If Thoth had hoped for a quiet entry into his bedroom, he was sorely mistaken. His friends were on him the minute he walked through the door.

“How’d it go, how’d it go?” Xian the brown hare asked, thumping his foot excitedly.

The question was repeated in chirps, squawks, grunts and even one neigh. The eclectic collection of animals Thoth kept in his room were mostly rescues, and usually ever-changing. These lot – two geckos, an iguana, a mare and her foal, a family of mice, two parrots, a handful of garden birds and Xian the hare – had all been here since the flood. Thoth couldn’t exactly kick them out since there was nowhere else for them to go. The colt could potentially go to the stables, but he wouldn’t leave his mother and his mother wouldn’t leave the room. It had taken long enough for Thoth to get her to trust him, let alone anyone else.

“It was…” Thoth had never been able to lie. “Um…”

“Oh dear,” one of the geckos, Longflick, said sympathetically. “Did she not conceive?”

Thoth stared at him. “What? That is – ”

“Yeah,” Shortsnout, the other gecko, agreed. “I hate it when you hook up with a girl and she doesn’t even get pregnant.”

“Guys!” Thoth threw his hands up in the air. “That’s not how dating works amongst fairies!”

He had to repeat it in all of the languages present while Shortsnout and Longflick exchanged puzzled looks.

“So how is dating meant to work for fairies?” Xian asked while Thoth slumped on the bed.

“I don’t know.” He shrugged, tugging at his shoes and avoiding their avid stares. Not like that, anyway.

Honestly, it was sad enough that he’d only gotten his first date at sixteen. It was even sadder that the entire affair had been a disaster from start to finish, and he couldn’t even work out what the problem was.

“I’m going to the lab.” He grunted over his friends’ protests, pulling his tie off and flinging it down on the ground.

Once he’d shut the door on them, he shoved his balled hands into his pockets and stomped back along the corridor, frowning at the carpet. What had gone wrong? He’d made an effort – even tentatively got his chamber maid’s advice on what to wear so that he actually looked presentable for once. Renee hadn’t seemed impressed. She’d crinkled her nose at the sight of him, her eyes flicking up and down. She’d been even less impressed by his suggestion that they take his boat out and had steered him instead to a cutesy little café on one of the peaks.

Conversation had felt like an interrogation. Renee wanted to know about his mum mostly, and switched tacks to the royals and the rest of the Council of Originals when she’d exhausted that topic. She wasn’t responsive to any of Thoth’s attempts to explain how the café could make its service more efficient. Nor was she interested in hearing about the plight of Shaman’s wildlife during the flood.

He was still musing over Renee’s disgusted expression when he asked how they should split the bill, their less-than-warm parting, when he reached the door to the lab. He’d left it in a hurry that morning, having overslept and not wanting to be late for the ill-fated rendezvous; he must have left it unlocked, because it was slightly off he catch. Fortunately, everyone in the castle knew not to come in here. Thoth pushed the door open and frowned.

At least, he thought everyone in the castle knew not to come here.

“Who’re you?” He asked the girl suspiciously. She was dressed like a servant, approximately his age, with pale skin and vibrant red hair. “What’re you doing in here?”


MASTER OF THE ORBIS . MASTER OF THE WATER ELEMENT . SON OF AURA