Page 23 of The Cursed Kingdom

Should I lie? I don’t know how much access the faeries have to the human realm, and I don’t want to give him my name and risk him looking me up. That could lead him to Lill, and that’s out of the question. I refuse to expose her.

“Abby,” I say, purposefully leaving out my last name.

There are millions of Abbys in the human realm, and he won’t be able to find anything with that—especially if he doesn’t know where I’m from.

Samuel nods, and I practically jolt out of my seat when the center of the table lifts. A circle the size of my head raises about a foot in the air, and it continues upward as another platform with menus appears from underneath and fills the gap.

Nothing connects the two platforms, and my jaw drops as the first one continues to the ceiling and smoothly slides away.

Samuel remains silent as he watches my outward shock, but he doesn’t say anything about it as he grabs a menu.

It’s a small slip of paper, and I force myself to relax and grab the second one. It’s in English, which makes me realize that Samuel speaks English. The faeries and I share a language. That doesn’t seem right.

We don’t speak as we read over our menus, but I spend the entire time thinking through the questions I want to ask. There’s so much I need to learn, and I don’t know where to start.

“Where is Farbay?” I eventually ask, setting the menu in front of me. “You said that’s where the break in the wall is.”

Samuel nods. “You’re currently in Callonton, and Farbay is the border city directly south of here. It’s a several hour ride away, as I’ve already explained.”

I blink.

Samuel continues. “There are rumors that the princes will be traveling to the portal of the gods, though. If that’s true, the area will be heavily monitored.”

I’m already exhausted. “And what’s the portal of the gods?”

Samuel peers at me over the top of his menu before reaching into his pocket and pulling out a shard of dark glass. It’s about the size of his palm, and I cock my head to the side as he sets it on the table between us.

The magic flecks around us begin to swirl and funnel into the glass, and I blink several times to ensure I’m not hallucinating as it glazes over and turns black. The blackness spreads, continuing until it takes up a decent portion of the table, and then it shifts upward to form a three-dimensional, detailed map.

I’ve never seen anything like this.

“I need to get one of those,” I mumble.

Samuel lets out a quiet laugh. “Humans can’t yield magic. This would be of no use to you.”

I hope that’s not going to be a common theme here. It makes sense that faeries would have most of their technology centered around magic, but that doesn’t bode well for me.

“This is Bellmere,” Samuel says, pointing to a spot near the left of the map. “Our capital.”

The map is split into three sections. On the left is a large stretch of land covered in rolling hills and dense cities. Bellmere is the largest one.

Samuel slides his finger east, pointing to a spot nestled between two long mountain ranges and a large river.

“This is Callonton, where we are now,” he explains. He slides slightly south, toward the edge of a natural forest barrier. “And this is Farbay, where you need to go.”

The entire bottom half of the map is covered in forest, and I already know what he’s going to say as he taps his finger against the area. “And this is the Redstall Forest. Faeries don’t go there.”

“Why?” I blurt out.

Samuel shoots me a look. “We’re getting there.” The entire right side of the map is one large, empty section of land. “These are the shifter deadlands. Alpha Caspian angered the gods when he kidnapped and tortured Lyra, and they turned the shifter kingdom into ash as punishment. The shifters retreated into the Redstall Forest, where they now live. It’s been generations since we’ve had eyes inside.”

Who the fuck is Lyra? And who the fuck are the shifters?

Lill’s told me before that most mythical human stories were written by people who had knowledge of the faerie realm, so while the details may have been changed, the general premise is usually correct.

I’m going to assume shifters are similar to the human equivalent of the title, then. They’re werewolves. Beasts. Giant animals that shift between man and animal.

I clear my throat. “So shifters live in the forest?”

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