“He turned to dark magic that he knew better than to touch. Magic forbidden by those who protect the Tree. The pure magic of the Leylines themselves.” Liluth’s voice continued. “My Lord shouldn’t have been able to touch it, but he found a way. The will of a Fae Lord is difficult to thwart, even for the Tree itself. But doing a thing does not always result in what you expect, and there were consequences. The ripples were felt across hundreds of worlds. So many lives were touched, so many threads of fate twisted out of their patterns… and so my Lord was punished.”

She let out a sigh, closing her eyes. “One moment, everything was normal in the Towering Forest. The next, the land trembled as the great tree shuddered. All of us fled as the land under our feet turned cold, then faded into nothing. Three voices called out, “This Fey Land is no more, it’s Fey Lord is no more. May Felix someday earn redemption, should he seek it, and deserve it, as only we may say.” Tears rolled down the Elven woman’s face. “The Forest was gone, a dark mist left in its place. Anytime we tried to enter, it led us right back to the edges. The First could no longer feel our father. Worse yet, the magic had changed. Our children no longer had echoes of agelessness. Over time, the long lives faded. Only the First remained the same, as long as we did not leave. Plenty left, searching for a path to redemption for our Lord, a way to appease the Fates.”

My heart clenched in my chest. Leaving my family behind for the year-long contract was nothing compared to this pain, this tragedy. How many people suffered because of what the Cat had done? I didn’t have a clue, but it really didn’t matter. What mattered was finding a way to make it right.

“Did they find one? A way to make it right?” I asked, needing to know.

Liluth shook her head. “Nothing. No one who left found any trace of what had happened to our Lord. It was like he no longer existed for us.” Her fingers tightened on the armrests. “But he is here.” A sad smile covered her face. “I can feel his magic in this Shop, in you. Though it’s different, not the Forest, it is my Lord’s power.”

It made sense that the Cat had screwed up and gotten himself banished here. Or at least, that’s what it sounded like, based on the story Liluth told.

“This is the closest any of us have gotten to him since the Towering Forest vanished. I can feel the curse in the magic. I bet he’s cut off from it until he finishes whatever the Fates set him to do.” Her face fell. “I’d hoped that I could do more to help him, but if it’s a task the Fates have given him, there is nothing anyone can do.”

“What about Betty?” I asked. “The Shop, you said it’s his power, how is it also different? Betty is their own entity…”

Liluth’s eyes narrowed. “The Shop has a name? Its own personality?”

“Yeah, they can do things. I ask them to do things and it happens.”

“But you call it Betty?” She shook her head. “Did you name it? Or did the old Keeper name it?”

The first thing that came to mind was the Cat’s warning about naming things. How a name could give something power. Maybe I shouldn’t have named the espresso maker? Still, it seemed wrong to not give the shop a name. I couldn’t just call it ‘the shop,’ that felt completely wrong. “I named them, but they agreed to it. I think.” Warmth rushed up from the chair and it felt like a hug, making me feel better.

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Liluth noticed and her look changed to one of concern. “The Fey Realm didn’t act like its own person when it was whole. It might have something to do with the curse, or the loss of connection with my Fey Lord. While people view them as separate, we First have always known the Fey Lord and his Realm are more like the same thing than distinct beings.”

“So, Betty is the part of the Fey Lord that likes me and wants to be my friend?” I asked.

Liluth didn’t respond to my question, and instead looked thoughtful for several moments. “I do not know. Though, the magic trusts you, that much is clear. I hope you can figure out how to help my Lord, and send him home. So many have lost hope. Generations don’t even believe he is real. Most have fled to a different world, and settled there. The last of the First, we wait, and we hope, though our number trickles down as one by one my people lose that hope.”

***

“That’s the conclusion she comes to? I like her just fine, I threw her a birthday party yesterday,” I mumbled.

Lady Twilight chuckled. “She’s young, and what happened here with your Realm is pretty strange. I wonder how to put it to rights.” She side eyed me. “Though, you’re the only one with the whole and true story, as you would put it. Sable might want to know. She might need to.”

I rolled my eyes letting the rest of the anger go. If Lady Twilight spoke the truth, my daughter would be safe, though stuck with dragons for who knew how long. It wasn’t any worse than my punishment of being in the store and putting things to rights. The years dragged on all the same, as they would in the future.

“There is nothing to tell. I need to put things right.”

“Do you have any indicator of what those things are?”

I shook my head, or tried to. The dragon seemed to get the point. “All I have is the book. It tells me what the next task is. Though, you were not supposed to show up today. This is detouring us from what should be.” I very slowly laid down on the counter, not moving any closer to the Elven woman I couldn’t take my eyes of off. Liluth was one of the First in more ways than one. She had been my First Daughter, the First of my children in truth. She was my dearest Daughter, who trusted me, and I had failed all of them. When I had been banished, all one hundred of my First children still lived, and now there were only ten, and her time was quickly fading. All because I had reached too high to try to thwart the Fates.

“We need to leave momentarily,” whispered Lady Twilight. “I can feel the welcome ebbing. The magic I used to find this place has limits, even for me.”

“They aren’t going to be happy with you.”

“Dragons have always been outside of the Fates. They tolerate it, because they have no choice.”

***

Before I could ask anything else, Lady Twilight made some motion and Liluth stood up.

“Thank you, Sable, for watching over my Lord. I hoped he wouldn’t be stuck alone all these years.” She bowed her head at me, then the two of them hustled right out the door before I could respond.

The door thudded shut and locked. Silence reigned.

“So, you’re cursed?” I asked, quietly, without turning to look at the counter.

“I am.”

“Until things are put to right?”

“Yes.”

“How long have you been stuck here?”

“A very long time…” he said, sounding old, with a depth of age and grief and exhaustion that I could barely comprehend.

“How do we break the curse?” I asked. This time, I turned to look at the counter, but the Cat wasn’t looking in my direction. Instead, he gazed toward the balcony and the potted tiny oak tree.

“You don’t.” He turned and jumped off the counter, vanishing out of sight.