“And what if I kiss you?”
I ask the question. Hate myself for doing so.
And then wait with a truly reprehensible held breath for her answer.
But it never comes.
She has fallen fully back asleep.
The cuffs are fastened. There is no reason to linger.
Yet I do. Watching her lips. Replaying her mumblings. Letting her unguarded words calcify inside my chest.
And a new idea occurs to me. One that gives me the excuse I need to prolong our end-of-night interaction.
I go to the chest beside my throne to grab the parchment I use to issue orders best not spoken aloud—also some ink and a shadewing feather to write with—before quickly returning to her side to use the stone floor as my writing surface.
Perhaps I should feel weak for indulging this strange instinct to gaze upon her longer than I should.
But the note I pen makes up for all indulgence:
If you wish no further punishment, you will still be here in my sleeping quarters when I wake.
I set the note beside her and rise to my feet, just as the incoming sunsrise renders the world outside my sleeping glass a rosy pink.
After removing my leathers, I let the suns cast me into stone sleep with the certainty that if she somehow manages to undo her cuffs again, that clear threat will keep her in her place.
My clear threatdoes not keep her in her place.
When I uncast at suns’ set, I find her furs empty, without even a trace of body heat.
“Princess…” I intone, pressure building behind my temples like a forming quake.
For the second time in as many morns, I rip open my door to go find the audacious little Eryx Oblation who has dared to defy me.
The Truth About Gardening
SALLIE ROSE
“I do not understandwhy the Mountain Goats get to have all the fun! Why can’t we gravels make beautiful nature jewelry, too?”
Lyxnia, head of the castle staff, demands—apparently speaking for all the fae who watched us work from inside their stone casts all day.
Three shocks greeted me when I crept out of the Stone Fae King’s chamber this morning.
One: A host of about twelve other goats had accompanied Brelliard to help me install the garden I’d heard whispering to me from beneath the bramble the day before.
Two: Commander Skorrin kept his word, assigning a few soldiers to rip out nearly every last bramble. There was now a huge patch of fresh dirt where the nest of vines used to be.
And…
Three: Most of the servant statues I’d had to navigate around yesterday were standing in a huge arc around the place I’d designated for the Bramble Garden this morning.
Honestly, I didn’t know whether to be honored or completely creeped out by all the stone eyes staring down at us as I handed out assignments to the goats.
But with so much to do before my scheduled execution tomorrow night, I decided to go with "honored."
I rolled up the sleeves of the oversized taarhorn knit dress I’d scored off Rinthiah last night and got started on the long list of mother seed spells I’d need to cast if I wanted to get everything in the ground before sneaking back into the king’s chambers at suns’ set.
