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Heather Fawcett Biography

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“The next time I took notice of you, you were sobbing all over the snow. Well, I thought, finally she's being sensible. Then I realized that you were sobbing because you'd stabbed yourself in the arm, and not out of concern for my imminent demise. I noticed that your tears were freezing as they hit the icy ground and collecting into the shape of a sword. Well, that almost killed me. I mean that---I froze for a full second, during which our yeti friend nearly skewered me through. I dodged, barely, my head whirling. One day I would like for you to explain to me how you heard of the story of Deirdre and her faerie husband, a long-ago king, which is one of the oldest tales in my realm. Do mortals tell it as we do? When the king's murderous sons schemed to steal his kingdom by starving it into torpor with endless winter, Deirdre collected the tears of his dying people and froze them into a sword, with which he was finally able to slay his children. It is a tale many of my own people have forgotten---I know it only because that poor, witless king is my ancestor. I felt the story in my blood and let my magic flow into the sword you were fashioning.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
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“There's a bump in your nose now." He glared at me. "There is not." "Your mouth is lopsided." He opened his mouth to argue, but then he just let out a weary groan. "What is the point? I am hideous. I can't wait to change myself back again." "Don't. I prefer you like this." He looked surprised, then he began to smile. "Do you?" "Yes," I said. "You blend into the background. I could almost forget about you entirely. It's refreshing." Naturally, he found a way to twist this into a compliment. "And am I ordinarily a distraction to you, Em?”

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“Wanting to be through with this quickly, I leaned forward and kissed him. Almost. I lost my nerve halfway there, somewhere around the moment I noticed he had a freckle next to his eye and wondered ridiculously if that was something he would remove if I asked it of him, and instead of a proper kiss, I merely brushed my lips against his. It was a shadow of a kiss, cool and insubstantial, and I almost wish I could be romantic and say it was somehow transformative, but in truth, I barely felt it. But then his eyes came open, and he smiled at me with such innocent happiness that my ridiculous heart gave a leap and would have answered him instantly, if it was the organ in charge of my decision-making. "Choose whenever you wish," he said. "No doubt you will first need to draw up a list of pros and cons, or perhaps a series of bar plots. If you like, I will help you organize them into categories." I cleared my throat. "It strikes me that this is all pointless speculation. You cannot marry me. I am not going to be left behind, pining for you, when you return to your kingdom. I have no time for pining." He gave me an astonished look. "Leave you behind! As if you would consent to that. I would expect to be burnt alive when next I returned to visit. No, Em, you will come with me, and we will rule my kingdom together. You will scheme and strategize until you have all my councillors eating out of your hand as easily as you do Poe, and I will show you everything---everything. We will travel to the darkest parts of my realm and back again, and you will find answers to questions you have never even thought to ask, and enough material to fill every journal and library with your discoveries.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
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“How is it that you know how to befriend wild faerie dogs and ferret out Words of Power, yet you missed one of the fundamental rules of dryadology---namely, not cutting wicked kings out of trees." "I've learned my lesson, thank you," I snapped. "Should you end up trapped in one, I won't let you out." "You shall have to. I know you too well, Em. You could never survive without having someone around to snarl at.”

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“Do you want to marry me?" "That's---that's beside the point." A nonsensical reply, but it came the closest to expressing how I felt. I had never even considered marrying Wendell---why on earth would I? Wendell Bambleby! Certainly I'd imagined being with him in other ways, particularly since I'd grown used to having him around---traveling with him across the continent, no doubt arguing half the time; conducting research; scouring woodland and heath for lost doors to the faerie realms. And yes, I liked the prospect of being with him often, or even all the time, and felt a sort of hollowness fill me when I thought about us parting ways. But I couldn't marry one of the Folk, particularly not a faerie king, even if he was Wendell.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
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“I was surprised to feel his hand brush against mine---he'd crossed the room without a whisper of sound---his grip feather-light. I froze, realizing that he was about to kiss me only a second after I knew I was going to kiss him. I leaned forward, but he put a hand on the side of my face, very gently, his fingers brushing the edge of my hair. A little shiver went through me. His thumb was by the corner of my mouth, and it made me think of the time when I had touched him there, when I'd thought he was dying from loss of blood. For a heartbeat, all the other moments we'd shared faded away, leaving behind only the small handful of times we'd been close like this, connected somehow like a bright constellation. He brushed his lips against my cheek, and I felt the warmth sink all the way to my bones, chasing out the ice of the snow king's court. "Good night, Em," he murmured, his breath fluttering against my ear and sending a river of goosebumps down my neck.”

