Lex’s announcement caused everyone to start talking at once.

“You can’t be serious.” Despite looking like she was on the verge of fainting, Spinner nevertheless managed to give Lex a flabbergasted look. “You’re telling me that Woodsy’s getting divine spells – the exclusive province of the gods – from faeries like her?”

She nodded at the danthienne still held captive in Lex’s aura, who was still struggling to free herself. “I don’na be havin’ nothin’ to do wit non’a that!” she yelped. “The pact ‘tween the Eldest of the Wyld and the druids is non’a me business, it ain’t!”

“We shouldn’t be talking about this!” moaned Woodheart, sinking down to her belly and placing her hooves over her head, ears folded back as though simply listening to what was being said was painful. “These are sacred mysteries! Speaking of them to outsiders could get me permanently banished from the forest!”

Littleknight meeped softly, raising a paw to pat her head.

“A druid,” spat Branwen, giving Woodheart a contemptuous look before turning her gaze toward Lex. “You hold the Autumnal Insignia that Queen Penelope personally bestowed upon you, and yet you allowed a druid into your encampment?”

The scornful tone in her voice made Nisha’s hackles rise, baring her teeth as she stood up and gave the armored figure a dark look.

“I don’t know who you think you are ‘Branwen,’” she growled. “But no one talks to Master like that!”

“I agree with my Younger Sister,” added Mei Li calmly as she stood up, giving Branwen a frown as she fanned her tails out behind her. “For a concubine to speak so disrespectfully-”

“Concubine?!” echoed Shadow as she looked at Lex. “Having four wives wasn’t enough for you?!”

Valor winced at the indignation in her friend’s voice. “I really don’t think that’s what we should be focused on right now, Shadow!”

“All of you, calm down.”

Lex’s command came with a violent realignment of the room’s feng shui, causing everyone there to gasp in unison. In an instant, the mere idea of speaking out of turn was enough to send a mixture of intense unease and profound awkwardness through them all, able to intuit a sudden change in the atmosphere despite (save only for Mei Li) not knowing what it was.

But for Lex, it was enough that they’d all fallen silent, with even the danthienne having ceased to struggle in his telekinetic grasp as he looked at Branwen again. “Tell me everything you know about the Wyld fey.”

The vildravn hesitated for the briefest instant, but the same ineffable sensation that had pressed her to keep quiet urged her to speak now, and she acquiesced to it a moment later.

“The Wyld is the name given to all fey who are neither Seelie nor Unseelie,” she murmured, crossing her gauntleted arms in front of her plate mail. “Whereas the two Great Courts are each made up of allied factions, united by their mutual opposition to each other, the Wyld have never been unified. Their ranks are made up of exiles, outcasts, those of an independent spirit, and others who are unwanted or unwilling to join the Seelie or Unseelie.”

“And what of their relationship with mortal druids?” pressed Lex.

In fact, he didn’t need to ask the question aloud, his foresight telling him what Branwen was going to say before she knew she was going to say it. But there was another reason to vocalize what he wanted to know, and it was made manifest as Woodheart squirmed in place, his inquiry heightening her agitation.

“I...I should go...” she murmured, cringing at how saying even that much moved her in opposition to the flow of feng shui. “I can’t think...about this...around you...”

Looking as though she wanted to crawl out of her skin, she nevertheless scooped up Littleknight and took a step toward the door-

You don’t need to force yourself, interrupted Lex telepathically before she went any further. Your religious vows will remain unsullied if you stay.

She gulped, and although the direction of feng shui didn’t affect her thoughts, she still hesitated to reply. But just hearing this is making me think about the sacred mysteries I was taught, and you’re reading my mind! she protested. Even if I’m not telling you voluntarily, it’s still a violation of the vows I took!

No, corrected Lex. It’s not.

I...don’t understand.

Ignoring the confused looks that the others were giving him as he raised the Autumnal Insignia toward Woodheart, Lex continued. This emblem is proof that I am a high-ranking member of the Autumn Court, which is the second-strongest faction of the Unseelie. Branwen said that the fey are your patrons; do your vows prevent you from speaking of your sacred mysteries to them?

