Rafe paced back and forth, making deep, grumbling sounds from the depths of his throat while casting contemplative glances at a very nervous and subdued Alice. Since our harrowing escape to the demon realm her normally curious personality was absent and she was very pointedly avoiding eye contact with everyone. The girl perked up and became terribly interested whenever something magical happened around her and with this realm oozing magic from every pore, it should have been sending her into joyous fits simply being here.

“The girl reeks of fae stench,” Rafe growled, eyeing Feros suspiciously.

“That she does,” Feros admitted, “and I had thought I had the situation under control.”

“Under control?” Rafe said with a stiff laugh. “The only way to control fae influence is to snuff the source.”

Alice broke her silence to exhale a soft gasp, eyes wide and pleading towards the demon king.

“I thought she would perhaps make a better asset to us,” Feros explained. He stood and nonchalantly, but pointedly inserted himself between Rafe and the girl.

It was a bold move to stand while the king was and even bolder to make any move to even hint at protecting someone from him. I or one of his children may have been allowed to take such action, but it was brave and perhaps a bit stupid for someone considered the equivalent to a commoner under his employ. I fully expected the king to strike him down verbally and would not have been surprised had he turned physical, but Rafe merely scowled at the fiend.

“An asset?” he spat. “The girl has cost us an entire castle and everything it contained!”

“For now, yes, that’s true,” Feros admitted, “but you know that I would not dabble in fae matters what so ever if I didn’t think there was potential for a big pay off. I also fully admit that it has been long enough since I worked directly with pure blood humans that I had forgotten how unreliable they can be, particularly children.” He cast Alice a serious glance like a disappointed father.

“What pay off?”

Feros looked around at everyone present, judging how much he would be willing to say in present company. It was only Rafe and the entourage we had arrived with minus the two, very confused, human servants who had been tasked with carrying the book to Mistra’s room in the demon castle. Tiffany was technically still present, though was slumped in one of the meeting room’s chairs, still unable to regain consciousness.

“Are you overly familiar with fae magic?” Feros asked with a nod of his head to the king.

“I’ve studied about it enough,” Rafe grumbled.

“Yes, of course, I wasn’t questioning your book knowledge, but have you experienced it in person?”

“Of course not, I wouldn’t let a fae anywhere near even the edge of my kingdom, let alone darken my door.”

“And have you kept abreast of their politics?” Feros was leading the king somewhere without directly spitting out what exactly he was trying to convey. In my opinion, it was his most irritating quality, he loved to dance in circles around important information, even when the situation was dire and there was limited time.

“What kind of mad man would I be to do that?” The king looked incredulous at the idea that Feros would even suggest such a thing. “Their politics are chaotic and nonsensical on the best day and absolutely maddening to try to track most days.”

“I’m sure you have someone in the kingdom tasks with tracking it, yes? If I may make a suggestion to you, it might behoove you to start touching base with them more regularly.”

Rafe stopped mid pace and fully turned to face Feros, a dark look on his face. “And if I may a suggestion, you should start telling me exactly what you’re trying to get at and it may behoove you in the future to remember to mind your tone when speaking before royalty.”

Feros inclined his head, but the subtle smile did not fade from his lips. “Apologies, my lord. Well, since I am well versed in different kinds of fae magic, I recognized right away that this girl very strongly exudes the influence of Spring fae.” He paused as if he expected someone, anyone in the room to react, when no one did his smile transformed to a bit of a frown. “I suppose I may have to explain a bit why that’s relevant, I am really quite used to the fae being the buzz of conversation in other realms. Everyone knows better than to interfere or draw attention to anything fae, but humans and demons I suppose really do act like they don’t exist at all. Perhaps that’s a good way to avoid drawing any attention at all, but if you’re the rabbit you should keep your eye on the hawk at all times.”

“The point,” Rafe said with clear annoyance.

“The point is that the Spring fae have been gearing for war against the Winter. Their respective courts have never been particularly fond of each other, but a series of complicated political decisions on Winter’s part recently have finally pushed Spring over the edge. Winter is not a push over though and Spring will need every weapon in their arsenal and maybe some even have got a bit lost along the way.” Feros spun around and looked meaningfully at the girl. “Alice here is obviously a fae touched child and one that I think wasn’t intended to be fumbled and lost. I know you can sense it, but extend your power and have a good feel for what I’m talking about.”

