Virelai regretted ever saying anything to Wisteria. She took a bite of the flaky pumpkin tart she’d selected as she monitored the younger elf. Wisteria had been openly staring at Maescia, seated a few places down from them, for almost the entirety of the feast. If she insisted on carrying out the plan Virelai had hypothetically suggested, she was going to get herself in trouble—or more likely, get all of them in trouble.

  Seraiah was preoccupied with whatever she’d agreed to for the Summer King, and Ren and Kai were exchanging heated whispers across the table, so that left only her to keep an eye on Wisteria.

  Wonderful. She had not signed up to be a child minder on this little adventure.

  Technically, she supposed Wisteria wasn’t a child, and she’d grown to kind of like the girl, even if she talked too much for her own good. Still, if she was meant to be stuck in the Seelie Court for the foreseeable future, she’d rather enjoy her time.

  Virelai nudged Wisteria under the table. “Eat your food before they take it away.”

  Wisteria dutifully picked up her fork and stabbed at her plate without taking her eyes from the other end of the table.

  “Staring is rude, you know.”

  That got her attention.

  “I wasn’t—”

  “You were. If you are serious about this endeavor, you are going to have to be a lot less obvious. How did you make it out of Nyrene and back again?”

  “I know what I’m doing,” Wisteria insisted in between bites.

  By the time the feast was over and the table moved to make room for dancing, Wisteria was back to staring at the creepy faery girl again.

  Ren disappeared with Seraiah into the crowd, and Virelai was torn between tormenting Kai about it and keeping watch on Wisteria. It was quite obvious to her that Ren hadn’t asked Seraiah to dance for any nefarious reason, but you wouldn’t know it by looking at Kai’s expression. It almost made her feel bad for him.

  She was about to offer him some reassuring words when Wisteria said, “I’ll be back.”

  Then she darted off into the crowd.

  “Oh, come on,” Virelai muttered. To Kai, she said, “I have to go find Wisteria. Enjoy dancing or brooding or whatever it is you’re doing.”

  If Kai heard her, he didn’t acknowledge it. Virelai left him standing there, watching Ren and Seraiah dance on the other side of the courtyard.

  When she caught up with Wisteria, they were in a narrow alley between the decaying buildings. The faery girl was struggling against something holding her to the wall. As Virelai got closer, she saw there were vines wrapped around her arms and legs with more snaking around her waist.

  Perhaps she’d been mistaken, and Wisteria’s magic had a use after all.

  “What do you want from me?” Maescia asked as the vines pulled even tighter, stopping her movements.

  “Oh, good. You arrived in time,” Wisteria said to Virelai.

  She was afraid to ask what she’d arrived in time for because it looked like they were about to torture the faery girl.

  Wisteria turned to Maescia, planting her hands on her hips. “You said we would play a game. I’d like to play it now.”

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  This hadn’t been part of the hypothetical plan she’d suggested to Wisteria, but she supposed it might work.

  It could also end badly for them.

  Maescia blinked those snake-like eyes at Wisteria. “A game? What sort of game?”

  “A game of lies,” Virelai cut in before Wisteria could say anything. If she could take control of this situation, there still might be hope of them getting out of it unscathed.

  Maescia’s face contorted. “The fae cannot lie,” she sneered. “You want to play a game I could not win.”

  “Ah, but you would not be the one lying. You would only need to determine which of our statements is a lie. If you choose correctly, you win, and if you get it wrong, we win.”

  Wisteria nodded along, like this had been her plan the entire time.

  Maescia pretended to think about it, but Virelai could already tell she would agree.

  “I will play,” she said, “if you tell me what I will win.”

  “You will win—”

  “Your freedom,” Virelai finished. “Otherwise, we will leave you here until someone comes to cut you down.” She had no idea if Wisteria’s vines would hold the faery that long or if it would require Wisteria to stand here all night. It would serve her right if she did, because Wisteria had gotten them into this mess.

  Maescia pursed her lips, eyes narrowed as she studied first Virelai and then Wisteria. “Very well,” she finally said.

  Virelai expected Maescia to ask what they would get if they won, but she didn’t say anything more. That was for the best because Wisteria would’ve probably told her they wanted to know what the Summer King was hiding about his sister, and then this entire thing would fall apart. Wisteria needed to learn how to finesse the information she wanted like a pickpocket, so that her target was none the wiser to what they were missing.

  “I’ll go first if it is alright with everyone,” Wisteria said.

  Virelai gestured for her to go ahead, hoping she wouldn’t regret it.

  “I will say three statements. Two will be true and one will be a lie. You must tell me which one is the false one, understand?”

  Maescia nodded.

  Virelai noticed the vines around her middle had already started coming loose. If they didn’t want her escaping before the game was over, they’d need to hurry this up.

  “Darling Dew flowers only grow around this court. Faeries are immortal. The Winter Queen gave the Elven Queen a potion to twist her magic. Which of these is the lie?”

  Maescia giggled. “You will have to try harder than that if you wish to win. The last one is a lie. The Winter Queen did not give the Elven Queen a potion to twist her magic.”

  Virelai saw immediately where Wisteria had gone wrong. They’d learned from Ren that Virelai’s father had been giving their rightful queen a potion while he held her captive. The potion had only been provided by the Winter Queen, so Maescia could call it a lie even if the potion had twisted Sterling’s magic or awakened the shadow creature like they’d theorized.

  “My turn.” Virelai named off her three statements. One of which was about the Winter Queen again.

  Maescia bared her teeth. “You think to trick me? None of those were a lie. Do another.”

  Virelai exchanged a look with Wisteria. This confirmed what they’d already suspected. The only statement Virelai had given that might have been false was that the Winter Queen had not assisted in awakening the shadow creature living in Sterling.

  “The shadow creature in the Elven Queen was not caused by mages. The shadow creature in the Elven Queen was not caused by humans. The Summer King knows how to remove the shadow creature from the Elven Queen.”

  Maescia twisted in the vines, managing to free one of her hands before Wisteria could summon her magic again. “If you wanted to know about the shadow creature, all you had to do was ask.”

  Wisteria shot Virelai a panicked look.

  “I have heard that our companions already asked your king for assistance, and he could not tell them how to remove the shadow creature. Is that because he does not know, or is he keeping secrets for his sister?”

  “He does not know, it’s true. He does not hide things for his sister. She may know or she may not, but he does not know.”

  Virelai frowned. If she understood what Maescia was saying, then the Summer King wasn’t working with his sister against the elves, and he hadn’t been lying when he told Kai he didn’t know anything more about the shadows.

  But that didn’t mean he didn’t know who else might.

  Maescia pulled her other hand free of the vines, and set to work on the ones around her ankles. Wisteria was muttering under her breath and staring hard at the motionless vines.

  They were running out of time and who knows if they would get another opportunity now?

  “Who does know?” Virelai asked.

  Maescia stopped tearing at the vines and looked up at her through strands of pale green hair. “I do not know, but faeries are not the only creatures who have lived so long in this world . . . or another.” She gave one last yank on the vines, and then she was free. “Your game was terrible. Next time, I will pick the game.”

  Wisteria tried to chase after her as Maescia skipped down the alleyway back to the dancing in the courtyard.

  “Let her go,” Virelai said, putting out a hand to stop her.

  “But—”

  “You aren’t going to get anything else from her. Besides, she already gave us another lead.”