Mouth hanging open, I'm stunned. Not because of his words. No, those remind me of my brother too. I'm stunned because despite everything, there still isn't a single crack in his armour to reach his magic. My stomach rumbles its protest.

Bringing my glass to my lips, I take another deep draught, hoping to dull the hunger pains a little longer. Then, I pretend to zip my lips shut and he continues.

"Since you appear to have the attention span of a mere child, I shall shorten the story to just the most important details.

My father and the leaders of all the magical races banded together to find a solution.

The sickness had taken uncountable lives. Whole families, whole bloodlines, were wiped from the earth. They searched and searched for a cure but none could be found. They decided that the only way to end the disease was to stop it at its source. Magic.

They worked tirelessly to devise a spell. One that could seal all magic away so that its corruption could never take another life. And they solved it. The witches were the ones who worked it out in the end. There was only one problem. Such a powerful spell needed more than just one to make it work. It needed dozens. Then, after it was cast, it would need a hundred more to keep it going lest it last less than a fortnight.

So the globe was scoured. One hundred of the most powerful beings were rounded up and, willing or not, made to power the spell."

He looks at the drink in my hand and, without needing to be asked, I stand and make one for him. Faerie wine isn't the easiest thing to come by but it also isn't impossible when you know where to look. I always keep a stash for special occasions. Namely, over the holidays when everything is closed and I can't get a good meal. I pour us both a glass and he sips it gratefully.

"They built us a home, of sorts, underground. It had everything we could need. Food, music, books, fineries like the world had never seen. The whole place was bewitched to cater to our every desire. It was to be a paradise. A place we would never want to leave. A place we never could leave."

His fingers clench around his wine glass.

"Some of us were there of our own volition. Some of us wanted nothing more than to keep our people safe. Keep them alive."

"Like you?" I ask.

His eyes meet mine but I can tell they aren't really seeing me.

"Like me," he confirms. "There were others, though, that had not chosen to come. Had been forced to. It did not matter to them that the walls were made of gold or that they could dine on new dishes every night. Imagine! A new meal every night for thousands of years.

But, no. They wanted the lives that they had lived outside of the seal."

He downs his glass and I pour him another. He nods at me gratefully.

"I thought for a time that they would adapt. That they would grow accustomed to their new lives and forget their old ones. And for a time, they did.

But there was a woman, Amaelia."

"The one who escaped?"

"The very same. Amaelia was a spitfire. She always wanted to argue. Politics, philosophy, art, you name it. For a thousand years she was content to read books and argue about their meaning. She would let you choose a stance then, no matter whether she believed it or not, she would take the opposition. Then, one day, something changed. She became... wistful. She began speaking of her life by the ocean. Of her garden and her chickens and her little cottage with its floor that was not quite even. She simply could not get it out of her head. She spoke of it night and day. It got to a point where it was all she could speak of and, when someone tried to speak of other things, she became belligerent.

She was angry. Angrier than usual. Angrier than she had ever been in the past. Angry that she didn't have her garden, her chickens, or her cottage. Angry that she was trapped.

She began to turn others to her cause and soon there was a division with Amaelia leading one group and a vampire named Calina leading the other. When they could not reach an agreement peacefully, Amaelia and her followers turned to violence. They reasoned that if our numbers grew small enough the spell would eventually break and they would be free. So they began killing.

Calina, for her part, was less deadly though no less violent. She came from a line as pure as virgin snow and her sense of duty knew no match. She had made a blood pact with her family to protect the spell at all costs and that was what she did. She did whatever it took, stopping short of taking lives so the spell would not weaken.

Our paradise became a war zone.

I tried to stop the bloodshed. Amaelia and I had been close and, foolishly, I thought that meant something. Perhaps it did since she did not kill me on sight. When it became clear that she was beyond reason I fled back to Calina's camp. Calina was furious at what I had done. She believed me to be colluding with Amaelia and ordered me imprisoned with the other traitors.

What she did not know, what no one knew, was that in helping my father build the seal I had also built secret tunnels and rooms. Places where I could continue to work on a cure in secret. You see, although I had volunteered for the seal I did not want to spend eternity there. I missed my life too, just as Amaelia and her followers did.

So I fled into the walls and hid in my lab. From there I watched as Amaelia's followers murdered and Calina's followers maimed. Each side thought me with the other. I watched them from the walls, doing what I could to prevent the bloodshed without revealing myself and continuing to work on a cure in the hopes that I would be able to release us all from our prison.

They lived like this for years. Back and forth, back and forth, until eventually the two sides were too skilled, too practised, to give an inch. Hundreds of years went by where neither side gained a victory. Calina was content to continue like this but Amaelia... Well, Amaelia became desperate. They had already taken more than two dozen lives and there were no signs of the spell weakening. She wanted her life back now more than ever and, if killing the other side was not sufficient...

She had a garden that she tended. It was not as big or full as the one she'd had by the ocean but she tended to it with love and care and it thrived. She grew things in it that only witches understand and no one ever questioned her about it. Maybe they should have.

By the time I deduced her plan the poisoned wine had already been drunk. They were all dead by morning."

He takes a shuddering breath and, instinctively, I reach for him. Just shy of his arm, I hesitate. It's been a long time since I've offered anyone comfort and I'm not sure I remember how. Instead, I take Snot from my lap and deposit her onto his. She's better at this than I am and his shoulders visibly relax as he runs his hands over her soft black fur.

"Did it work?" I ask softly. "Did the spell break?"

"No." He says. "It didn't."

Frowning, I lean over and refill his glass. "So what happened?"

"When Calina discovered what had happened she came for Amaelia with the full force of her small army. Amaelia had no choice but to surrender. They chained her and beat her for her crimes, feeding her only enough that she did not die.

Ultimately, Amaelia had succeeded, though. With half our original numbers, the magic that kept us hidden had worn away and the seal was eventually discovered then broken by a team of archaeologists searching for tombs. I suppose, in a way, that is exactly what they found."

He stares at the purring lump in his lap. Unsure what to say, I sit in the uncomfortable silence, sipping on my drink. There are so many questions that are running through my head but it feels wrong to ask them when the pain of the memories is written so clearly on his face. One thing is clear, though. Amaelia helping us is out of the question.