For the past few days, V’lane had been in his most humanlike form when we’d met, heavily muted. He, too, was trying to get on my good side. Ironically, the more he and Barrons tried, the less I trusted them both. Heads turned when the Fae Prince moved through the public places he took me. Even turned off, women stared after him with voracious eyes.

I dug into the spread with gusto, piling a plate with strawberries, pineapple, lobster, crab cakes, crackers, and caviar. I’d been living on popcorn and ramen noodles too long. “What exactly is the Sinsar Dubh, V’lane, and why does everyone want it?”

V’lane’s eyelids lowered halfway and he looked to the side. It was a human look, secretive, contemplative, as if he were sorting through a wealth of information, trying to decide how much, if anything, to share. “What do you know of it, MacKayla?”

“Virtually nothing,” I said. “What’s . . . in it . . . that everyone wants so badly?” It was hard to think of it as a book, with an “it” for information to be “in” when scored into my mind was the dark shape of the Beast, not pages at all.

“What did it look like when you saw it? A book? Ancient and heavy, bound by bands and locks?”

I nodded.

“Have you seen the creature it becomes?” He absorbed my face. “I see you have. You neglected to tell me that.”

“I didn’t think it was important.”

“Everything that concerns the Sinsar Dubh is important. What legends do humans tell of our origins, sidhe-seer?”

It was a sure sign he was displeased when he called me by title, not name. I told him what little I’d learned from the Irish Book of Invasions.

He shook his head. “Recent history, grossly inaccurate. We have been here far longer than that. Do you know the history of the Unseelie King?”

“No.”

“Then you do not know who he is.”

I shook my head. “Should I?”

“The Unseelie King was once the King of the Light, the Queen’s consort, and Seelie. In the beginning, there was only Seelie.”

He had me. I was riveted. This was true Fae lore straight from a Fae. Stuff I doubted I’d ever find in the sidhe-seer archives. “What happened?”

“What happened in your Eden?” he mocked. “What always happens? Someone wanted more.”

“The king?” I guessed.

“Ours is a matriarchal line. The king held vestigial power. Only the queen knew the Song of Making.”

“What’s the Song of Making?” I’d heard of it from Barrons and seen references in the books I’d been reading but still didn’t know what it was.

“Impossible to explain to your stunted consciousness.”

“Try,” I said dryly.