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“Now, there are a few dryadologists who could resist the opportunity to sample faerie food, the enchanted sort served at the tables of the courtly fae---I know several who have dedicated their careers to the subject and would hand over their eye teeth for the opportunity. I stopped at a stand offering toasted cheese---a very strange sort of cheese, threaded with glittering mold. It smelled divine, and the faerie merchant rolled it in crushed nuts before handing it over on a stick, but as soon as it touched my palm, it began to melt. The merchant was watching me, so I put it in my mouth, pantomiming my delight. The cheese tasted like snow and melted within seconds. I stopped next at a stand equipped with a smoking hut. The faerie handed me a delicate fillet of fish, almost perfectly clear despite the smoking. I offered it to Shadow, but he only looked at me with incomprehension in his eyes. And, indeed, when I popped it into my mouth, it too melted flavorlessly against my tongue. I took a wandering course to the lakeshore, conscious of the need to avoid suspicion. I paused at the wine merchant, who had the largest stand. It was brighter than the others, snow piled up behind it in a wall that caught the lantern light and threw it back in a blinding glitter. I had to look down at my feet, blinking back tears, as one of the Folk pressed an ice-glass into my hand. Like the food, the wine smelled lovely, of sugared apples and cloves, but it slid eerily within the ice, more like oil than wine. Shadow kept growling at it, as he had not with the faerie food, and so I tipped it onto the snow. Beside the wine merchant was a stand offering trinkets, frozen wildflowers that many of the Folk threaded through their hair or wove through unused buttonholes on their cloaks, as well as an array of jewels with pins in them. I could not compare them to any jewels I knew; they were mostly in shades of white and winter grey, hundreds of them, each impossibly different from the next. I selected one that I knew, without understanding how, was the precise color of the icicles that hung from the stone ledges of the Cambridge libraries in winter. But moments after I pinned it to my breast, all that remained was a patch of damp.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
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“Wait," I said. He tilted his head in exasperation, clearly anticipating some sort of lecture. He went completely still when I strode up to him and kissed him. For one strange moment, I felt like laughing, because it was so clear that I had shocked him. I soon forgot about that, though, as well as everything else. I had not kissed him since Ljosland, and that barely counted; the first time, I had been so nervous that I barely touched him, while the second he had been in his other, oiche sidhe form. Perhaps it was the leaves rustling invisibly or the breeze that plucked at my hair, but I had the sense that I had left the mortal realm somehow, and that when I opened my eyes, I would find myself in some enchanted grove surrounded by faerie lights. This impression was so strong that I pulled away, dizzy.”

