Only the Fae and Melissa Stowe knew the Fae Queen.

The Fae made up a one-fifth of the Shifter World's population. Fairies (both small and human-sized), giants, goblins, trolls, mermaids, pixies, naiads, dryads, elves, dwarves, banshees, and brownies made up much of that one-fifth portion. In Bria Hungary, the Fae lived together in popup cities like Faevil, channeling the Earthens revolution that currently took the Shifter World by storm: Earthens-style clothes appeared in hodgepodge hubs from both the Western and Eastern hemispheres, and new technology like cappuccino machines and iPads originally stolen from Earthens placed Bria Hungrian Fae in the high-tech bustle that uncannily mirrored Earthens. In every other country, the Fae lived in nature's imperfect palaces—gardens, oceans, forests, lagoons, caves, the damp overgrown world of a bridge's underside—all places that seemed perfectly fitting for humanoid creatures whose magic resembled the most natural forms of the world.

Shifters paid no attention to the Fae, and the Fae paid no attention to the Shifters.

As a result, the Fae knew next to nothing about the Shifter World's government. The Fae also made sure not to reveal too much about their own precious queen.

At fourteen years old, Melissa Stowe saved the Fae Queen's daughter from an assassination attempt by a jealous cousin. Melissa had taken her extensive love and knowledge of herbs and brewed a tea that flushed the poison right out of the Fae princess's system. In return, the Fae Queen promised Melissa a favor.

Just over fourteen years later, Melissa cashed in that favor right before the war of elevens started, thinking that favor was going to save her cousin. Instead, that favor saved every soldier who was not already dead in Elliott Way. Melissa wrote a letter to Amaranth, because Amaranth was one of the few women who knew where and how to reach the Fae Queen. Amaranth, in turn, wrote a letter to the Fae Queen, detailing Melissa's favor-in-question.

Ever since the beginning of time, human-sized fairies have had an extremely useful and sometimes concerning love of wars. "It builds facial features," said every fairy in every culture in the Shifter World. "It tones the muscles. Makes you gorgeous."

Human-sized fairies have also loved beauty ever since the beginning of time.

So when the Fae Queen received Amaranth's letter regarding Melissa's favor-in-question and the Fae Queen summoned twelve generals of the fairy army to her throne room and asked them how they felt about joining the war of elevens in northern Bria Hungary, the fairies were more than happy to oblige.

Two hundred human-sized fairies came pouring in from gates inside Elliott Way's carved walls and flooded floors. They were blue-skinned and green-scaled and red-haired; their paper-thin wings glittered as if light beams shone through the translucent membranes and veins. Every fairy was dressed as if they were ready for both a masquerade ball and a war: they came wearing the pale skin sheared off tree roots as dresses, had machetes strapped to their thighs, wore giant sky-blue leaves from the Lightning Islands as headdresses, covered their thin-boned hands with brass knuckles, adorned themselves with masks the color of an angry sky, and had bows and quivers of arrows slung across their backs.

The fairies arrived with two orders, one from Amaranth (as part of the favor to Melissa) and one from the Fae Queen. The favors went hand-in-hand: get every single soldier out of Elliott Way, and look good while doing it.

The war of elevens raged on. 

***

There.

When Lilly finally calmed down enough to get her fear and anger under control, she felt the current, writhing through her fingers like many anxious worms. Slowly, she rose to her feet to face Storm, to face Storm, focusing her energy and thoughts on the invisible current keeping everyone in the Shifter World alive. She could do this if she kept calm.

Stolen starlight glittered on her fingertips.

Lilly bit out through gritted teeth, "You seem very confident in your world-destroying abilities."

"You don't want to fight me, Lilly," Storm replied, gaze flickering from the silver crackling around her hands to her eyes. "You'll lose. Sit your ass down and save yourself the trouble."

