Page 7 of The White Stag
“The bad Seelie prince didn’t like that. His family disowned him and gave his throne to his brother. The disgraced Seelie prince vowed to find the missing princess, raise her like a Seelie, and return to his kingdom. With her by his side, he could take over both kingdoms.”
“Excellent memory. Those stories are true. Alastair Rex is the bad Seelie prince, and you are Reagan Darkclove, the missing Unseelie princess,” Cyrus said.
I just sat there and stared at the Boogeyman. They never used names when they told me these stories. I was looking at a smoke man with glowing red eyes, a hobgoblin making me mac and cheese, and when Oisin wasn’t the White Stag, he was a pale man with long white hair and still had antlers.
I was looking at them clear as day. If I reached out, I could touch them. I could smell the roux Finnan was making for the mac and cheese. All the windows in this cabin were open. There was no central air here, like back at home. I was guessing we were somewhere that didn’t need it. The breeze picked up and blew my hair back, and I could smell the flowers growing outside.
Most of my senses were kicking in like all of this was real, but I didn’t believe Cyrus.
“But I’m human!”
“No, pet, you are just like us. Why do you think you’ve never been afraid of us?” Finnan said.
“How?”
I didn’t get it. Everything I saw when I looked in the mirror was just like every single person I saw on the street. I’d seen them use magic. I didn’t have an ounce of it. If I had, my memories wouldn’t have been messed with. Alastair wouldn’t have been able to control me like that. I wouldn’t feel like I had absolutely no control over my teenage years.
“It’s these fucking pills,” Cyrus growled, slamming the bottle on the table so hard that I jumped.
“Don’t scare her, asshole. You aren’t mad at her. They tricked her into taking them,” Oisin said.
“I’m sorry, Reagan. It’s not you I’m mad at. We told you not to take these when they were first prescribed, and you weren’t going to. You stood up to your foster parents and refused. We didn’t know they were crushing them and hiding them in your pudding cup until it was too late.
“We got you out of there when we found out, but you started to detox on the street. We thought you’d be safe in a different foster home, but the fake diagnosis was already on your chart. They took one look at you and thought youneededthose pills instead of just giving you the time to get them out of your system. You were just a kid, and all you knew was that you felt like shit and wanted it to stop. You took them and felt better, so you continued to take them.
“We were going to get you off them for good and not put you back in the foster system, but Alastair found you. We’re pretty sure he was using your prescription refills to find you.”
“I’m having a hard time believing a doctor prescribed me poison, and any doctor or pharmacist that refilled this prescription didn’t catch that.”
“You never were good at telling stories, you nugget,” Finnan said. “You can’t leave out the important bits because you’re emotional.”
“Those pills aren’t harmful to humans. They are actually pretty damned good for treating anemia. But, unfortunately, you,little princess, are Fae, and iron doesn’t get along with us at all,” Oisin said.
“It’s true,” Cyrus said. “Humans like to tell their female young that little boys only bully them because they secretly have crushes on them. It’s a terrible thing to say to a young girl. But in the Unseelie Court, if a male has awful manners, it’s perfectly acceptable for a female to teach him a lesson.
“One of these schoolyard bullies assaulted you on the playground at school, and you needed stitches. They realized they didn’t have your blood type on file and that you hadn’t had bloodwork done in a long time. We couldn’t stop it because no one knew who we were. We tried to get in and swap your blood with someone else, but it was impossible.
“Fae blood is almost identical to human blood, but it’s entirely devoid of iron. So to a human doctor, it would look like a rare blood disorder where your body doesn’t naturally produce iron, and they would prescribe high levels of iron.
“That’s where things get tricky. The Seelie and Unseelie both do business in the mortal world. The Unseelie generally exports fine liquor. The Seelie have gotten into pharmaceuticals. Most of the Seelie aren’t total stains like Alastair. Their remedies heal humans.
“The prescription iron you are on now treats humans with low iron, but it has different uses in the Fae courts. It’s generally given to prisoners to keep them manageable in prison. It basically renders a Fae mortal. It’s against the law in both courts to give them to children.
“When you hit puberty, your Fae side would have awakened. We would have brought you here, told you the truth, and trained you with whatever powers emerged. Unfortunately, Alastair got to you before that.
“He didn’t just mess with your mind. He stole your birthright by keeping you on these pills. You were meant to be a powerful Unseelie princess, baby girl. You’ve got magic just like we do. Fundamental parts of what you aresupposedto look like after puberty as an Unseelie aren’t here yet. You’re supposed to have pointed ears, sharp teeth, and no Unseelie stays blonde. Your hair could be purple, blue, pink, or green. Those pills took that from you.”
That was honestly a lot. I was so mad, I couldn’t even speak. All of this sounded like a substantial tall tale, but I believed every word of it. If the monsters under my bed were real, then it made a lot of sense that the Fae courts were too. It made sense that Alastair was the evil Seelie prince from their stories. I hadn’t quite processed being the princess from those stories, but what the fuck?
“Tell her what you did to that stupid bully who started all this,” Oisin said.
“Tell the story right if you’re insisting on being the one to tell it,” Finnan said. “This is why Oisin and I always handled bedtime stories.”
“Shut up, Finnan. You were the only one who decided to get extra with cheese and noodles instead of explaining it, since you think you’re better at it.”
“Excuse me? I’m a Bauchan. Hobgoblins are supposed to be extra. This is going to be perfection, and it will go along great with the birthday cake I made.”
“You made me a cake?”