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Book:Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands
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“Do you wish to return to Cambridge, Em?" he said. "Because if that is the case, you need only say the word. I suppose I could return to teaching--- perhaps I could do both, or install a regent here, to rule in my stead. If there is one thing I will not stand for, it is for you to be unhappy---" "No, indeed!" I exclaimed. He appeared to have worked himself up into a proper speech, so I put my hand over his mouth. And then-- my initial thought was that this would be more efficient than arguing with him--- I pulled his face to mine, and kissed him. As I had guessed, he forgot all about what he had been saying, and pulled me closer. His lips tasted like the salt the servants had sprinkled onto the coffee--- quite agreeable. I stopped thinking, something I rarely do, and for a moment there was only the hum of crickets and rustling of night creatures in the trees. He drew back and touched my cheek, his dark eyes searching mine. A flickering, moon-colored glow had appeared above us--- he had summoned a light. "I mean it," he murmured. So not quite so forgetful, then. The light caught caught on the silvered flowers in his hair and made him look even more inconveniently otherworldly than he already did, but I found that when I focused on small, familiar things, like the way his mouth came up slightly higher on the left side, and how his green eyes leaned more yellow than blue, I was able to disregard this. "I know," I replied. "I have brought myself here, Wendell--- I am not some poor maiden who stumbled unawares through a ring of mushrooms.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales
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“Wendell was no sooner gazing at the silver sewing needles than he was brushing away a tear. "They are like my father's," he said wonderingly. "I remember the flicker of them in the darkness as we all sat together by the ghealach fire, with the trees surrounding us. He would bring them everywhere, even the Hunt of the Frostveiling---that is the first hunt of autumn, the largest of the year, when even the queen and her children roam through the wilds with spears and swords, riding our best---oh, I don't know what you would call them in your language. They are a kind of faerie fox, black and golden together, which grow larger than horses. My brothers and sisters and I would crowd round the fire to watch him weave nets from brambles and spidersilk. And all the moorbeasts and hag-headed deer would cower at the sight of those nets, though they barely blinked at the whistle of our arrows." He fell silent, gazing at them with his eyes gone very green. "Well," I said, predictably at a loss for an answer to this, "I hope they are of use to you. Only keep them away from any garments of mine." He took my hand, and then, before I knew what he was doing, lifted it to his mouth. I felt the briefest brush of his lips against my skin, and then he had released me and was back to exclaiming over his gifts. I turned and went into the kitchen in an aimless haste, looking for something to do, anything that might distract me from the warmth that had trailed up my arm like an errant summer breeze”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
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“Below us was a frozen lake. It was perfectly round, a great gleaming eye in which the moon and stars were mirrored. Lanterns glowing the same cold white as the aurora dangled from lampposts made of ice, which framed paths from the lake’s edge to a scattering of benches and merchant-stands, draped in bright awnings of opal and blue. Delicious smells floated on the wind—smoked fish; fire-roasted nuts and candies; spiced cakes. A winter fair.”

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“Shadow awoke with a snort and promptly leapt all over Wendell, and he paused to pet and coddle the dog into submission before helping Lilja set the table. Supper was a noisy affair, for Margret likes to talk almost as much as Wendell when in familiar company, and Shadow was delighted by the presence of so many of those he loved, and snuffled up to each of us by turns, whining excitedly.”

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“There was something about the stories bound between those covers, and the myriad species of Folk weaving in and out of them, each one a mystery begging to be solved. I suppose most children fall in love with faeries at some point, but my fascination was never about magic or the granting of wishes. The Folk were of another world, with its own rules and customs---and to a child who always felt ill-suited to her own world, the lure was irresistible.”

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“Throw the offerings!" Agnes and her husband had returned--- I could just make them out, clambering unsteadily down the hillside with their lanterns raised. In an act of ill-advised and entirely undeserved kindness, they had gathered up a handful of villagers to ride to the rescue of the idiot scholars who had tangled with the most fearsome of the local Folk, despite their warnings. A strangled sound escaped me, something between a sob and laugh. "Get back!" Eichorn shouted at the villagers. Rose was clambering to his feet, wheezing, for the fauns had released him to snatch at the "offerings" tossed their way by the villagers. I would have expected bloody hunks of meat, but instead, ludicrously, they seemed to be throwing vegetables--- carrots and onions, predominantly. How did it happen? The scene is a blur of noise and movement, to my memory. I believe I was laughing at the time--- yes, laughing. The image of those nightmarish beasts appeased by a hail of carrots was too much for my frayed composure, and for a moment it seemed this would become another story I told at conferences or to rouse a laugh from my students. For the Folk are terrible indeed, monsters or tyrants or both, but are they not also ridiculous? Whether they be violent beasts distracted by vegetables, or creatures powerful enough to spin straw into gold, which they will happily exchange for a simple necklace, or a great king overthrown by his own cloak, there is a thread of the absurd weaving through all faerie stories, to which the Folk themselves are utterly oblivious.”

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“The wood was her favourite place, for it was also where you could find foxes and hares and slowworms and at least ten species of birds. She could sit for hours in the treetops, observing owls chasing mice, mice fighting over burrows, and all the other small dramas that were part of everyday life in the woods. She liked animals - there as something restful about them, like people.”

