**Winner, Hugo Awards 2024, Best Novella**

From USA Today bestselling author, T. Kingfisher, comes an original, subversive fairytale about a kind-hearted, toad-shaped heroine, a gentle knight, and a mission gone completely sideways.

On the day of Toadling's birth, she was stolen from her human family by the fairies, but she grew up safe and loved in the warm waters of faerieland. Once an adult, the fae ask a favour of Toadling: return to the human world and offer a blessing of protection to a newborn child.

Centuries later, a knight approaches a towering wall of brambles, where the thorns are as sharp as swords. He's heard there's a curse here that needs breaking, but it's a curse Toadling will do anything to uphold...