Elliott Way had prepared her to fight, had taught her that magic was wonder and mystery and that anything was possible, anything at all, as long as her fear was under her control and the magical current was at her disposal. In all of the infinite grandeur of space and all the wishy-washy rules of magic she didn't quite understand, there had to be something she could use to get out of this.

In all of space. The thought sent her heartbeat thrilling through her blood, and with it came the overwhelming feeling of I can do this, I can do this because I have the sun and moon and stars and infinity to help me.

"I'll win." Lilly thrust her hands out, and Storm sneered, "You know absolutely nothing about space magic," before clasping his own hands together.

Starlight hit lightning. Both lights were red: Lilly's was the vivid scarlet of roses and rubies, and Storm's was ten shades paler.

The second the blasts crashed against each other, much-needed energy was sucked from Lilly's body, and the momentum of the crash hurled her up and backward. She hit the ground rolling side over side, down the side of the hill. When she landed at the bottom, she shuddered, gulping down desperate exhales. Mud caked her hands, her arms, her pants, the right side of her face. She blinked the rain out of her eyes, rolled onto her back, and looked up to see Storm descending on her.

He snapped his fingers.

Lilly rolled left and ducked her head into her chin. A thin fork of lightning missed her right ear by inches. Jolts of electricity jarred her. 

Adrenaline substituted for her lack of energy. Suddenly extremely alert and dizzy by the new crispness every shape around her held, Lilly staggered to her feet. Storm prowled closer, and before Lilly could even get her breath back, her body left the ground again: Bone-chilling wind shoved against her body, and she tried to heave in an exhale, but she couldn't get in all the oxygen she needed before Storm flung her down again. She hit the ground with a muddy slap.

Pain shot through Lilly's body. It was fire, it was I-want-to-give-up-I can't-do-this-I'm-in-too-much-pain and it was I-can't-quit-now-I've-got-space-on-my-side. Swallowing down large gulps of oxygen, she clenched her fists. Mud squelch through her fingers. She called out to space, to her magic. Her vision came back in shards: She was on the ground and Storm was to her left, raising his hands, ready to finish her off—

Magic, space, something.

The ground quaked. A half-second later, it split wide open.

Storm stumbled. From the chasm rose bright, luminescent rocks twenty feet tall—they were transparent, casting a thousand constellations of light over the shadow-splayed hills. Silver rivulets of rainwater slithered down the extravagant ethereal crystals; each space-rock was gloriously robed in vivid sapphire, vermillion, chartreuse, saffron, and amaranth. The rocks shot up and up and up from the mud in a perfect single-file line, heading straight for Storm.

Storm snapped his fingers and a triplet of lightning blasts exploded out of his hands, coupled with a crackle of thunder. The white bolts blew her crystals to a million pieces.

Lilly flinched. Crystallized rock flew in every direction. The colorful shards glittered around she and Storm like confetti, and the ground stitched itself back together.

"Glowing rocks?" Storm asked with a bark of laughter.

"Ethereal crystals from a different planet," Lilly panted in wonder, shaking out her hands. That was cool. Granted, ethereal crystals from a different planet didn't save her life, but she was proud her magic could do something so extraordinary.

"Amateur," Storm spat. "I'm tired of this."

He lifted his chin, still grinning, always grinning, and Lilly lifted her hands to match him, but suddenly the world around her charged. The atmosphere felt like it did the first time she'd walked into a room with a gate to another world: electrifying and heavy. There was a flash of light, sending shockwaves of heat up and down her skin, and then the shadows dancing around she and Storm fled, matched with many violent shades of red. 

Around her, standing in a loose circle with their skinny arms outstretched, were red humanoid figures glowing beacon-bright. It was as if lightning had turned sentient, like it had touched the ground and transfigured itself into human-ish creatures.

Lilly didn't move, hands half-raised, heart thundering in her throat. She felt as if her skull was filled with lead. 

Storm clucked his tongue. "You should stay still. They're triggered by movement, so if you even lift a finger they'll shock a body part off."

