I ushered the Winter princess inside quickly, unnerved by what was one of the most intense shows of emotions I’d ever seen from her. Even Alys stopped devouring her breakfast long enough to give Kiri a worried look.

  “Please, sit.” I gestured to the table. “Would you like something to eat? We can indulge a bit while we discuss whatever is bothering you.”

  “There is no time for —” Kiri cut herself off and visibly gathered her composure before slowly settling on a chair. “I apologize. That was quite rude of me, especially after you invited me into your home. Yes, please, I would like a small snack. Something sweet, if possible.”

  I felt immediately relieved. Whatever the situation, at least it wasn’t bad enough for her to insist we proceed at once.

  I had a few pieces of toasted bread left over, as well as some of that belladonna jam I’d made a while back. It was a simple task to retrieve both items and present them to Kiri, who patiently prepared a slice and took a bite.

  It wasn’t quite the convoluted hospitality rites some of our kind liked to get up to. Yet the significance of the act, small as it was, wasn’t lost on either of us.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “Of course. Now… how can we help you?” I glanced at Alys from the corner of my eye as I gave Kiri the floor.

  The dragoness had returned to devouring her food, though she did so, dare I say it, daintily. My lips briefly twitched. Despite the tense atmosphere, the sight of Alys trying to leash her ravenous appetite was utterly adorable.

  “After our last conversation, when we saw each other in person,” Kiri began, “I decided to be more proactive in protecting Swiftband. My familiars were fairly effective at keeping an eye on things, but both their number and their range felt insufficient.”

  She paused and licked her lips before picking up the cup of milk I’d set out for her alongside the jam. I’d boiled it already, so it was still somewhat warm, and she hummed briefly in contentment before continuing.

  “I managed to improve on both fronts. These improvements have allowed me to track things at a much greater distance. We will now have better forewarning whenever danger approaches. ”

  There was obvious pride in her voice, and for good reason. To take on a familiar was to accept a small strain on both your mind and your mana capacity. One familiar wasn’t a particularly significant strain for a fae, but Kiri had been controlling several, and now had apparently added more. Even for a Winter Royal Fae, that was impressive.

  “At a certain distance, I can only keep track of major paths,” she went on. “If someone puts in the effort to sneak closer, the warning I can provide will come much later. Still… we got lucky this time.”

  I tensed immediately. It wasn’t hard to guess where Kiri was going, but to hear her say it out loud sent mana crackling through me as I clenched my hands.

  “How far out are they?”

  “They are moving cautiously and in somewhat high numbers, so… about two or three days.”

  I was genuinely shocked at how far her familiar network extended. Even if she only had a handful of familiars that far out, it was beyond anything any fae our age at the Autumn Court could have managed.

  “I see. Do the elders know?”

  “No, not yet. I came here first.”

  “Why?” Alys chimed in for the first time, her voice a low growl. “I appreciate it, but why come to us first?”

  “The people headed our way are soldiers. Not mercenaries, soldiers. They are planning to disguise themselves as bandits, but they were far enough out and the frontier is barren enough that they felt secure traveling in their proper equipment. My familiar managed to overhear some of their chatter.”

  I waited, tense and angry, as her eyes focused in on mine.

  “They were sent here with orders to fetch the local alchemist and prepare the town to be claimed by the Hergeiros family, whom they serve.”

  An angry rumble erupted out of Alys, along with more than a few sparks. I winced as her flames licked against the table, but they didn’t seem to damage anything.

  Yet.

  “What?” my dragoness hissed, balling her hands into fists.

  “They want to abduct the local alchemist… and his wife.” Kiri’s tone softened as she looked at Alys. “They were apparently ordered to try and avoid hurting you, but you are considered an ‘acceptable casualty.’”

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  Now that was almost enough for my own anger to boil over and flood the room in poisonous mana. Targeting me was one thing, but that pathetic elven surveyor had put Alys in harm’s way.

  Worse, he thought she was pregnant. With my child.

  The fact that she wasn’t actually pregnant was immaterial. He thought she was. And he had still labeled her ‘an acceptable casualty.’

  Control fled me. My mind churned with all the ways I could make him regret being alive. My mana raged, causing my eyes to revert to their intense green color and stripes of red to appear in my hair.

  My voice, in contrast, was the perfect picture of calm. “How many are there?”

  “Fifty-five, in total. I think they believe they can reliably occupy the town with fifty soldiers while having the others escort you back to the Hergeiros estate.”

  Fifty soldiers. Trained, equipped, and presumably somewhat cunning, if they’d been sent out on such a mission. I felt my lips curl into an unpleasant smile. That might just be an adequate number of people for me to take out my frustrations upon sufficiently.

  It was so, so easy to slip right back into the mentality that had been beaten into me during my training. I would make those lowlifes suffer.

  Then I drew in a sharp breath as an entirely different problem occurred to me.

