HANDS SLAPPED HER CHEEKS lightly. “Wake up. Wake now, Faeling. Please. I need you.”

Blue hands, shimmering with Scintillant Faerie power she recognised from her own poor efforts to master her heritage.

The little one shifted anxiously, her frightened eyes flicking to the chaos enveloping her world. That was why she had collapsed, overwhelmed, unable to cope.

Dragons thundered overhead and between the trees of this small forest. The sweetish stench of burning flesh mingled with charred green wood, with pyres of dark black smoke billowing skyward as the forests roared as if in fury or pain, burning endlessly. Between the blackened trunks spurting yellow and orange flame, Faerie fled in droves, driven hither and thither by rampaging hordes of Dragons, clashing with the slower-moving squads of grey-skinned Faroon soldiers who slithered slowly through the chaos, keeping fifty feet apart but covering the area between them with nets of magic.

The Faerie, they snarled up in their traps and nets were bundled into metal cages. Black fire wreathed the bars, burning like acid at the slightest touch.

Tearful, smoke-blackened faces. Hollow eyes. Screams piercing the haze, a fleeing Faeling struck a burning tree and burst into flame, her expiring curiously soundless, her soul …

Sucked away by a shadow’s shadow slipping through the carnage.

The blue hands touched her neck. “Take this. Quickly. It’s coming – you are the only one – please!”

“What is it?”

“The greatest secret of our people,” urged the voice, clipping something cool behind her neck. “This is the ariayaenvul. Keep it safe at all costs, little one. Only you can do this. You are Scinntarinae.”

The Faeling began to speak, to question – aye, to panic.

“No. Hush. You must – you must be the one. I will trust in that beyond death. One day, you’ll understand. Now, I shall secure your escape.”

The mothering presence began to withdraw.

“No! Don’t go!”

“I must. It’s the only way. Flee now, little Fae. Flee and don’t look back.”

“Noooo … mommy! Please!”

“Be true. One day we shall see each other again, I promise, o beloved sparkle of my soul.”

The other flew away into the churning smoke, the carnage, the burning, a single point of azure radiance, pure and beautiful in her power. The Faeling wept bitterly. Then, as she lifted her eyes again, it was just in time to see a sinister shadow rise to envelop the azure. It pulsated once. A cry of unspeakable agony tore from the Scintillant Faerie as her soul ripped free of her body.

The entity suckled lasciviously upon the Fae’s life-force.

She could not move. Could not speak. All she knew was that the weight about her neck, the appalling weight, amplified as if the consumption of that soul had been captured into her. No, into the ariayaenvul.

Connected? How could this be?

Horror!

The shadow lingered, seeking, tasting, sensing the world about it with puzzlement, then with increasing eagerness. It relished her fear. Palpated her mind. This one, it wanted more than any other. This one was special.

It eased toward her, drifting this way and that as if it could not quite place where she was. Allory froze, wishing nothing more than to vanish into the enveloping darkness.

A lilting hiss froze her soul, “Dadfae’s here, little sparkle. Come. Where are you? Let’s play.”

Her soundless shriek shattered her being into a billion infinitesimally tiny, scintillant pieces. The shocking violence of that scene, the anguish of thousands of Faerie, the mortal peril, all vanished before the shadow ever touched her.

I am the boneyard girl. Keeper of souls.

* * * *

Allory sniffed uncertainly at the atmosphere about her. Something nearby smelled like Faerie, but this could only be the senseless output of her overactive imagination, or an echo of the horrendous vision she had just endured. Was there no hint of smoke here? No burning? Myriad haunting cries faded unheeded from her recollection. She blinked and everything smoothed away.

Nary a wrinkle to disturb her serenity.

Ashueli had informed her that no Fae lived in the canyonlands. The pogroms had wiped them out. More importantly, a careful peripheral check revealed no lurking predators. Her gaze tripped over a wide yellow flower that could almost be taken for an exotic Faerie face, called the ‘Flower of Expressions’ if she remembered her Fae lore correctly. Quaint. She had never seen one of those before. Dozens of butterflies flitted about higher up, feeding from the flowers as she would do. Sampling. She loved nothing more. So many exotic types and flavours to discover!

Allory winged languidly up the pipe, savouring the multicoloured offerings. Novel aromas and tastes abounded. Oh, divine! Antennae-curler! Toe-tingler! That lovely Pixie Cuisine Chef would have adored this location. With a wiggle of his podgy fingers, he would have conjured up a perfect dusting of flavour-magic from these magnificent offerings.

Some creatures were just so gifted …

She paused in trepidation for a second, spying a lime green serpent in amidst the foliage, but it was a harmless egg-eater. Close one. She must remain vigilant, because she had learned more than one lesson in these parts about things that would love nothing more than to munch her. Sweet chirruping birdsong mingled with the harsher cries of the reptilian prowlers, so unfamiliar to a jungle girlfae. Right. One last sip of these creamy trumpet flowers and she was in danger of scrummy nectar leaking out of her ears. Time for a leisurely wash. Just what the Fae Philosopher had ordered.