Lilly wanted to scream at him, to sass him, to hurl him off the face of the planet with magic. The magical current slipped out her hands with this newfound uncontrollable anger. She had no desire to lose a body part, and Storm seemed to be okay with keeping her body intact as long as she obeyed him, so she stayed still and he left his lightning humanoids far enough away so that Lilly could only just feel their crackling heat and shocking charges ripple over her skin.

Storm smiled spread his hands out diplomatically, clearly excited to show off. "I'd say my beasts caused a great distraction to the world, wouldn't you? It's hard to figure out how to hunt a little girl down, get her into a position to force her to use magic to destroy the magical dimension, and stay good looking, all while an international government is trying to track you down. Good plan, right?"

"It's brilliant," Lilly murmured, despairing. Louder, she added, "Except for the part where I will never ever use my magic to destroy the magical dimension for you."

"The funny thing is that you keep doing exactly what I want you to do, sweetheart." Storm raised his voice again over a particularly loud howl of wind. Lilly shivered, her clothes feeling like a thousand pounds as they grasped her skin. "You stole starlight. It fizzled out of existence, but magic never really goes out of existence, does it? It just soaks back into the invisible veins of the world, or into the ground of very magical places. Starlight is in the invisible veins around us right now. Do you know what the atmosphere of the magical dimension is made of?"

If Lilly was okay with losing a body part, she would have shoved her hands through her hair in frustration.

"Hydrazine vapor," Storm said when she didn't reply. "That's what Earthens scientists use to make rocket fuel. Extremely flammable in its liquid state. Very unstable. And do you know what helps make starlight in the Shifter World's space?"

"No." The fear was gory, loud, rattling her ribs like someone had given her a good hard shake.

"Sulfur, charcoal, potassium nitrate. Saltpeter. That's gunpowder, so concentrated in even the smallest trace of starlight, it takes millions of years to burn out."

"So it's like gunpowder on steroids," Lilly breathed.

"The magical dimension is cold compared to our dimension. If heat escapes from our dimension into the magical dimension, hydrazine turns into a liquid and falls to the ground of the magical dimension. Seconds later, the starlight that's seeped into the veins of our world slither into the dimension and everything explodes. Every string, every vein, everything."

"Now all you have to do is open the magical dimension."

"Unfortunately for you, I've been practicing opening gates for years." 

"No," Lilly whispered. What could she do but watch? What could she do but stand there, hoping humanoid lightning creatures wouldn't shock off an arm or a leg, knowing very well it didn't matter what she did or if a part of her body was shocked off because it was over, it was all over? In the next five seconds, Storm was about to destroy the Shifter World. Storm, who was too excited to pay any more attention to her, whirled around to face the rain-blurred hills.

Storm arched his arm behind his shoulder like he was getting ready to throw something. He brought his opposite arm up above his head. What a perfect, powerful silhouette he was like this, lit up with glittering red and electric blue, blurred by the rain. 

Magic unraveled, split at the seams, and the magical dimension spread into a giant twelve-foot-high five-foot-wide oval before Lilly's eyes.

***

At the same time Storm plucked at the magical current and the energy around it to tear open the magical dimension, Kaitlynn was dying and Zander cut a string.

This was quite possibly the scariest thing Kaitlynn had ever done in her life.

She did not want to die.

The concept of astral projection was not new to Kaitlynn. At the end of each year, priests of the Lesser Gods would meet with priests of the Greater Gods in the astral realm, a realm only spirits loosed from their original physical bodies could walk. When the priests of the two classes of gods met, they worshipped the Great King, and if the King was pleased with the worship, He would cultivate a plentiful crop yield for the next season. Shezekians charged the streets in the Parade of Astral Priests, lanterns painted by five-year-olds were offered to the sky, delicious food was prepared weeks in advance, gifts were exchanged on Astral Priest morning, and school was canceled for a month.

