The Hedge was the name of the short stone wall that ran from coast to coast along the border of Elsewhere and Underneath. It had been erected by one of our ancestors long ago, and despite its mundane appearance, did an extremely good job of keeping both the Unseelie out, and the citizens of Elsewhere in. It was heavily enchanted, so that it was impossible to shadow walk past, climb, or tunnel under. The only entrance in and out was a small, heavily guarded pass. It looked like little more than a crumbling break in a stone wall, however, it was rumored that once one stepped over the wall into Underneath, the glamor would lift, revealing what truly lay beyond. Since no one had entered in some time, and even fewer returned to tell tales of the Unseelie realm, I didn’t know for certain if that were true, nor what we’d find if it were.

“What were you doing here?” Bael asked.

“Performing an execution on a guard who’d been enchanted by the Unseelie.” I cast Bael a sideways glance. “Sorry, I?—”

“It’s fine,” he replied. “I know better than most what monsters they are.”

I nodded, still feeling a bit foolish for having brought up the Unseelie at all.

Bael’s mood had drastically improved over the last few days, as if he were almost excited to enter Underneath. I couldn’t imagine that was the case, but neither could I understand why he’d be putting on such an obvious affect.

I supposed I should simply be grateful.

For weeks things had felt strained between us—perhaps more on my side than his—but now that our goals were aligned once more, things had easily fallen back into the easy companionship we’d shared before I ever laid eyes on Lonnie Skyeborne.

It wasmidday when we finally made our way out of the Wildes, and appeared on the edge of a town, where the Hedge was visible in the distance. The air was hot and oppressive, and the ground under our feet cracked and dry. The closer one got to the Hedge, the hotter it was…like the land itself was warning us to turn back.

“Do you want to stop in the town?” Bael asked.

“No.”

He grinned. “Me either.”

I glanced over at the rundown buildings and shook my head. It might have been smarter of us to stop and eat, perhaps catch a few hours of sleep, but now that we were so close I didn’t want to waste time. It had been days since the snake told us where to find Lonnie, and I feared she might have landed in the port of Underneath already. Our best chance to reach her would be when the boat came into harbor. Once Ambrose took her wherever he was going, things would get dramatically more complicated.

“The break in the wall is just over that hill.” I pointed, and Bael followed my gaze toward the outline of a reddish-brown slope in the distance, that was really more of a small mountain than a hill.

“Shall we go then?” he asked, moving as if to walk through the shadows once more.

I put out a hand to stop him. “No, we’ll have to walk. The magic from the Hedge will stop you from shadow walking, and I’m not sure what would happen if you were halfway into the shadows.”

He grimaced, perhaps also imagining the potential horror of being stuck between two places indefinitely. “Right. I suppose we’d better start walking, then.”

The entrance to the Hedge was just as I recalled it. The wall was only about three feet high, and the break within it looked more like a failure of time and weather than a gate to another realm. Standing beside the wall—or rather, leaning against it—were two obsidian armored guards.

Bael and I had agreed that I would do the talking when it came to the guards. It would have been easier to simply kill them, but as magic didn’t work well so close to the Hedge I was not sure if it was worth getting into a physical fight with our own, well trained, soldiers.

As we approached, it became clear that I needn’t have worried.

The two guards looked neither well trained, nor capable of winning any kind of fight. The closer of the two, a tall thin human, appeared to be asleep. The other, a middle-aged Fae male, stared off in the opposite direction from which we approached. He, at least, should have heard our footsteps long ago. I sighed. Fucking idiots, giving a bad name to the army as a whole.

I plastered a false smile onto my face, trying my best to seem as unthreatening and empty headed as the guards. “Hello,” I called, loudly enough to alert anyone in a mile radius.

As expected, the Fae guard jumped, startled, and the one who’d been sleeping stirred.

I’d often had the occasion to notice that outside the capital, Fae rarely recognized me without Quill on my shoulder to provide them a clue of my identity. Still, I tensed slightly as the guards turned to look at us. They barely reacted, not a hint of recognition in either male’s gaze.

I relaxed. “We’re here to relieve you,” I said when we stood only a few feet away.

“Ah, excellent.” The human guard grinned, blinking the sleep from his eyes, and leapt to his feet. “Cheers, mates.”

He took a few steps forward, as if to walk past us, but the Fae guard threw out his hand to block his partner. “Hang on.” He gave us a skeptical once over. “Never seen you before. Where’d you come from?”

Part of me was almost relieved. I was glad he didn’t recognize us, but if both the soldiers had left without question at the word of two strangers, it would have shattered my faith in our army as a whole.

“Inbetwixt,” I said vaguely. “Just arrived today.”

The Fae male cocked his head, his skeptical expression melting. He laughed. “Too bad. I was hoping you were from the capital.”