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“Then you told me how you had tricked the boggart into thinking you a long-lost relative of his last master---a feat which had required extensive research into local lore---then bribed him with exotic seashells, for you remembered some obscure story about a boggart whose secret fantasy was to travel the world, boggarts being bound to their crumbling ruins, while I half listened in astonishment. I say half, because I was mostly just watching you, observing the way your mind clicks and whirrs like some fantastical clock. Truly, I have never met anyone with a better understanding of our nature, and that anyone includes the Folk. I suppose that's partly why--- Ah, but you really would kill me if I desecrated your scientific vessel with the end of that sentence.”

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“She was clad in a tea-colored dress and white apron, and on her head was an enormous buttercup worn like a kerchief, two of the petals pinned together beneath her hair. Her face was very red, very shiny and very plump. She looked, I thought, a little like a lost doll, though not one mortal children would enjoy playing with; her eyes were the usual all black, and she appeared to be a type of faun, with large and intimidatingly sharp black horns that curved backwards out of her head, and legs that ended in hairy hooves. "A butter faerie," Niamh said. "The queen had several in her service--- this one, I am told, had the queen's particular affections due to the quality of her product." "Fascinating," I said, wishing I had time to make a sketch. My encyclopaedia's entry on butter faeries had been sorely lacking in detail. "I have never encountered one before." "They're quite rare," Niamh said. "A good thing, I've always thought. They are peevish, half-mad little things, particularly if you remove them from their creameries." "I did not know they were found in Ireland," I said. "Most of the tales of butter faeries are from Somerset, are they not?" "Ah!" Niamh said, her face alight with scholarly enthusiasm. "Indeed they are. But once upon a time, as you know, Where the Trees Have Eyes had several doors leading to British faerie realms. One of these, I'm told, led to a pretty corner of Somerset. I theorize that the creatures used to go to and fro before the door collapsed, trapping several of them in this realm.”

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“The faerie's creamery was not too deep, happily, or at least it did not feel so; a chimneylike skylight cut into the stone roof admitted the warm gold-green light of the forest. Given the faerie's size, the workspace was expansive--- even Wendell, the tallest among us, did not need to duck--- with a hard-packed earthen floor and an array of shelves, some of which held blocks of butter wrapped in paper and twine. In the middle of the workshop was the butter churn, beside which was a tin bucket of milk with condensation forming on the side--- which I think is what the faerie had been worrying about, for she immediately rushed over to it and carried it into her cellar. The air was cool, on the edge of cold, and the smell of the place made my mouth water. Not only of butter, but thyme and lavender, strawberries and honey, which the faerie used to flavor some of the blocks. Those on the nearest shelf had leaves tucked beneath the twine--- basil, I think.”

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“Yes, I was a queen of Faerie--- and I wished to appear so. To match. For where had I ever matched before? At Cambridge, yes--- I matched with the old stones, and the dusty libraries. I suppose that, in Faerie, I had wished to match with the Folk. A foolish aim indeed! I wondered at myself now. Yet I suppose that one cannot spend one's life half in love with Faerie without wishing to be part of it, to wonder if it might feel like home in a way no mortal place ever had.”

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“As the eyes of the assembled Folk fell upon me, I realized that I had forgotten to change back into my queenly attire. I still had on my old shift and winter wellies, as if I were returned from fieldwork in the countryside. I was even more disheveled than usual from my adventure, for I had lost a bootlace somewhere along the way, and I did not even want to imagine what my hair looked like. My journal poked out of one pocket, my notebook another, and my fingertips were smudged with ink. I looked every inch a scholar, a none-too-reputable one at that, and not one millimetre a queen. And yet, somehow, this seemed barely to register on my audience. The Folk stared at me as much as Arna, with an avidity they had never displayed before. Perhaps it was the contrast I made with themselves, perhaps something else. The Folk respect power above most things, after all, and perhaps there was power in abandoning my fumbling attempts to please them, as if I were above it all, even if I did not feel that way. In any case, I was not used to commanding their attention, and on the whole was not certain I preferred it.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales
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“Wendell and I would spend the next several months traveling his realm. Our realm. I must get used to that. I would take copious notes all the while, no doubt filling several of the ridiculous journals the bookbinders kept churning out, and stumbling across so many research questions it would take me ten lifetimes to tackle them all. And after that, who knows? I have my compendium of tales to finish--- I plan to gather stories as Wendell and I travel, adding them to the small hoard I've already collected. My presence is not required in the mortal world until October, when I will be delivering a presentation on several key findings in my map-book, which shall be published in a month's time. When the Berlin Academy of Folklorists sends you an invitation to their annual conference, you cannot say no.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales
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“He smiled. "This is all going into your book, isn't it?" "I was not even thinking about my book," I said defensively--- I was only half lying. With my encyclopaedia complete, I have, as Wendell knows, turned my attention to another large project--- creating a mapbook of all the known faerie realms, as well as their doors. Such a book will be a patchwork thing, unavoidably so--- faerie realms are often attached to specific geographical locations in the mortal world, though only a few have been explored in a meaningful way--- but I wish to use it to argue Danielle de Grey's point: that the realms are more interconnected than previous scholarship has suggested. Finding evidence of the nexus would be the linchpin of the entire project.”

