“Elexander –“

“Ecky.”

“What?”

“Call me Ecky, everyone else does.”

“E – Ecky, where are we heading?”

Prince Lefrich glanced over at him, a slight smile on his face, but he did not reply.

"It's a tradition that, whenever you go on a quest, you pay a visit to..." for the first time, Elexander looked nervous. "Her."

"Who?"

"You don't say her name in the woods," Lefrich snapped.

So that meant she was a faery. Goosebumps prickled over Sam’s skin at the thought.

In a very quiet, and - if Sam didn't have every experience of him to know better - hesitant voice, Elexander began to sing. It was an old song - a patriotic song that the knights used to sing around town.

But Prince Lefrich joined in.

Sam stayed silent, but Elexander's eyes looked at him so imporingly, that by the third voice, he had added his own week voice to the chorus.

They picked their way across the forest, kicking up dust from the path.

For a half hour, Sam had forgotten what they had come in here for.

Then Lefrich swerved his horse off of the path, and he remembered.

Even if he had wanted to turn back, he hardly could with his donkey tied to Elexander's.

The trunks were getting thicker, until they were almost as wide as him. The roots were moving upwards, as though they were restless in the ground. As though the trees were trying to get up and walk.

The moss grew thicker, and Sam noticed that most of it was still damp with dew, even though it hadn’t rained in at least a week.

“We’ll have to dismount here,” Lefrich said, pulling his horse to a stop.

The horses shifted as they were left alone, hoofing the ground as they were tied to a gnarly bough.

"Only one person can see her," Elexander said, seemingly to thin air.

"How about rock, paper, scissors?" Sam said, but his chuckle died at the looks he received.

"That's why we have you," Lefrich said, his eyes fixing on Sam. “It was my father’s idea to take along an alchemist, not mine.”

His heart sunk.

"Alchemy has nothing to do with magic," he said.

Lefrich laughed. It was almost spiteful.

“Didn’t the faes give you your magic?”

“Alchemy isn’t magic.”

“No? What’s the difference?”

Sam opened his mouth to argue, but he found he didn’t have much of an argument. He knew it wasn’t – he knew. Coursi had taught him that much, but he hadn’t given him the specifics. He had no idea what to say. And he hated that.

“Faes taught you their 'magic,’" Lefrich said. "And that's why you're going in there."

Lefrich clapped Sam on the shoulder, pushing him to where a log lay in their way. Beyond it, the trees seemed to tighten into a tunnel, before growing over each other, fighting for space.

"Okay, so it's going to ask you three questions," Lefrich said, still nudging a numb Sam forward. "And you get to ask three questions back, okay? So this is what you're going to say-" Lefrich told Sam the three questions, and made him repeat them back to him. Then nodded, satisfied.

"Good luck," Lefrich said, shaking Sam's hand. It was an oddly formal action, considering how soft his eyes suddenly looked.

Empathetic, maybe even sorry.

"Thanks," he said, then took a large breath, and climbed over the log.

He had only taken three steps before he slowed and frowned. This wasn’t wise. He didn’t want to do this. He didn’t want to be here – the Prince evidently didn’t want him here – no one wanted him here. Well, maybe Elexander.

Elexander could hardly count.

He remembered what his mother had said. About people not wanting peace between humans and faes. Sam couldn’t make sense of that one. If things continued the way there were going, then more people would go missing. Maybe an arm would be found, or an item of clothing.

Never a whole body.

Sam was sick of the fear. The paranoia that hung over everyone's heads. He was scared of seeing amber eyes in the night and fumbling to light a candle. Surely peace would be better. But what would that look like? Faeries were so savage - the were so unfeeling. Could reconciliation be any better? To be on the same side as...them?

It had to be better than now, he supposed.

Sam climbed under a particularly large root, and suddenly found himself ankle deep in mud.

On a misty river back.

A river that he knew did not exist near his home.