“Did you just touch her dress?” demanded a shrill voice.
Demelza pushed through the crowd and saw a pink-haired beauty surrounded by a tight knot of girls. Plenty of girls were beautiful. But none of them had the bearing of a queen like this one. It was something in the slight arch of her brow and the simmering indifference in her gaze. Her rosebud mouth was set in a haughty pout.
Beside her was an Aatos Mountain girl. Demelza recognized her by the snowy down of her hair, which the girl kept closely cropped. Her eyes were a pale blue and she might have been striking if it wasn’t for the sycophantic expression. She was the one who had yelled at someone for touching the dress of the pink-haired beauty.
“Does anyone even have a chance with Lady Edmea here?” asked a girl beside Demelza.
Demelza turned and saw a tall, lovely girl with floppy rabbit ears that were nearly indiscernible in the fall of her brown hair. She flashed a gap-toothed grin.
“I’m Zizorelle,” said the girl. “What’s your name?”
“Demelza.”
“That’s pretty! Are you from the Wylds? I can’t tell beneath the, uh, mud.”
“No, I’m not,” said Demelza. She nodded in the direction of the pink-haired girl. “What did you say her name was?”
Zizorelle’s eyes widened. “You don’t recognize her?”
“No,” said Demelza. “I… I don’t get out much.”
Zizorelle had the kindness not to express her lack of surprise.
“That’s Lady Edmea,” she said. “Her father owns half the Vale of Sylke and has some of the best sylke tailors in his employ. Her mother was the Countess Erda. The beauty of her generation and all that. Her first life ended while Edmea was still a child but then she came back as a cherry tree and you know what she started growing?”
“… Cherries?”
“Dresses,” said Zizorelle, sighing in envy. “The most gorgeous dresses you could imagine. My cousin’s husband’s sister managed to get one for her wedding day and it was mesmerizing. They said the fabric was woven from the lovelorn sighs of teenage girls. The way it sparkled! I thought it was diamonds but later my cousin told me it was the tears of happy brides.” Zizorelle had a dreamy look in her eyes before she glanced longingly at Edmea. “She looks like a queen already, doesn’t she?”
“She does,” said Demelza. “Though I wonder if she’s here for the right reasons… The prince is looking for love.”
Zizorelle sighed again. “The prince! He’s handsome, isn’t he? At first I didn’t have a chance to say anything other than ‘hello’ when we were introduced and I was so nervous on the boat that I was off in a corner reciting a poem my mother used to tell me and he recognized it! It was so sweet, honestly… and have you noticed his ears? I like that they stick out a bit. And the way he said some of the couplets from the poem! You’ve probably not heard of it, it was written some time ago by the warren people of the Ulva Wyldes and is about this rabbit boy and his teeth that won’t stop growing—”
“‘The Tale of the Teeth’ by Harlan Zajac?” asked Demelza.
Zizorelle stared at her. “You are the second person this evening to know what I’m talking about! How could you possibly know of it?”
“I like to read,” said Demelza. She made a note not to leap to show off like that again. It would only raise questions that she wasn’t sure how to answer.
“But it’s written and spoken in the old dialect of the water hares…” said Zizorelle, and her gaze narrowed. “Where did you say you were from again?”
Demelza was spared answering by the ringing of a giant bell. On the grand dining table, a fox-faced attendant wearing a jacket of pearls suddenly appeared. He cleared his throat and the crowd fell silent.
“Dear contestants, we hope you enjoy your first evening of the tournament. Perhaps you have even made friends—”
Lady Edmea snorted. “I’m not here to make friends.”
Some of the girls next to her looked crestfallen. The fox-faced attendant continued:
“Please be advised that contestants are generally discouraged from removing one another from the competition. If you are caught, the Isle shall remove you from the premises.” The fox smiled. “If you are not caught, the Isle shall judge you favorably.”
A flock of birds erupted from the shadows and a few ofthe contestants screamed. But they were not birds, but keys. One dropped into Demelza’s hand and began to hop along her arm while shaking out its feathers.
“The keys will guide you to your chambers, which you shall be sharing with other contestants. We hope you find your accommodations to your liking,” said the fox. He clapped his hands and the lights dimmed as the girls took to the stairs, guided to their rooms by the winged keys. “Tomorrow, the trial of talent shall commence. For some of you this will be your first and last night in Rathe Castle. Be ready.”
13A Bear and a Bargain
Demelza expected that the rooms would be an extension of the mushroom residence’s pale grandeur. What she did not expect was to open the door and immediately see a massive bear holding a piece of cake. The bear looked at Demelza, looked at the cake and then shoved the cake immediately into its mouth.
