“What’s that?” she asked, snatching it up. Inside, she found fresh bread and a huge chunk of crumbly blue-veined cheese.
“Help yourself,” he said, dropping onto the stool next to the gleaming armor. “This looks better.”
“How was the trip?” she asked through a mouthful of bread.
“Aggravating,” he said. “Uncle Rahul has become a courtier. I’m not even sure he’d fit into his armor anymore. But—”
“Oh, no, no, no,” a small voice said. “This won’t do.”
Magda stopped chewing. She turned to find a tiny woman in a prim gray suit. The brownie’s dark eyes were overly large and her little lips pinched in an critical pucker.
“Are you the Rae?” the brownie asked, looking her up and down. “No, no, no. What has happened to your hair? Is that all you have to wear? Is that your armor?”
Magda resisted the urge to boot the stiff-shouldered creature into the bushes.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Meer,” the brownie stated brusquely, placing her long, delicate fingers on her hips. “Master has sent me to serve you until you are able to establish a household of your own. I knew you’d been exiled from civilization, but I had no idea that I’d find this—” She shook her head. Her wild curls were drawn back severely from her temples, erupting again at her crown and tumbling down her back. They bounced with her every movement, as if seconding each disapproving shake of her head. She snapped her fingers and three smaller brownies appeared, two males and a female, all in trim gray suits with messes of brown hair framing their tiny faces.
“Yes, Miss Meer?” they said in unison.
“The house?”
All three spoke at once.
“It’s a disaster—”
“Dust up to my eyeballs—”
“Linens in tatters—”
Meer clapped her hands twice and they fell silent.
“The house is not as important as its occupants,” she told them. “We accompany the Rae to the Spire shortly. We must prepare the family for court.”
She pointed at the first young man. “Clothing.”
He nodded and disappeared.
To the next she said, “Kitchen.”
He, too, vanished.
She turned to the young woman. “Take the lady and her son in hand. I will see to the house and the Rae.”
“Yes, Miss Meer.” Then the young woman was gone.
Meer turned back to Magda, who had been cleaning out the food from the basket while the brownie had issued instructions to her staff.
“Obviously, you’ve been malnourished during your extended respite in the human wastes.” In a blink she was gone and then back again with another basket, twice as tall as she was. “I will prepare the west bedroom above the library for you, and a bath. Eat and then come up at once. A Rae must sleep ten hours each night or her acuities suffer irreparably. I suppose that explains the hair.”
Before Magda managed a retort, Meer vanished.
Damion smirked. “And there’s that.”
Magda crouched before the second basket. “Meer’s right—”
“About your hair?”