Rafe gave the fiend an unimpressed look, but unfurled his will and swept it over the girl. Alice’s eyes went wide with both fear and wonder, her entire body shaking as his power enveloped her. Her lips parted and she let out an uncomfortable squeak that I assumed was meant to be a plea for him to stop. A moment later, his power receded and Alice groaned softly and slumped forward in her chair, still conscious but clearly exhausted from the interaction.

“Hmm,” Rafe hummed, now looking notedly less annoyed, “I see.”

“She is rough, but there’s a diamond of potential locked within her,” Feros confirmed.

“Pity that she is human, if she were a demon she would already be unstoppable.”

“I have said pretty much the same,” Feros mused, “I have some ideas on that, but we can discuss that at a later date. For now, I think she is a powerful asset to have in our possession, even if she is certainly a liability right now. Winter sensed her and seized on the chance of eliminating her before Spring could find her first.”

“My kingdom was at risk of being invaded from two kingdoms and you did not think that should be explained to me?” I questioned. I had been deferring to Rafe to handle the situation seeing as we were in his kingdom, but I couldn’t keep silent any longer.

“Well, yes,” he admitted with a dry laugh, “even I can’t twist that to be anything different. However, had our young ward simply listened and followed my instructions to the absolute letter there should have been no way for them to sense her. I had been shielding the whole area around her any time she explored her powers, even before I had officially became her trainer, but it can be exhausting to keep it up all the time, hence why I had specifically and seriously told her never to do anything with her magic outside of when I told her it was okay. In order to fully keep the shielding up, I need to ground and recharge my magic every so often. It seems that at some point over the past month Alice chose the exact wrong moment to be defiant and it happened to line up with my resting period. If they had been looking for her and I think we can assume now they had been, even a brief, unshielded spark would have been enough for their trackers to determine where she was.”

Alice, who had seemed to recover a bit, had enough decency to look up with shame in her eyes and nod her head to validate that she had been dabbling with her powers outside of the instructed times.

“So you hinged the fate of my kingdom on a little girl’s ability to resist playing with the equivalent of a toy?” I crossed my arms in front of me and frowned at the fiend.

“Again, I haven’t worked with pure humans in so long, it was a mistake.” Feros looked flustered, it seemed it was not something he tended to feel all that often. “Most creatures have an innate sense of self-preservation, I had forgotten that humans seem to be one of the few creatures that value immediate satisfaction of their curiosity over their long term safety.”

“Tell a demon child not to touch fire because it’s dangerous and they obey while the human child will thrust their hand directly into the flames to test if you were right,” Rafe added.

“Exactly, it’s a wonder the human realm has survived at all for as long as it has.” Feros bowed to me deeply with much more sincerity than he ever had before. “I truly apologize for not briefing you more intensely on the danger the girl posed. I thought that doing so would require some intense study on your part since you are completely unfamiliar with fae workings and would distract you from your own magical studies. Obviously I made the wrong choice and left you blindsided.”

“It certainly has,” I said stiffly, “I assume you plan on ensuring this is made right somehow.”

“We can try,” Feros said, “but I was unfortunately being serious earlier when I warned that the House Yser might be lost to us for now. Though I don’t think they will find much there they will care to occupy and keep for themselves, but if they infer where we’ve gone they will likely hold up there until they find a way to cross or hope that we will try to return to take back the castle. It is best that we don’t try to return until we can find a way to verify they’ve left and are long gone.”

“Now I have no kingdom.” The knowledge sat as a heavy pit in my stomach. In what felt like a breath of a moment I went from sitting atop of plinth of power, raising my own army, and plotting to take more kingdoms as my own and now I was little more that a refuge being given sanctuary.

“You do not, no.”

Mistra snaked her hand around mine, squeezing it tightly. “We will get it back, one way or another. Our kingdom needs the connection to the human realm to thrive, we cannot let the connection be severed permanently.”

“My daughter is right, though I’m not sure it’s her place to do my speaking for me.” Rafe gave her a scolding look, though it softened quickly. “We cannot let what is effectively an invasion of our rightful land stand, regardless of who it is that has invaded. If we must stand against the fae to get it back, we will. Perhaps this is even a small blessing, the Church will not dare breath too hard near the fae least they draw attention to themselves. I assume they will have to lay low with any magical schemes they’ve been working on. This might act as a bit of break in their arms race, giving us time in this realm to get ahead of them.”

“Oh I would love to see that,” Feros said with glee, “the Great Church trying to deal with the fae. They tend to think they’re just made up, pagan nonsense or allegory for some kind of demons, that would be a very hash realization.”