8. If you mean how we speak the same language, I’m not sure. We (fae) have an ancient Mother Tongue that is rarely taught anymore, but the Common Tongue is consistent throughout the four fae realms… and apparently wherever you are from.
9. It is better for Kalshana, its people, and me.
10. Ah, my precious human. You are like a snowdrop—so clever, so beautiful, so full of life-saving secrets, but also terribly dangerous. I haven’t spoken this answer aloud to even an empty room. I wouldn’t dare put it on a paper, even for my confusingly brave wife.
I read it three times.
I’d come over here with another question in mind, but his answers made me completely forget it. The fact that he’d taken the time to respond to my questions when I hadn’t expected it filled my whole mind with a rush of emotion. And then he’d called me so manythings—precious, clever, beautiful, life-saving, and brave. A lump snagged in my throat, and I swallowed hard to get rid of it. I had not been called so many sweet things since I’d been a child.
Of course, he also threw inconfusinganddangerous.
It left me with too many feelings to figure out on an empty stomach. Instead of trying to analyze it all, I added one more question under his list:
What is a snowdrop?
Chapter 14: Bylur
Islipped into my new study while most of the visiting fae nobles reveled in the dinner my staff provided for them. But I was not alone. Dedalus sat in the chair at my desk, whittling. He scraped soft wood off a small block and let it fall to the rug on my floor.
I’d almost relaxed—we’d had an unspoken alliance for decades, united by similar miseries in our pasts and goals for our future. I’d expected him to come to me to solidify our houses for years, but he hadn’t openly told the court that he supported me.
And now he dropped trash on my floor. That was an aggressive power move, so I unfurled my magic, letting shadows flow off me. When the tendrils of my power reached Dedalus’s feet, they curled around the scraps of wood on the floor.
He slid his knife into a sheath on his waist, stood up, and dusted more shavings off his trousers and onto the floor.
So that’s how he wanted to play this?
I stepped closer and kept my voice deceptively even. “I see you’ve found my new study.”
He matched my tone. “Why did you move down here? Are you trying to hide from us?”
I stepped closer. “Surely you heard I’m married now. It seemed appropriate to give the room attached to my quarters to my wife.”
And there went his self-control. He fisted the little block of wood. “I’ve never liked political games, Bylur.” He snarled my name like we were children about to start a fistfight.
He usually managed to act more restrained. I didn’t know where this was coming from, but I wasn’t opposed to discussing it. “I’ve never liked them either, but playing them is unfortunately essential for survival.”
A vein bulged on the side of his neck. “I’ve never played. Since our parents died, I’ve always been perfectly clear that my house would support you. I was happy to let you direct the kingdom. Because—” He hit his fist on the table. “I trusted you.”
I raised a brow. “Trusted? That doesn’t sound very fae of you.”
“I was tired of things that sounded fae,” he growled. “Power games. Political schemes. Assassinations. War. I got nothing out of it all except for dead family. Like you. I thought you understood that. I thought you wanted to change it.”
He stalked up to me, close enough that I could have unsheathed the knife on his belt. “I would have given you every soldier you asked for. Any money you needed to make this cursed council work. I believed in you that much.”
This was very uncharacteristic for him. For any fae. Nobody put themselves in a position to be used. He’d hinted at his support before. Now he dropped it in the open with as much abandon as we might discuss events from a century ago.
But he used the past tense in his unusual declarations.
“Speak plainly, Dedalus. What is bothering you?”
He stared at me for three seconds before answering. “Do you trust me?”
I stared back. I couldn’t lie. He had to know that. And he had to know that I knew the customs of fae intrigue too well to trust.
I shrugged. “I do not trust anyone.”
His face hardened. “Then she was right.” He threw his little block of wood at the wall above my bookshelf hard enough that it embedded into the paneling, bending the wood around it like a wedge. Then he clenched his teeth and stormed out of the room.