Kaitlynn had astral projected several times on Astral Priest morning. It required deep, trance-like relaxation, but who could be deeply relaxed when a war raged behind them? Desidonna knew this. When Kaitlynn and Wyx had visited the suffering psychic, Desidonna had gasped, "Storm is going to pull energy from the magical current. You're too young. The dimension would never open for you if you did that, so you have to give all your magic."

She'd then directed Kaitlynn to a cupboard, too tired and weak to get up herself, and told Kaitlynn to grab the blue vial on the left. The contents of the vial, Desidonna said, would not only send her magic spewing out of her body, but would catapult her spirit out of her body because physical bodies did not have enough room to hold both a spirit and a dense surge of magical energy vomiting out of the gash she was supposed to cut in her arm. The magical energy coursing out of her would allow her spirit to open the magical dimension in the astral realm.

Desidonna said, "Every string in the magical dimension is a physical manifestation of all the types of magic in the Shifter World. Fire, water, earth, space thieving, clairvoyance, the magic to open gates." Then she passed out.

Zander would enter the dimension and cut the string that allowed the magical dimension to open in this dimension. His job was easy: he only had to cut a blue string, the only blue string in a series of pink and orange strings. Wyx just had to make sure Kaitlynn's body didn't bleed to death, or else the spiritual cord that tied her spirit to her body would snap, and her spirit would drift away. She'd die. 

We're doing this to save the world.

Kaitlynn had just cut open a four-inch gash in her arm.

The pain was shocking and horrific at first, but with every passing second her body fell into cold numbness, and she lost balance. Zander caught her as she fell and eased her to the ground, muttering, "You can do this. You're going to do just fine. You'll be okay."

"You can do this," he muttered, having finally found his voice. "You're going to do just fine. You'll be okay."

But the blood was pouring, gushing, made thin by the rain pounding their chosen hilltop. Behind them, Elliott Way scrambled with screams and bloodshed and battle. Who was to say that the beasts wouldn't break out of Elliott Way and storm over her and her friends?

If Kaitlynn died, Grandpops would certainly cry. He had never cried before; people in Kaitlynn's village called him Méo Gashangis, the man with no sentiment. Kaitlynn knew this was not true. Grandpops was one of the most sentimental people she had ever met, he just did not show it in front of others. He said he was saving his tears for something important, something treasured. That way, the tears were special. Like if you were to pass into the unseen realm, ferashu, little flower, then I would cry, because that is an occasion worth treasured tears.

Her pulse sped up, only Kaitlynn knew that this was not her pulse. This was something completely different, like the wings of a dragonfly fluttering rapidly inside her wrist. She clenched her very numb fists—

Her mind seared with sad, brave thoughts about Grandma and Grandpops: their sweet smiles showing yellow teeth, Grandma's super-strong coffee that could be smelled from down the street, the raw fish tastings she and Grandpops went on every Saturday morning. Her entire right arm sizzled with power; her entire body buckled.

"Come on," Zander muttered. "You're okay, you're gonna be okay." 

Kaitlynn swallowed. The tears fell. She was already losing energy and already felt extremely dizzy. She threw all her energy out—mind and spirit and body—into the strange phenomenon that was astral projecting. She threw her fear at it, too, and her passion, and her kindness, and her sadness. She imagined everything inside of her welling up and radiating off her—maybe that was what was happening, who knew?—she ground her teeth and water came pouring from her hands and her cheeks turned hot with pure flush and she ripped out of her body, and screamed, and ripped out of her body, and screamed some more.

Like if you were to pass into the unseen realm, ferashu, little flower, then I would cry, because that is an occasion worth treasured tears.

Her body shot out of her spirit.

***

Zander sealed the dimension right as Storm opened it.

Three minutes before, he'd caught Kaitlynn as she fell.

Her skin was hot, so hot, and her tears dripped over his arms. He eased her down to the muddy ground and waited for her to open her eyes, to breathe a little deeper, something, anything. Her hands were clenched tight and her right arm was bloody with thin red rivers.

