Aislinn didn’t understand the twist to his words. It was almost—but not quite—mockery. An odd attitude to have when he seemed to want to join those he mocked for the rest of his very long life.

“Apparently Bella and Ronan have gone to the Unseelie Court. It can’t be that bad.”

Gabriel smiled. “Well, there’s no Faemous film crew there.” No. Apparently the film crew the Shadow King had allowed in years ago had been eaten. “And the nobles aren’t as . . . prissy.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Prissy?”

He nodded. “The Unseelie Court is darker, and you have to watch your step.”

“So I’ve heard. Magick cast; blood spilled.”

“Sometimes. The magick is stronger, more violent, and held in higher regard. You know that. The laws are different there, and you must be careful. You don’t want to make enemies of some of them.”

Fear niggled. “How are Bella and Ronan?”

“Very well. They’ve adjusted to life in the Black. They said to tell you they’re fine, but Bella misses you. They say to tell you they’re happy.”

She studied him for lies. It was what she wanted to hear, of course, and Gabriel seemed the type to tell you what you wanted to hear. But she so wanted to believe what he’d said. She’d lost more than one night’s sleep worrying about her friends. The memory of watching them walk away into Piefferburg Square on Yule Eve, forever banished from Seelie by the Summer Queen, still made her heart ache.

Though the crime that Ronan had committed—taking work from the Phaendir—normally would have held the punishment of death. He’d been lucky. They both had. The Phaendir, a guild of powerful immortal druids, were the sworn enemy of the fae—Seelie and Unseelie alike.

There was good reason.

The Phaendir, with the full support of the humans, had created and controlled the borders of Piefferburg with powerful warding. They called it a “resettlement area.”

Piefferburg’s inhabitants called it prison.

If one wanted to be philosophical about it, the fate of the fae was poetic punishment for the horrible fae race wars of the early 1600s that had decimated their population and left them easy prey to their common enemy, the Phaendir. The wars had forced the fae from the underground, and the humans had panicked in the face of the truth—the fae were real.

On top of the wars, a mysterious sickness called Watt Syndrome had also befallen the fae. Some thought the illness had been created by the Phaendir. However it had come about, the result was the same—it had further weakened them.