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Book:Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands
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“I had several sketches drafted for my mapbook--- my intention for the first edition was to focus on the best known faerie kingdoms of Western Europe, scouring the literature for references to their doors. Some doors have been documented; more have not, or exist as rumors. While it's true that many faerie kingdoms are tied to specific mortal regions, others are more nebulous, and a tale may place one at the edge of a village a hundred miles from the setting of a later iteration of the same story. I am aware that mine is no easy task, given that faerie doors can and do move, and what I will accomplish is likely to be a mere snapshot of Faerie during this particular era. Even so, it will be a monumental achievement for scholarship, something for others to build upon--- particularly if I can produce evidence of such disputed doors as the nexus.”

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“We seemed to have emerged upon a snowy curve of mountainside below a glacier--- I believe we were in Faerie, for there were two little stone houses tucked in amongst the jagged icicles at the glacier's edge, with smoke curling from their chimneys. One had an apple tree in its yard, the apples coated in a rind of ice. The icicles themselves were like a forest of glittering trees, through which the fox faerie was darting, deeper into the glacier. "Hurry up!" the faerie called. I hurried, against my better judgment I might add, but then that is almost always the case when interacting with the Folk; stumbling into an impossible forest of icicles is not the most ill-advised thing I have done in my career. The forest made little plinking sounds and reflected our darting shapes strangely. In the distance, there was music.”

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“We will be taking a long sabbatical from Cambridge, both of us. Wendell does not believe he will return, and why would he? The scholarly life was for him merely the means to an end, the end being finding a way back to his home. But I know that I will, if only from time to time. Perhaps a semester here, a semester there. A tenured scholar has a great deal of freedom, after all, and once the article I have written on my journey into the Silva Lupi (much redacted and condensed, of course) appears in next month's issue of Modern Dryadology, Cambridge will be all the more eager to retain me. Rose, who acted as co-author, and actually deigned to allow my name to appear first in the publication, is certain it will send the scholarly community into a tizzy. And also--- I will have my mapbook to publish.”

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“Wendell pushed the door open. Light. It was full morning, and my vision flooded with color. Primarily green, but there was also the yellow of moss and lichened stone, the violet of bluebells clustered at the edge of the forest, the gold of sunbeams, and the rich azure of the sky. The door opened onto a hill in a small clearing, beyond which a wall of trees nodded their boughs in the wind, as if in greeting. The air was wet from a recent rain and heavy with the smell of green and growing things--- all as I remembered.”

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“Wendell rested his hand on one of the cherry trees in an absent sort of way, gazing over the landscape. The tree began to flower, buds bursting forth in a riot of purples and blues, and the leaves grew so green they resembled crushed emeralds. It matched Wendell's expression, somehow, as he swept his gaze over the view, a contentment that seemed to radiate from him, cheering all in his vicinity. Two servants carrying what looked like a newly minted silver mirror stepped more lightly, their faces brightening, and a fat leprechaun sprawled against a nearby boxwood chuckled in his sleep.”