Right in front of Zander, a small tear swimming with bright pink light interrupted the dark shades running like a muddy watercolor painting. It was a vertical line, about as tall as Zander. He could get through it if he really squeezed, but it wasn't going to be an easy fit at all.

He clenched the shard of glass Kaitlynn handed him.

"What if she doesn't wake up?" Zander asked Wyx.

"Then she dies, and she helped save the world. Now go, you don't have time for this," Wyx replied gently, brushing Kaitlynn's damp hair back from her forehead. "I'll keep watch for Storm or any unfriendly ugly creatures. Best not to use your own magic in there. We don't know what could happen."

Zander stood, inhaled sharply, and entered the dimension with tears streaming down his cheeks. The atmosphere was pink, the pale, the milky color of pearls he saw female Bloom Officials sometimes showing off when they came into town to collect taxes for the Congregation Center.  Everywhere, as far as the eye could see, was pink.

There were also strings. Thin gossamers, to be exact, that stretched and tangled and wound around each other. Zander had to be careful or he'd step on this one or get his hand caught in that one. Up, down, left, right...it was as though he were caught in a web of strings, strings, strings in a backdrop of pink. How strange that each one of these strings represented a magical power in the Shifter World. It was incredible—where did one string end and the other begin? How were all these tangles created? What if new magical powers were created by science or some strange lab accident—would new strings enter the dimension?

Zander stood there with his hands on his hips and blinked his tears away. The ground was all glass; he could see himself reflected in it. He felt as though he were breathing through a straw, and he tried not to panic. It would be okay...all he had to do was find the blue string. But every string he saw looked orange or pink or red or purple...there was nothing blue in the mix.

The more his eyes adjusted, the easier it was to search through the dimension.

He saw the glimmer of a blue string at eye level a few feet to his left. Carefully, like an adventurer trying to avoid a tangle of lasers, Zander stepped. He did not want to touch any string he didn't have to. What if he stepped on a string and it snapped?

He reached the blue string and raised the glass shard to cut it.

Kaitlynn was dying, and his heart hurt for her. Wyx was with her.

Lilly was kidnapped by Storm.

Max was...who knew where Max was?

A sob rattled his lungs. Don't you dare die, Kaitlynn. You've got to give happiness to everyone around you. 

He sucked in thick, useless air and cut the string.

The dimension rumbled. The glass beneath his feet began to crack, hairline fractures spinning wild in every direction. Zander's heart palpitated. The blue string fell limp. Zander whirled and went back the way he came as the glass cracked, cracked, cracked beneath his feet, and went through the rip in the air, back into the screaming storm outside. 

The magical dimension sealed shut behind him. 

"You did it," Wyx gasped as Zander fell to his knees in the mud next to Kaitlynn. "You actually did it."

Zander pressed two fingers to the skin right below Kaitlynn's ear. In the midst of the rain and wind and ground-shaking thunder and Elliott Way groaning with cataclysm in the near distance, it was hard to focus; he looked for Kaitlynn's pulse for what felt like syrup-thick minutes, trying to find a flutter, a beat, a breath, anything. It was like trying to reach out to find the magical dimension while you were dumbstruck in the middle of a nightmare. 

Wyx crawled up on Kaitlynn's shoulder, shaking his head. 

Zander said, "Come on, Kaitlynn. Come on." 

He did not want her to die. 

He could not find her pulse. 

Far, far to his left, coming up the slope that led down to Faevil, a small shape came into view. It looked like a black box with wheels in this distance—oh yes, a Jeep—Zander threw up his hands sent a flare of sparks into the storm. 

"Help," he whispered, and realizing that was pointless, he yelled again, "HELP!" Pointless, pointless; the storm was too loud. The cataclysm that was Elliott Way was louder. He sent out another blazing line of sparks, and the Jeep turned in his direction, grinding through the mud. 

