One story's ending is just another's beginning...The Fairy Queen has fallen, doomed with a mortal heart, and the eld woman's two dearest friends, the Lady of the Glade and the Goblin King, are now wed, whole and happy. But even happy endings come with consequences, and for the eld woman, life has changed irrevocably. Mortality now hangs over her like a shroud, and her entire world has been turned on its head by a broken little boy newly returned from Faerie. Ill portents fill the air, the seasons themselves seem out of step, and it might be that she has been very, very much mistaken about a certain roguish phooka she thought she knew so well.This is a story of found family and love finally realized; a thoughtful tale of magic and choices and the consequences that come with both. It is also a story about someone often seen in fairy tales, though rarely celebrated. She is called by many different names: henwife, spaewife, wise woman, witch. She is the herb woman who gives the heroine just what is needed to escape her fate. The old woman in the cottage at the edge of a dark wood who advises the hero on which path to take. She is the giver of good advice and the keeper of secret knowledge. The wise crone who guides the maiden, helping her win love and happiness. She is not the one who finds love and happiness herself... but why shouldn't she be?Though this story can stand on its own, it will be much more enjoyable (and make a great deal more sense) if you have read the first book in this series, Lumina and the Goblin King.