I shift, feeling the damp sheets. Soaked, actually. I’ll need to bathe before tonight’s service. Yet as I sit up, the smell hits me, the putrid, unnatural stink lingering beside the sweat and piss of my night terrors. But it’s more than that. It’s a marshy odor of salt and corpses. I rip the sheets away from the bed.
It smells of swamp. My magical marker has never been so strong, as if in neglecting my genius, I am letting it fester. I need to air it out.
That night, Kassandra dismisses me, my pungent presence giving her a headache. My last night in Illusion for two moons, and I sit in my room alone with a bucket. My genius reaches out to the water in the bucket, whispering its request.
The water rises, dripping and lopsided, before taking shape. Ithink of the lessons Eli demanded of Kassandra, the little birds and bats and butterflies. My genius morphs the water into tighter creatures that begin to resemble moths. They fill the air, multiplying, and flit around the room.
It’s not enough.
It hurts, keeping it all in, and I don’t have the strength to be small anymore. So I do what I do when I can no longer follow my mother’s instructions. I follow my father’s.
Teeth clenched, I press into a push-up so deep my nose touches the cold stone. Up and down, up and down, up and down. A burn builds in the muscles in my arms, my back, my core. The moths circle me in a torrent, raindrops splattering my back and limbs. My genius feeds the root magic, unfolding and flourishing. I do not stop when sweat gathers on my brow. Not when breath comes quick and tendons quiver. Not when my jaw aches and salty tears drip to the stone, mingling with droplets of water. Faster and faster the creatures whirl. Harder and harder I push up and down until my name is forgotten and dawn cracks across the solitary bedroom window. Only then do I and the creatures collapse.
Gasping, I lie prone on the wet floor, clothes soaked. When my pulse finally calms and air comes more easily, I gather myself.
The Illusion kitchens are quiet, save for the occasional line cook moving between storage and ice rooms and the long counters. In the moments they move out, I dart in, snagging what pieces I can. Apples, a hunk of cheese, bread, a handful of broccoli. Little by little, I fill a sack until it’s bulging, then bring it to the bloodstain in the tunnels.
I’ll miss whatever Unluckie visits tomorrow, but that doesn’t mean they have to miss out on meals. Next week, I’ll have to figure out what to do, but that’s a problem for later. I just need to get through hour by hour, day by day.
My palm presses the bloodstained brick framed by roots.
“I miss you, Mama,” I say. “Take care of Jeremee for me.”
When I leave, my hand is wet not with blood but with the tears I scrub away.
—
The following evening,a Reign Crest faerie comes to my room to collect me, giving me a gold tunic uniform that is smooth and slippery to the touch.Silk.I’ve only handled the material a few times when dressing Kassandra. But this silk is my own now, and I should feel elated to don the same material as the High Fae. A mark of my status as the most noteworthy of faeries—a Reign Crest. The best of the least. It feels like a cruel joke.
“Are you all right?” the faerie in front of me asks. She introduces herself as Lila. With mahogany eyes, coiled hair, and deep bronze skin, she appears like a celestial being in her golden uniform. The shirt is cropped at her taut midriff, the loose pants cinched at the ankle. It doesn’t surprise me that the other faerie I’ll be working alongside is exceptionally beautiful.
“Just wondering how to clean this,” I say. “Such a delicate fabric for a servant.”
“Oh!” She smiles. “Lemon juice in warm water, and dab the stains. The night shift for the House of Reign is different work. The day servants take care of most of the cleaning. We serve and entertain.” My stomach clenches, and she gestures to the uniform. “Come on, let’s get you changed and give the oath so we can be on our way.”
My arm burns at the memory of Briar dragging the silver feather across skin.
“Won’t that bloody the clothes? Not sure how to scrub out a large stain like that,” I say, mouth dry.
Lila’s eyes widen. “Large stain?”
“For the oath?”
“Planes above, no!” She searches my face. “Each House has a different form of the blood oath. House of Reign requires just a few pinpricks.”
So House Illusion chose for the bond to be that brutal.
I spot a figure hovering outside my bedroom. Briar peers inside, her face tight.
“I wanted to say goodbye,” she says. My heart deflates. Another consequence of the separation, another way for Dominik to punish us all.
“I’m sorry to leave you,” I say.
“You will return.”
I face Lila. “May I?”
Lila nods, and I pass her the uniform, then meet Briar in the hallway and throw my arms around her. She squeaks in surprise, her strong arms wrapping around my waist.
