Silas nods again and pricks her finger. Three rings wrap around each arm, her skin reddening, and it strikes me that it has never been marked; it is not used to it. She hisses in pain, clenching her teeth.
“Apologies, mistress,” Silas says.
“You are only doing your job.” Kassandra stands and faces me. My heart stops, my throat thickening with emotion.She looks like a faerie.With her small stature and angular face, she looks more like a faerie than I do.
“Your turn,” she says.
I seat myself next to Silas and offer my finger. He pricks and the information scrolls across the page. “Congratulations,” he says. “You have a tip from Lady Kassandra in the amount of five hundred silvers, or five gold coins.”
I choke.
“Would you like to withdraw, apply toward your current balance, or deposit into your…” His voice trails off. My savings account that will be given to my loved ones upon my death.
“Apply to what is left of my Illusion debt,” I say. “Then deposit the remaining, please.”
Silas exhales, relieved in not having to expose our arrangement. When it is time to prick my finger again, I do not want to feel excitement, a lightness in a time like this. Yet as the Reign magic unlatches its hold of my balances, I feel it as much as I seeit.
My rings dwindle to just two on each wrist, the least I’ve ever had. With a cursory glance, I resemble a halfling, especially with my height.
Then it is Death’s turn.
“What do you see when you look at the executioner?” I ask Silas. “If you don’t mind me asking.”
He startles. Death doesn’t move, a hand outstretched to the teller.
“Um,” the halfling stutters, looking down. “Oh, nothing.”
“Please,” Kassandra nudges, brows drawing together. “Who do you see?”
Silas adjusts his glasses, stealing a glance at the executioner. “Apologies, it’s just that you remind me of the first fae I worked under. He was…well, it’s your eyes, you see. They’re violet like his were.”
Gregor the Great.
“How long did you work under him?” I ask.
Silas shifts. “My entire life, until a decade ago. I was…demoted to teller in Illusion when he began his decline—may he wander well—and moved to House Healing for hospice. But before that, I was his valet.”
The air in the room seems to dry up. Kassandra covers her mouth.
“His personal valet?” I gawk.To King Gregor?
“It was an old tradition in House Reign, to have halflings serve as personal valets and ladies-in-waiting for the royal couple. Only when the administration started to transition over to the prince were the faeries brought into those roles. They typically serve the royal children, yes, but never the king and queen.”
Kassandra and I look at each other.
“How’d you end up in Illusion?” she says gently.
He coughs. “The current administration wanted me gone, said I wasn’t young enough to be progressive. But the late king wanted me…taken care of with salary and retirement. It was a favor, really, to the king. A favor granted by the Lynx of the Lowlands.”
Kassandra sucks in a breath. “My father took you in, in exchange for what?”
“I don’t know.” Silas squirms. “I wasn’t allowed in that room.”
“Apologies, we shouldn’t have pried,” I say.
Silas collects his things. “It’s okay. It’s nice to talk about it. My old life.”
Kassandra thanks him and he nods, bowing, and departs. Shegives me a look that I know meansAn in. We might have an in on proving Maxian’s heritage.