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“I found myself noticing familiar plants and features as we travelled through the woods. Some brownies, for instance, had stone dwellings built into the earth--- closer to cellars than houses, to my eye--- roofed in densely interwoven fern fronds. Doubtless others dwelt in the canopy, for when I looked up, I saw the telltale silver gleam of impossibly narrow bridges connecting the trees like spiderthread. But as we moved away from the castle, I saw less of this glittering architecture, and more of the humble, cellarlike variety. I also noted that I was growing increasingly adept at spotting moss-brownies, as I had begun to call them in my head, for the mossy caps they wore. These small, black-eyed creatures, whose bodies were often covered in moss as well, could be seen peeking at us from behind branches, or sometimes in plain view upon a green stone or bough, where they were surprisingly difficult to detect.”

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“I remembered what Callum had said about Queen Arna--- that she had taken the poison within herself and somehow infected the realm with it, as a mortal might pass on a cold. It was a mad idea, of course, and yet simultaneously--- as is often the case in Faerie--- there was a sort of logic to it. Monarchs of Faerie do not merely inhabit their realms; they are thought to be intricately entwined.* *Wentworth Morrison's Folk-Lore of Scotland, Volume III: Thrones of Faerie (1852) remains the definitive resource on this topic, but Farris Rose's exhaustive investigation of Cornish faerie stories (in particular his Atlas of Tales, 1900) provides additional insight. Cornwall holds the record for the sheer number of interactions between mortals and monarchs of Faerie (Rose's "Comparative Analysis of the Faerie Markets of Bodmin Moor," published in Dryadological Fieldnotes in 1902, offers several intriguing theories as to why this might be so). In many of the tales recorded by Morrison and Rose, a faerie monarch's power is also their Achilles' heel: while they control the landscape and weather, they can be defeated by being trapped and removed from their homes, as a flower dies when uprooted from its soil. It was both a threat to Wendell's rule and the perfect revenge against him. He who had evaded the same poison was now forced to watch it consume his realm.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales
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“What?" I said. He rose, shaking the dew from his cloak. "You have that look." He had mirrored my own train of thought, which made me scowl at him irrationally. "Which?" "The one you wear whenever you outsmart me in some area," he said. "Well," I began with a shrug, then stopped. My magnanimity was wearing thin, I'm afraid. "Haven't I?" He laughed, a clear, bright sound, and then, before I knew what was happening, he had lifted me from my feet and spun me through the air, the greenery and shadow of the forest a whirl all around me. "My beloved Emily," he murmured in my ear. "Yes, yes, all right," I said, though I did not pull away. My smugness was back, together with a warm sort of satisfaction. It was pleasing to see him this happy.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales
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“You already know more about faerie kingdoms than any mortal." "Stories," I said faintly, drawing my hand back. "I know stories." He gave me an odd look. "And have you ever needed anything else? Have you not shaken a kingdom to its foundations, found a door to a distant otherland, overthrown a queen? Hand you the right storybook, and you are capable of anything.”

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Book:Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales
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“Though I could guess which doorknob was for Wendell's kingdom, I could not resist trying the loveliest first: the tiny turquoise sea. Hardly daring to breathe, I turned the doorknob, and the door swung open with a gentle sigh. Salt wind spilled into the faerie's house. Before me stretched a dry, rocky coastline punctuated by groves of yellowish trees. The turquoise sea was endless and far too bright, broken only by an ellipsis of rugged islands. Just beyond the door was a spindly olive tree and a cairn of white pebbles. Largely to see if I could, I reached through and took one--- the sun beat down upon my arm, a most curious sensation, while the rest of me felt only the cozier warmth of the faerie's alpine home. I closed the door. "Greece," I murmured. "I think. It looks to be situated either in the mortal world or a place of overlap, like Poe's door. I had no idea the nexus led there--- they have no stories of tree fauns in Greece. Perhaps they do not use it much?”