Her eyes widening as she looked at the metallic leaf floating above his claw, Woodheart slowly shook her head. No. Only the Old Tongue – the language we use for our rites and festivals – is forbidden to be taught to anyone who hasn’t taken druidic vows. We can discuss our religion in general with the fey...and honorary fey, I guess.

By itself, that answer was all he needed. Yet Lex could hear in the thoughts of her friends their awareness of her still looking uncomfortable, and querying several different futures quickly turned up why: even if she wasn’t violating her oath, Woodheart still felt uneasy about Branwen and the danthienne potentially revealing things she’d have preferred remain secret.

The obvious answer was to send Fail Forward and his wives away and speak to the fey women alone, but Lex found himself eschewing that possibility. He still had more that he wanted to ask the earth mares, and his foresight told him that neither Mei Li nor Nisha wanted to leave him for fear of his having another emotional breakdown.

Fortunately, there was an easy alternative to sending everyone away.

Would you prefer if I spoke to Branwen telepathically so that her answers remained private?

Her eyes widened at the show of consideration. You’re willing to do that? Just to make me more comfortable?

Yes.

That was enough to earn him a small smile from the druid, hugging Littleknight to her chest. Thank you.

Under other circumstances, Lex would have gruffly told her that he didn’t want her gratitude, forcefully asserting that his actions were undertaken because they were the right thing to do rather than because he cared about earning goodwill.

But in truth, Woodheart’s goodwill was something he cared about.

After having almost killed her – having struck her with the necromantic mask in an ill-considered attempt to kill Toklo back when he and Fail Forward had been traversing the wilderness – several days before he’d become a titan, Lex knew that he’d wronged the druid. Going out of his way to soothe her troubled mind now, when the conversation had turned to topics that she was otherwise forbidden to speak of, was the very least he could do for her.

As far as apologies went, Lex knew that it was wholly inadequate, but to ignore her discomfort would only have compounded the shame he felt over what had happened.

And with Kara’s revelation about himself still weighing heavily on his mind, more shame was the last thing he wanted.

Turning back to Branwen, Lex bit back a sigh, forcing himself to focus. Tell me about the Wyld fey’s relationship with mortal druids.

That depends on which Wyld fey you’re talking about, shot back the vilderavn, clearly picking up on his desire to make their conversation private, as well as how she had more freedom to speak her thoughts telepathically. I told you, they’re not a unified group. And even if they were, I’m an Unseelie of the Autumn Court; they don’t talk to me.

Then tell me about those “Eldest” that the danthienne mentioned.

She shifted in place at that, letting out a slow breath as though she’d been expecting that.

The Eldest is the title given to the most powerful of the Wyld fey. Supposedly, they’re called that because the several of their number predate the split between the Seelie and Unseelie. They’re basically titans in their own right, and are rumored to have power on par with gods, though it’s not like anyone’s ever put that to the test. Although they’re not coordinated like the factions within the Seelie and Unseelie are, there are all sorts of rumors that they’re the reason why the two Great Courts don’t force the rest of the Wyld fey to pick a side.

How many of them are there?

Of the Eldest? There’s at least a dozen that I know of, but with how the Wyld fey prefer to stay away from the Great Courts – fraternizing with one side tends to invite retaliation from the other – there might be more. Or less, if some of them have died and word hasn’t gotten around.

That was enough to give Lex pause.

He’d met exactly two fey titans so far, those being Penelope La Gard of the Autumn Court and Gwynharwyf of the Llys Seren. The former hadn’t been very strong at all, which was apparently reflective of her faction’s power being at a low ebb, while the latter had been mighty enough to stop him in his tracks. And it was likely that the leaders of the Summer and Winter Courts – the most powerful bodies in the Seelie and Unseelie, respectively – were even stronger than Gwynharwyf.

But even if these “Eldest” were only as powerful as Penelope, a dozen of them would be enough to definitively tip the balance of power in favor of whoever they joined forces with. Which was reason enough to allow the Wyld fey to exist as an unaligned third group apart from the two Great Courts.