Flitting down to the base of the waterfall, Allory noticed a second one of these Expressions flowers. Two? Ha. Multiplying while she was not looking, eh?

“You’re very pretty,” she informed the flower drolly.

It quivered ever so slightly. Huh?

One could not trust her own mind in this state. That was how brutal these latest nightmares felt, the effect of causing a creature to doubt her own sanity, never mind the fleeting but acute pain effects she had experienced. Repeated jabs that stole her sleep. The phenomenon kept changing in nature, scope and effect, as Yaarah put it, and she still had no clue why or what it meant – yet she recognised a clear difference between the attacks and her more lucid dreams, the ones where she sensed she must somehow, by some unknowable magic, have been present.

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The enigmatic harp music had also vanished. Poof. Her handsome swain had the minor drawback of being non-existent, a figment of her overzealous imagination. Typical Allory. Yet the idea of that music remained with her, the melody emblazoned upon her soul.

Could she truly change the course of fate as it had suggested? I am the boneyard girl. My music is my own.

Powerful, tantalising … an impossible ask. Allory sighed.

Wash. Cleanse. Think.

Slipping off her teal semaloon skirt, she began unlace the neckline of her serami. Her deft fingers loosened the tight, traditional rhosi-knot. Wriggle, and –

Thump! “Oof! What the – mmm!”

A hand clamped over her mouth. Far too strong for her to dislodge. An infeasibly brawny arm trapped her hands by her sides. She felt a male Faerie’s pectoral muscles swelling against her back as the intruder swung her off her feet, handling her person as if she were a mere Faeling.

Scream!

Badly muffled. A squeak no one would hear beyond this grove.

“Fear not, maiden most fair,” a thrilling voice whispered in her ear, in a most unfamiliar accent full of raspy consonants and almost sung vowels. “I shall save thee from these fiendish beasts, all fearsome and fey.”

Allory squeaked between his fingers, “Let me go, you overgrown brute! I don’t need any saving.”

“Ah, but you do.”

The Faerie was frighteningly strong, his grasp like the cuddly embrace of a russet anaconda. He adjusted his grip to muffle her protests even more. Wriggling was clearly pointless. The shock of this assault flung all thoughts of self-defence, all her training with Ashueli, right out of her mind. Allory tried to kick, fight or bite, but her pitiful efforts did not faze him in the slightest. Up in the air, nipping through the foliage, he adjusted mid-flight and with a rapid raid glued some kind of leaf over her mouth, keeping her from yelling for help.

“Mmm! Grrr!”

Probably sealing in her cuteness for all eternity – that much success fighting him off. How big and strong was this Fae? Everywhere she looked was a beefy shoulder or part of his massive chest or … great, now his hand covered her eyes as if to protect her from a few stray leaves.

Freaking wretch, what’s he doing?

“I am the hero who has come to thy rescue, o most beauteous bud among all Faerie flowers,” he supplied, as if her every panicked thought stood written upon her forehead. “Fear not, I shall tarry with thee until the very end of Spheris itself.”

Right. A circle doesn’t have an end, numbskull – oh. Right-right.

With a neat flip, the manfae popped her over a branch upon her stomach and pinioned her in place with his considerable weight and muscle. He gathered her slender arms behind her back with vicelike strength and proceeded to truss her wrists, elbows, knees and ankles at considerable speed, all the while humming to himself or murmuring words – well, meant to comfort, one supposed. Her mumbled protests availed her nothing, to put it in his whimsical language.

To her distrustful relief, worse options appeared to be very far from his allegedly courtly, considerate mind. Was she supposed to just forget about all the rope?

As he tied his work off neatly, he advanced assurances such as, “Fear not, o maiden of charms most puissant, for this hero’s tender hand shall permit no harm to befall thy most agreeable person.”

Right. Weird much, mister? Tender-handed brute!

She said, “Mmm?”

Clearly encouraged, he declaimed as if reading off an ancient scroll, “I am the robust instrument of retribution visited upon those fiery fiends who held thy singular sapphire splendour captive. Behold, my towering strength shall shield thee safe from all misadventure.”

“Nuh-huh!”

Poetry-quoting beast! Adjective-obsessed moron! her brain yelled at him.

“A professional hero I am, doughty defender of all innocent, downtrodden and broken-hearted creatures, having risen like the hammer of fate itself to succour thee from all the wicked things of Spheris!”

Right. Very nice of him.

“Nnn-grrr!” she complained vigorously, but to no avail.

Allory rolled her eyes. It was about all she could do, given the dismaying expertise with which she had just been turned into a rope sausage. He and Princess Ashueli had evidently taken lessons from the same tutor in nasty, inescapable knots. Did he practise on his friends? Ridiculous! To her rather more considerable surprise, however, she found herself far more irked at his antics than terrified. Truly? What had happened to that shrinking jungle blossom, that coward in a runt’s body?

