Ainsel,” he whispered, and the magical, crystal moment just kept extending itself. It felt like a dozen reflections of herself looked out at her: some turning away, some waving her on—but what mattered, right then, was that she was there. She was real. She was the one doing this.

His breath tickled her face before his mouth brushed softly over hers and she knew he kissed her because he wanted to kiss her. The realization was a key that unlocked her frozen awareness of her body and she arched toward him with a little cry as something sharp and hot and hungry bloomed within her.

He stroked her hair away from her face and kissed her again, a light, delicate caress. And again, and again, slowly and deliberately deepening the kiss in response to her frantic little motions, until his tongue licked inside her mouth. She clutched at him, sliding her hands under his shirt.

“Ainsel,” he murmured again, his thumb rubbing a circle on her temple, kissing the side of her lips and her jaw as he spoke. “Shh. I’m here. You’re all right. It’ll be okay.” A shudder passed through him and he exhaled against her throat before kissing her mouth again, a tender melding that reached deep within and made her feel both anxious and happy. It was like some kind of delirium, speeding her heart and demanding she touch him more, more, more.

But before she could, something that felt too big to be real appeared above the forest and fell. It hit the ground hard enough to jolt Ainsel back to herself, especially when she realized it seemed to be swearing in three languages.

A growl rumbled in Remy’s chest and he lifted himself away from her, though he remained on all fours as if shielding her body with his own. She looked around and saw Galbaric, standing, staggering a little, and clutching his head as if in great pain.

Remy’s snarl faded but he retained his protective pose as they both watched the Thunder King. After a moment, he looked in their direction, his eyes flaring wildly. His voice verging on inhuman, he rasped, “Where is my coat?”