  If we wiped them out, what would the Hergeiros family do? Would they assume a ‘simple’ town had managed to resist their people, or that the soldiers had been lost to the wilderness on the way to us? If the former, would they accept their losses or escalate the situation?

  I had no way of knowing what this family knew about Swiftband, or even how much Onas had been able to notice and report back. Clearly, my alchemical products had roused enough greed to set these events in motion, but the audacity of the move was still rather stunning.

  The frontier drives were made for the prosperity and future of the entire kingdom of Snowdrop, and the surveyors were meant to help the promising towns secure what they needed to flourish. Claiming one of those towns was a direct act against the interests of the royal family.

  Yet I had no idea how powerful or well situated the Hergeiros family actually was. Did they have enough personal power to disregard potential backlash from the crown? Or would exposing this scheme see them severely censured?

  Either way, the family probably had enough sway at least to get us in trouble for slaughtering their men, even if they had provoked the confrontation in the first place.

  That was… inconvenient. For the first time in my life, standing and political clout were firmly on the side of someone opposing me. Being a Belladonna in service to Autumn might have repulsed me enough to run away, but I could admit to a curl of frustration that I couldn’t cow these idiots into leaving us alone with only my surname.

  I also couldn’t unleash my full wrath upon them. Nor could Kiri. They’d been sent after a common fae, his draconian wife, and a peaceful town, not an Autumn Court Noble backed up by a Winter princess.

  The kind of destruction I longed to wreak would attract a level of attention we could not afford.

  “We need to make a plan,” I declared into the brief silence that had settled as Kiri watched Alys and me seethe. “I’m afraid we can’t kill all of them.”

  “We can burn them all. I guarantee no one is going to find even the ashes,” Alys snarled.

  “As much as I would love to see that, we can’t afford to provoke them into making another, more significant attempt.”

  I gritted my teeth, hating the fact that Kiri and I had to hide our abilities.

  If we could simply put forth our best effort, it wouldn’t matter if the entire Hergeiros family decided to rise up in arms. I knew I was looking down on the elves somewhat, but considering I could erect an entire forest of death between my loved ones and any foe, it was hard not to.

  Especially factoring in Kiri’s abilities. Her familiars alongside my own brand of magic would be a potent combination. Most mortal armies would falter unless they could throw enough bodies at us to overwhelm our reserves of power.

  Unfortunately, putting on such a show would bring both of our Courts down on our heads.

  Then again… perhaps something a bit more subtle could work?

  Setting aside my anger, I tried to focus on planning. “Kiri, could you use your familiars to funnel the soldiers down certain paths or sections of the forest? Or maybe we can draw them in by letting one of us get ‘spotted’ and then fleeing? I assume they will want to stop anyone from reporting back to town, just in case.”

  Kiri nodded. “I can do that. They would probably be more interested in capturing a hunter, however. They do seem… professional. They would likely want information before moving on us in earnest.”

  “Maybe we could ask Nasha for help? She can be fast when she wants to be,” Alys rumbled, her eyes narrowed in malicious contemplation.

  I could tell she didn’t like having to refrain from walking up to them and setting them all on fire, but she was willing to listen when I cautioned against it.

  “I’m not sure if we should involve the others. I hesitate to approach even the elders,” I admitted, my fingers tapping rhythmically on the table.

  “Why not? I want them to be safe too, but they deserve to know,” Alys grumbled.

  “Because if anyone decides to investigate what happened to the soldiers afterwards and questions the townsfolk, they could be put in danger. There are plenty of spells for detecting lies and deception.” I paused, pondering. “But those spells aren’t subtle. They require the ability to snag the target’s mind, mana, or soul. Most mortals can’t perform them without it being obvious. Though, if the Hergeiros family is somehow on good terms with a full-blooded fae, who could do those spells much more subtly…”

  “I think it would be worth the risk,” Alys cut in bluntly, giving me a stern look. “The elders deserve the chance to defend themselves and their home. These people are coming here to steal our town from us.”

  “They aren’t here to steal so much as to occupy and subjugate,” I shot back, only to lift my hands in surrender when her look intensified. “Sorry, sorry. Very well, I agree. We should tell the elders. And Nasha would probably be our best bet for drawing them in anyway. Her and the other hunters.”

  “What kind of plan do you have in mind?” Kiri, thankfully, brought us back to the previous subject.

  “If we can get them to follow a path we set, I can place all sorts of interesting plants in their way. They would be subtle enough not to draw any attention to us, and they would be solid traps for anyone sneaking around in the future, too.”

  It was certainly a better idea than erecting a wall of vines and thorns around the town so no one could even approach without being able to fly.

  “What kind of plants?” Alys asked, clearly intrigued.

  The smile that stretched across my lips was a thing of pure malice. “Tell me… have you ever heard of manchineel trees?”