One or two cheerful whistles later, which celebrated the additional immovable fastening of her trussed arms to her torso – entirely superfluous, but at this stage perhaps meant as an additional decorative touch – the wicked manfae pinched her behind to raise a decent shriek and flipped his captive over.

She gazed up at her abductor.

Breathless.

At first glance, he was a Faerie as she had suspected … but oh, what a Faerie!

Her scattered thoughts promptly ran off to the horizon, went kerpew! and kerpow! somewhere out there and came back with, frankly, rather embarrassing results. ‘Abduction? What abduction?’ her brain inquired archly of the rest of her. ‘Actually, I quite like being abducted, because if my captor is going to look like Middlesun just stepped down to the surface of Spheris and took Fae-flesh, that would be him. How’s it even possible that much manfae is just one man? He’s … woooooowwweeee!’

Essentially, a great dollop of drivel and suggid-slime slopped about between her ears.

She despised herself.

And had a severe threat of outright drooling to contend with.

Sparkly drool.

Her captor was exceptionally tall for a Faerie, perhaps as much as twenty-two inches to her eleven and a smidgen. Double her height; ten times her muscle. Allory had always admired the burly warriors among her people. This young manfae took muscular and upscaled it to heroic, as if he had just stepped fresh out of his own legend, dusted it off lightly, and guffawed at the result – but despite the girth of his biceps and the eye-popping breadth of his powerful shoulders, his physique was all symmetrical and in proportion. And gorgeous. Jaw-dropping, nectar-frazzling, antennae-curling gorgeousness times a thousand. He had a square jaw, smile lines just touching the corners of his eyes, feathery crimson antennae … his light orange skin even came blazoned with luminous yellow designs that highlighted every play of his muscles as he moved.

Not that she was looking. Oh no, this girlfae gawked unashamedly. Inspected, studied and outright ogled. Gasped for breath and gaped again. His muscles, not exactly hidden by a sleeveless crimson vest likely cut to emphasize his brawn, had extra little muscles around them. Helper muscles. Every vein and line of him might as well have been chiselled by a master artist.

On top of all this splendour, his brilliant canary yellow eyes crinkled at the corners as he regarded his captive with tender … well, adoration.

Disturbing adoration.

Allory found herself thanking Centresky itself that her mouth was glued shut, or there definitely would have been a humiliating incident involving her tongue haplessly flopping down her chin. Only, was his face a flower? The effect was truly peculiar at some level that the rest of her bedazzled mind insisted, in the greater scheme of things, really did not matter.

“Well met, little Fae,” said the gentle giant, adding a devastating smile to his already dazzling array of charms. “My name is Harzune the Hunter, your one and only hero.”

So saying, he laced up the neckline of her serami with almost laughable consideration for her modesty.

“Be not alarmed, for my only intent toward thee is noble, just and true, to woo such an enchanting bud most devotedly. Now, pray do not scream as I remove this temporary binding.”

“Eep,” she agreed eagerly.

Phew. Her own personal hero? Heady stuff.

Peeling the sticky leaf off her mouth with a theatrical flourish, he declared, with his hand pressed to his heart, “O radiance of heavenly delight taken form and flesh to gild yon glade with such wondrous and fulsome pulchritude, pray share with thine adoring devotee, what is thy name and from whence dost thou hail?”

That was a lot of archaic language to sort through at once. Especially the way he delivered his speech, in rich tones that made her antennae shiver, and that smile that made her inmost sap quiver in dizzy rapture. Stupid sap! Whatever was the matter with her? Ridiculous!

Allory licked her lips and managed to say, “Eep?”

The dreamlike smile broadened.

“Eep-aah,” she explained earnestly, managing a whole two syllables of nonsense for a change.

I’ve completely lost the jungles over here.

For once in her life, completely understandable. Vexing but authentic.

“Ah, it’s the flower face,” he offered, smoothing the Flower of Expressions disguise off his features, apparently, with a thought. Allory blinked rapidly several times, but her eyesight failed to stop serving him up as even more impossibly divine. “Better? Behold my warm affection toward thy delicate state. Have no fear, o sweetest bud that e’er dappled the dews beneath Middlesun. Prithee tell, art thou of age?”

“Of … age? Prithee, uh, maybe? I’m … uh …” Suggids, this flower on legs has made me forget my own age? Finally, she blurted out, “Nineteen. Aye. I’m nineteen, of course.”

“Wonderful news,” he crowed, rubbing his hands together so vigorously, his heroic muscles leaped in concert. “Perfectly marvellous.”

Stop doing that with your pectorals, her incapacitated brain squealed in elation. I can’t not look!

He beamed at her.

Eventually, Allory managed to splutter, “Wh – whee – eep! Why?”

“For we shall be married at once!”