He then looked to Saturn, who was pouring wine into a pewter chalice. This deed done, he slid it across the table to Teddy, who took it up, swallowed a healthy dose, and put it down.

And then he started at the beginning.

There were many times the room grew close due to the weight of their combined fury, or stagnant due to their shock at what Teddy told them.

But neither interrupted him all the while he spoke, sharing his story from the moment Fenn took him at Nyx and Lorenz’s back step, to when they met in the forest just hours before.

He ended with his eyes on Faunus.

“We need to find an aviast. We need to get birds to King Mars, King True, King Aramus, Prince Cassius, Queen Ophelia. They must know. They must prepare.”

“First, Teddy, this earth has lost Queen Ophelia. Princess Elena is now Queen of the Nadirii.”

“By the gods,” Teddy murmured.

“Second, Airen is in the throes of a civil war. It started but days ago and all the rulers of all the realms are there now, fighting it.”

Teddy just stared at him.

Bloody hell.

How long had he been captive and then on the run?

The world had turned over.

“And last, this creature you mention, you are sure it is the Beast?”

“It transformed from man to…to…” He shook his head and looked between the two men, though he settled on Faunus again. “It is impossible to describe. Hideous. Fearsome. Powerful. In the form of a man, he crushed a man’s head between his bare hands. As the Beast, his claws severed Fenn’s head and he drank from the neck. He was not a troll. He was not a gogmagogg. I do not know of anything in magic, of this earth, even in lore to describe him. Except the Beast.”

Head still in hand, Faunus tipped it back to catch Saturn’s gaze.

Teddy looked to Saturn and saw the end of his shrug, and when he noted he had Teddy’s attention, he wrapped his fingers around the wine bottle, reached across the table and poured Teddy some more.

He then poured himself more and got up to add some to Faunus’s goblet.

They were all silent and they drank.

It was Teddy who spoke.

“I understand you do not wish to appear like you’ve lost your mind by sharing this with your ruler.”