"I'm sorry," I said, deep regret in my words. "I would give you the antidote if I had it."

"Would you really?" he asked with a little smile. "A rogue male, injured by his own Queen's hand? How curious. And yet I believe you really would."

"Why did your Queen poison you? Why did you leave?"

He sighed. "Mona Sera is among one of our worst Queens. Those of us she takes in, no other Queen would have. Twenty years with her and I was sick to my very soul. But though she is a bad Queen, she is wise in matters of business and has accumulated vast wealth and power in her dealings with humans. She forces us to sleep with humans in return for concessions she desires in business. Humans are drawn to us by our uncommon beauty, even to the least of us. But we derive no pleasure in return. We are two different species. Our skin does not fill with light when we are with one of them."

"Fill with light?" What was this light thing, I wondered.

"Our hearts are left with emptiness," he continued. "Mona Sera created a caste of comfort women and men for these outside duties."

"Were you one of them?" I asked quietly.

"Yes," he said, shame lacing his voice. "I was one of her comfort men. This last time she sent out my half sister, Sonia, our beloved midwife, as punishment for her recent rebelliousness against this practice. These matings, though joyless and loveless, do bear fruit at times."

"Like me."

"Yes," he nodded, "and it is Sonia's duty to deal with such consequences. She delivers them and abandons them to the humans to keep the purity of our line. She has done so dutifully until her daughter's recent miscarriage from one of these unfortunate unions with humans. Since then, Sonia could no longer look upon the practice of abandonment with detachment and petitioned the Queen to resign from such a task. As punishment, Mona Sera sent Sonia out to sleep with a human male notorious for his twisted enjoyment of sex.