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Aereth ran happily through the trees, pausing to take the strange fruits they offered and cramming them whole in her mouth. The more she ate, the stronger she felt, and the less she seemed to remember about the other world she had come from, the one with all the women in armor, and the sorceress . . . the sorceress with the warm blue eyes. The sorceress gave her the most pause, but she ignored the feeling and kept stuffing her face with food.
Eventually, Aereth came upon a group of fairies all sitting in a crowded circle, gazing down at something that was apparently very amusing. Her mother, the fairy queen, was among them, sitting on a tree root throne that was draped in a cloak of flowers. She looked very pleased by something. So did the rest of the fairies, who were hooting and laughing.
Aereth brightened and ran to Queen Anindel, flopping in her lap. The queen laughed girlishly at this and kissed Aereth on the cheek. “There you are, my little one!” she said, which made Aereth happy as she crammed more fruit in her mouth and swung her legs.
The fairy queen began to stroke Aereth’s hair. “Did you have a pleasant time with Nimwe?”
Nimwe was a fairy woman who had been tasked with watching over Aereth when the fairy queen could not. She was of a greater size than most fae, as Anindel was, and not tiny like the winged fae who flitted about, giggling and making mischief. Nimwe stood at four feet tall, with pointed ears and a pretty smile. She was a beautiful woman, with tiny feet and hands, and long white hair and bright blue eyes, eyes that reminded Aereth of . . . someone. Nimwe’s heavy breasts were full of the sweetest milk, and she fed Aereth from them whenever the child pleased, often stroking Aereth’s hair as she gazed down upon her.
Aereth had been with Nimwe for hours before finding the fairy queen again. Sitting under a tree, Nimwe had told her strange stories of other realms, stories of unicorns and demons, of the gods and goddesses. Aereth had listened enrapt, but Nimwe had fallen asleep against the tree, and so Aereth had left her there.
“Nimwe tells good stories,” said Aereth, “but she’s always napping.”
“Breastfeeding and chasing you about exhausts her, I suspect,” answered Queen Anindel. “I placed a spell on her to fill her breasts with milk for you. The magick is draining her.”
“You placed a spell on Nimwe for me?” Aereth asked in surprise.
The fairy queen laughed. “As if I would breastfeed you myself! No, let some other woman carry that sweet burden.”
Aereth made a face. “But I don’t need breastmilk!” she protested and crammed another plump fruit into her mouth.
“Tis a special breastmilk,” said the fairy queen lovingly and continued to stroke Aereth’s hair. “It shall bind you to this realm, so that you can never truly be taken from me!”
Aereth didn’t know what to say to that. “What do you mean, Mother?”
“I mean you shall always return here!” said the fairy queen happily and hugged Aereth tight from behind.
Aereth frowned. “Shall I leave?”
“Oh, yes,” said the fairy queen sadly. “You see, a powerful sorceress has come to take you away—”
“But I don’t wanna go!” cried Aereth at once and turned in the woman’s lap to face her.
The fairy queen seemed pleased by that. “Yes, child, I know. But you can always return here if you please. Nimwe’s breastmilk will see to that. You shall never lose your tie to us!”
Aereth didn’t feel comforted by the fairy queen’s words, even if they did seem sincere. She turned back around and glumly stuck more fruit in her mouth.
There was a sudden cheer from the fairies gathered nearby, and Aereth realized they were looking through a window in the floor. Aereth slid off the fairy queen’s lap and pushed her way to the front of the crown, where she knelt down and peered through the window.
There were people on the other side, and they were lying in a flower field far below. They were naked. Aereth thought she recognized the one lying her back. She had long golden curls and her breasts were large. They heaved as a second woman – quite muscular and tall – sucked hungrily upon the golden hair between her thighs.
The woman on her back seemed to be in a helpless daze of ecstasy. She was gasping and blushing and screaming louder and louder, the hair tumbling in her face. Eventually, she thrust her great breasts to the sky, her slender belly trembled, and she cried out, staring above with unseeing eyes. The fairies cheered greatly at this.
Aereth was puzzled. The blonde woman seemed so familiar . . . And she couldn’t imagine what was so amusing about all the screaming and wiggling about.
“You shall do that one day with Nimwe,” said the fairy queen, leaning down and gathering Aereth in her slender arms. She carried Aereth away, and as they went, the trees began to form an avenue of pillars either side of them, leaning in to shield the fairy queen from the sudden light rain. Queen Anindel was carrying Aereth on her hip as the branches of a tree twisted around, forming a stair for her to climb. Fairy lights bobbed around them on the air as they rose higher and higher. They were heading for the queen’s bedroom.
“I shall do that with Nimwe?” said Aereth, face twisting. “Why?”
“When you are a woman, yes,” said the fairy queen. “I think you shall quite enjoy it. Did our guest not look happy?”
“No, she seemed . . .” Aereth couldn’t find the word. “She seemed confused,” she said at last. “She kept frowning and screaming and blushing. Why should I wish to do that?”
Queen Anindel seemed amused by that. “Oh, you shall wish it.”
They came at last to the queen’s bedroom, which was little more than a cluster of furniture standing in the cradle of the tree’s branches. There was a four-poster bed with a green coverlet, a nightstand, a desk with books piled across it, and in the center of the “room,” a throw rug that was green to match the coverlet. Here, fairy lights floated through the air like large fireflies, and Aereth wiggled down from Queen Anindel’s grasp to chase them.
Looking sleepy and quite pleased with herself, Queen Anindel removed her crown of twigs and let it fall, so that several small winged fairies caught it mid-air for her and bore it away. She went to the bed and sat on the foot of it, summoned her brush from the nightstand (it flew into her hand), and began to brush her long blonde hair, humming as she did so.
Aereth eventually grew bored of chasing the fairy lights and turned, looking for something else to entertain her. The fairy queen’s bedroom was full of pretty trinkets and baubles she had never been allowed to touch, all of them made of glowing crystals, wood, and gold.
There was a great crystal ball on a wooden pedestal. It sat there like a giant soap bubble, gleaming an innocent purple in the dim light of dusk. Aereth had been trying to get her hands on it since she’d been there, but the fairy queen had scolded her away the first time, and every time since, Anindel had been too fast and too sharp for Aereth to get at it.
Aereth was determined to have her curiosity sated, however, and was always looking for new opportunities to approach the giant orb. It glowed so gently, beckoning, humming with power, calling to her. She had to touch it, look at it, see what was in its crystal depths. But how? Perhaps she could create a distraction. She had a funny feeling she had played this game before, with another adult, in what seemed like another lifetime.
“Aereth,” Queen Anindel called in a sing-song voice, drawing Aereth’s attention away from the crystal ball. When Aereth looked up, the fairy queen was patting the bed beside her. “Bedtime, I think,” she said.
Aereth moaned irritably but crawled up into the four-poster bed as she was bid.
“There, there,” said the fairy queen, stroking Aereth’s hair. “Dream, child. Dream of Falcon Knights and old elven witches . . .”