Dangerous silence fell. Briar risked a glance at Eliam, but his expression remained still stone and equally as unreadable.
"Attachment suggests choice," he said finally. "I merely maintain my property until it serves its purpose."
"And then?"
"Then it ends. As all mortal things do."
The casual discussion of her death made her stomach turn. She set down her spoon carefully, afraid she'd be sick if she continued eating.
The second course materialized producing an unrecognizable meat that bled golden ichor when cut. The smell made her eyes water, sweet and rotten at once. This time there were three knives to choose from, each wickedly sharp.
She hesitated too long.
"This is ridiculous," Lady Sarelle said. "Shall we watch it fumble through every course? How tedious."
"Perhaps a demonstration would help," the bark-skinned fae suggested. "Show it how civilized beings dine."
"Or," Eliam said, voice cutting through their amusement, "we could acknowledge that expecting human table manners to translate to fae custom is deliberately absurd."
"Then why bring it at all?" Lady Sarelle challenged. "If it can't manage basic etiquette—"
"Because I wished to." He rose from his seat with fluid grace. "And because watching you all pretend superiority over a creature you're clearly threatened by amuses me."
"Threatened?" The golden skinned fae laughed. "By that?"
"Why else would you work so hard to see it fail, Lord Tamiel?" Eliam moved down the table toward Briar. "Unless you're afraid of what it means that a human survived where fae have died?"
He stopped beside her chair, one hand settling on her shoulder. The touch was light but commanding.
"The third knife," he said quietly. "Cut twice, horizontal, then vertical. Eat only the center piece."
She followed his instructions, trying to ignore how every eye tracked her movements. The meat tasted of honey and copper, coating her throat with sweetness that bordered on pain.
"Better?" he asked the table at large. "Or shall I continue teaching basic lessons while you pretend not to watch?"
"We're merely curious, majesty…," Lady Sarelle said, but something in her tone had shifted. "After all, your last human barely lasted a week."
"My last human tried to burn down the east wing." His hand tightened slightly on Briar's shoulder. "This one has proven more... adaptable."
The third course arrived at last, fruit that changed color when touched. Briar didn't even try to determine which implement to use. She sat still, waiting, hating herself for it.
"Pathetic," someone whispered.
Rage flared hot in her chest. These creatures who'd never known helplessness, who'd never been stripped of choice, dared judge and mock her? Her hands clenched around her napkin hard enough to hurt.
Eliam must have felt the tension in her because his thumb pressed in warning where it still rested against her back. When she looked up at him, his expression was sharp with something that might have been concern.
Or calculation.
"The fruit requires no utensils," he said. "But only eat the flesh that turns silver. The gold is toxic to mortals."
She reached for a piece that looked safe, but he caught her wrist.
"No. That one attempted to seduce a king once. It remembers." He selected different fruit, setting it on her plate. "This."
"How sweet," Lady Sarelle purred. "It needs such careful tending. Like a delicate flower. Or a particularly slow child."
The bark-skinned fae laughed. "Remember the human who ate the remembering fruit? It spent three days reliving every humiliation of its life."
