Moonvale+The Hawthorn BargainMoonvale+

The Hawthorn Bargain

Twenty years ago you freed a fox from an iron snare. Tonight a fae lord comes to your window to pay his debt.

8–10 min · 4 decisions · 4 endings · headphones on

Start the story to answer him, or hear the first scene right here. The opening is free. Answering him needs Plus or Gold, or one of your Starter unlocks.

When you were eight, you cut a fox out of an iron snare in the hawthorn wood. It was not a fox. Twenty years later, on Midsummer's Eve, a fae lord with cat-bright eyes and very good manners is standing at your open window, because his kind cannot lie and cannot leave a debt unpaid. He walks you through the wood to the hill, teaches you the rules (eat nothing, thank no one, and mind every word), and gives you the count that opens the door. Then, in front of the whole court, he asks you to name your boon, and he will grant exactly what you say, not what you mean. Choose whether to invite him in, how to word your wish, whether you remember the count when the music closes around you, and what you say at dawn. A regal, candlelit, slightly dangerous fae romance for headphones. Four decisions, four endings (one of them a Gold bonus).

Read the opening

There you are. No, don't scream. If you scream, your neighbour wakes up, and he comes out with that iron poker of his, and then I have to be rude to him. I'd rather not be rude tonight. You don't remember me. That's alright. You were very small. Eight summers old... barefoot in the hawthorn wood. And there was a fox, caught in an iron snare. You cut it free with your mother's sewing scissors. Your hands were shaking the whole time. And when the fox was loose, it looked back at you... and it wasn't a fox anymore. That was me. My kind can't lie. And we can't leave a debt unpaid. It sits in us like a splinter. I've carried yours for twenty years. It's Midsummer's Eve. The hill is open. I've come to pay. So. You may climb out to me... or you may ask me in. Choose carefully, little one. Everything you say to me tonight counts.

Your turn: “He waits beyond the open window, moonlight on his shoulders.”

This is the free opening, word for word. Hear it above, or start the story to answer him.