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Book:Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands
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“You're as boring as one of them now. Like a mortal pretending to be Folk. Why don't you just go back to their world, brother?" Wendell's eyes narrowed. "You, on the other hand, have only grown more like the old queen. Or, rather, a poor copy--- plenty of spite and jealousy, but lacking her imagination." The girl's face went white. "The true queen will have you quartered and hung from the battlements, along with those stupid mortals you care so much for." "Your opinion of mortals is so low," Wendell said. "Yet one of them was your mother's undoing. How does it feel to be proven a fool?" "My mother is not dead," she spat, and for a moment I thought she was going to lunge at him. "She cares too much about the realm to--- to---" "To die?" Wendell gave a quiet laugh. "If only there were protection in that! Alas. Our father cared a great deal for the realm, too. But then, you were too young--- I doubt you remember him much. Well, let us go and see what our mother's malice has wrought upon our beloved realm, and then we shall see if there is anything in you but her worst qualities.”

Sibling RivalryVerbal Salt
Book:Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales
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“I had a weapon with me, but--- I lost it." For the briefest of moments, she looked confused. I cannot say for certain--- my memory of these moments is poor, and also, I have never been skilled at reading others. But I am, of course, an expert in the ways of the Folk. And whatever else she might be, the woman before me was inarguably Folk. "What was it?" she said. "A horn," I replied. "The horn of a faun." She did not move, though something in her face relaxed. "That would have been a fearsome weapon indeed, for one brave enough to wield it. Pity." I nodded. "Fortunately, I had made a little powder from the tip, which I had in my pocket before you came in." It was not my imagination--- the queen was visibly tired, exhausted even. It had come on quickly. She seemed to make an effort to focus on me. And then I saw the moment she understood. Her hand clenched around the fine tablecloth. "You---" "Yes," I said. "I put it in the wine. At least, I'm fairly certain I did--- you'll have to excuse me, but Faerie does not agree with my memory. Of course, I did not know you would come here to taunt me--- but I thought it a possibility. I suppose you were right: the capacity for forethought is an advantage we mortals have over the Folk.”

HeroineTrickedPoisonedStepmotherClever GirlForethinking
Book:Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands
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“The faeries took no notice of my cry. No doubt they were used to lost travelers screaming for help. One of them grabbed me by my cloak and wrenched me painfully back and forth, like an animal wishing to drag me to the ground. But I did not need to call for Wendell again. He stepped out from behind a tree---or perhaps from the tree; I didn't see. He reached a hand out and snapped the neck of the faerie gripping me, which I had not expected, and I staggered back from both him and the crumpling body. He saw the mark on my neck, and his entire face darkened with something that seemed to go beyond fury and made him look like some feral creature. The faeries scattered like leaves, though they were too intrigued and too stupid to run. "Are you hurt?" "No." I don't know how I made myself speak. I have seen Wendell angry before, but this was something that seemed to surge through him like lightning, threatening to burn everything in its path. He moved his hand, and a hideous tree rose up from the snow, dark and terrifying, all thorns and knife-sharp branches. The boughs darted out, and he skewered the faeries on them. Once they were all immobilized, held squirming and screaming above the ground, he moved from one to the other, tearing them apart with perfect, calm brutality. Limbs, hearts, other organs I did not recognize scattered the snow. He did not rush, but killed them methodically while the others howled and writhed.”

RescuedDark HeroFaerie MagicGory Mess
Book:Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
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“Wendell marched down a winding path in the mountainside--- he must have conjured it himself--- to engage the elder horsemen in a square of meadow tucked between two crags. I don't know if it was some inane faerie custom or simply the custom of the horsemen, but the one who appeared to be their leader--- judging by the size of his horse and the number of scars he bore--- stepped forward as if to challenge Wendell to single combat. Wendell, still with that calm detachment, somehow cut out the beast's heart in two sharp movements and hurled it at the rider in a stomach-churning spray of blood, knocking him from his saddle. At that point, the remaining horsemen decided to abandon honor and charge him together, but their horses were, wisely, terrified of Wendell by this point, and shied away when he neared, some throwing their riders off, which Wendell dispatched in various appalling ways, sometimes appearing to forget about his sword entirely. Rose stood there the whole time, aghast, but I was familiar with Wendell's murderous moods and turned away after the third or fourth death, drawing Ariadne with me to the fireside. I was still shaking with fury. So he would risk killing himself rather than pausing to think our way out of things, would he?”

GoreHorsemenFaerie KingDark HeroSwordfight
Book:Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands
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