That he hadn’t known about them at all – the Wyld fey having been mentioned nowhere in the Libram of Ineffable Damnation, nor having come up in the thoughts of the fey he’d ravished during his debauched meeting with Adagio’s creditors – was a disconcerting discovery, considering that his status as a marquis of Autumn meant that he was now involved in fey politics.

But the idea that they were supplying spells to mortals was far more disturbing.

Just mentioning that was enough to make Lex recall Odin’s cryptic hint about how it was possible for titans to grant spells to their followers. Was this what the one-eyed god had been referring to? Was his awareness of so-called “fate” so great that he’d known that this topic would come up?

It was preposterous to think so, but it was equally preposterous that he could have known about Long Road, and yet he had.

As far as the druids go, I don’t know any details about who started it or why, but everyone in the Great Courts – and if this danthienne is any indication, most of the Wyld fey – assumes that they work for the Eldest, continued Branwen.

Why?

The vilderavn shrugged. Because druids worship nature, and the cycle of seasons – which keeps the strongest of the Seelie and Unseelie factions locked in a stalemate – is central to that. Which is why they're no friends of the Unseelie in general or Queen Penelope in particular.

And are the druids the only mortal agents the Eldest supply with spells?

Have you not heard how I’ve been saying, over and over, that I don’t know anything about them for sure? snapped Branwen. Everything I’ve told you is third- and fourth-hand! All of it could be wrong, or outdated, or missing crucial pieces of information! I’d say you’d have better luck interrogating that little green wench, but danthiennes are busybodies who only care about trading rumors for jewels and finery, so good luck figuring out if anything she has to say is reliable!

She continued to rant, but Lex ceased to pay attention, turning his thoughts toward another individual:

Brightrose.

Fireflower’s brother, Brightrose was an aranea – a magic-using spider-pony – who, like the rest of his siblings, had been accidentally brought to Everglow along with the dragon that had attacked Tall Tale.

Unlike his siblings, however, Brightrose had healing magic, which was the only reason Lex had survived his battle with the monster that had planned to devour Tall Tale’s ponies.

But what he’d never learned was exactly where Brightrose’s healing magic came from.

At the time, Lex had been aware that arcane spellcasting wasn’t capable of utilizing healing magic. Not without developing an incredibly complex thaumaturgical array of instructions that would have required an exceptionally strong mental architecture to utilize, something Brightrose hadn’t exhibited. And yet it couldn’t have come from a god either, since through his relationship with the Night Mare, Lex knew that a god required either mortals to grant them access to a world – which required a dedicated body of active worshipers to set up – or a champion imbued with their power to personally venture there and act as a relay in order to give a worshiper spells.

Neither of those things were true for Brightrose, which begged the question of how he had healing magic at all?

With the rescue of Vanhoover having loomed so large in his mind at the time, Lex hadn’t been able to investigate the answer to that question, eventually hypothesizing that Brightrose was a divine spellcaster. More specifically, that he’d prepared a number of healing spells from whatever god he’d worshiped back on Everglow, with no way to replenish them now that he was in Equestria.

It wasn’t a good hypothesis, but with no better ideas, it had been the best idea he’d been able to come up with.

Now, however, Lex had a new hypothesis, one with far more unsettling implications.

The araneas had been, according to Fireflower, forest-dwellers before coming to Everglow, living in the wilderness in a manner akin to what Fail Forward had said about Woodheart’s druidic order. If Brightrose was receiving divine magic from one of the Eldest – or some other fey with titan-levels of power – then it was possible that his patron now knew where Equestria was.

And since they weren’t a god, they wouldn’t need any sort of special requirements to be fulfilled in order to direct more of their power there.

And while Mihr was leading a blockade of Equestria against planar intruders, Lex had no idea if it would prove effective against fey powers. Or even if the archangel would bother to enforce it against them; with his narrowminded focus on numinous gradients, it was entirely possible that Mihr approve of a fey titan’s presence if they didn’t exude overt malevolence.

Which meant that the need to return home with all possible haste was even more dire than Lex had realized.

Because for all I know, the fey are there already.

Author's Note

Learning about the Wyld fey, and the Eldest who are their faction’s titans, Lex realizes that they might already be on Equestria!

Is he right about where Brightrose gets his magic from? Would Mihr really let the fey through the blockade?