The moment the Jeep got close enough that Zander could just see the silhouettes inside it, three people climbed out—a woman in lavender scrubs, another woman with an expression that said I'm about to raise hell and a very pronounced limp, and a younger, surly-looking boy who carried himself like he was about to collapse at any second.  

"Can you help my friend?" Zander asked the nurse, feeling the sting of tears rise in his throat. 

The nurse knelt down, and in the flaxen glow of the Jeep's headlights, Zander could see the subtle nuances in the nurse's face as she pressed gentle fingers to Kaitlynn's pulse points. Her eyelids lowered as if she was about to cry and didn't want anyone to know, her pale lips were turned down at the corners, and the lines on her face were taut. 

"What happened?" the other woman asked; she grimaced as she lowered herself to kneel next to Zander. 

"A psychic on the edge of Faevil told her to astral project in order to have the magical strength to open the magical dimension so that I could seal it," Zander replied. He was shaking all over, out of breath. "Will she be okay or not?" 

"Um." The nurse pulled a roll of gauze from her pocket and started to wrap Kaitlynn's wounded arm in it. "She has a pulse. Very faint. You can feel it in her wrist, but she won't be alive for long if she doesn't get help and the nearest hospital is miles away—" 

"Desidonna," Wyx interrupted. "Last time we saw her she was passed out on her floor, but if she can't help us maybe her imps can. She knows about the dimension and astral projection. She's smart. She might know what to do." 

"Can you take her there in your Jeep?" Zander asked the nurse. 

"If your hamster can lead the way." 

Wyx scoffed, "Do I look like a hamster to you?" and Zander helped the nurse lift Kaitlynn's limp body to the vehicle. As they settled her across the backseat, Zander heard the boy ask, "Is Lilly in there?" 

Zander whirled around. The boy was pointing at Elliott Way, which was a mere silhouette outlined with fire—its roof was now a series giant craters, its many spires were either completely wrenched free of their bolts or leaning dangerously to one side. On the lawns just outside and over the bridges were many people—fairies and trainees and instructor, and above them was a winged monster that sliced through the rain like a missile. 

It dove. 

Screams bloomed in the distance; Zander looked away and said, "Lilly was taken by Storm before he let his beasts loose in Elliott Way." 

The woman was now on her feet, and there were knives in her hands. She said simply, "Where?" 

"I don't know." 

From the Jeep, Wyx called, "We have to go, you whackadoodles!" 

"I have to find her," said the woman, trembling as badly as Zander. "I have to find my cousin." 

"I've seen you walk, lady!" Wyx shouted back. His little head appeared outside the side of the Jeep. "You think you can find Lilly and Storm with that limp? I don't know who you think you are but you are not about to kill yourself for no reason." 

"Talking lizards," the other boy muttered, raking a distressed hand through his hair. 

"Gibberkrab with moon blood!" Wyx screamed back. "Come on, you crazy—" 

And then Elliott Way exploded. 

The walls burst outward, and the craters in the roof were suddenly capped with water. There was a deafening crack and a horrible cacophony of shrieks. Water rushed, rushed, rushed, swallowing the mass of people at Elliott Way's edge from view. The wave sloshed over another hill and disappeared into a valley, where it ran down a slope on the facility's eastern side and disappeared.

Zander jumped; the woman raised her knives and, realizing how little that did, exhaled sharply. 

Zander looked at the woman, the boy, Elliott Way. It's hell. It's all hell. "We can't do anything for Lilly if we don't know where she is." 

"I know," the woman replied. "I know. But I—" she closed her eyes and made her knives disappear up her sleeves, and in that simple, swift movement, Zander knew what she was thinking because he felt the same way: but I can't lose her. 

"Now!" the nurse called from the back of the Jeep. "This girl's pulse won't keep and I'm sure as hell not going to leave you three out here in this storm with monsters massacring everyone fifty yards away!" 

"Melissa," said the boy, "let's help save that girl." 

Melissa nodded and limped back towards the Jeep. 

Zander saw the tears rolling down her cheeks before she turned away and he began to cry again, too.