Page 117

Ijoined my usual hunt when the rest of the humans rose and began milling around the main chamber of the warrens. They all cast me sideways glances. Talked behind their palms and speculated as to where I had been all this time. The last they saw me, I had been with them. Then the rumors of the King’s attempted assassination began filtering through the court and then Ard Tiarna Brittle Spear’s capture. It was, of course, a given that I had also been there.

It was no secret that I was not allowed to leave the King’s quarters during the day. No one had ever seen me leave it without the rest of the hunt collecting me. They all knew that, unlike the rest of them, who were free to move around the palace at their leisure when their duties were complete, I was not allowed to leave the room I had been assigned. None of them knew exactly why. None of them knew exactly what occurred in that room. Most of them speculated that the King wiled his time away all day fucking me raw.

And I let them think that. I let them think whatever they wanted to. Unless they had the courage to ask me themselves, they could speculate about anything they wanted. It was not in my best interest to correct the murmurings and allegations of the whispering rabble when all they were doing, with their hushed speculation, was trying to find some scrap of power to feel better about their miserable lives. It would be cruel of me to disillusion them, to take that smallest bit of dopamine away from them. Especially since it did nothing to serve my ultimate goal.

I didn’t hate them for their whispers. I felt bad for them. They had nothing but an empty eternity of dreary days ahead, with nothing to break the monotony of one day to the next. If tittering behind their palms, speculating, and making stories up about me got them through the day, did it really hurt me to let them have that?

If any of them had the courage to come to speak to me about it, I’d tell them the truth. I was not Fae enough just yet to spin lies and weave falsehoods. I was human enough to abhor that part of it all. But none of them would ever be courageous enough to do so. It made them feel too powerful to think that I was being raped every day. And for that, I pitied them.

When I crested the stairs with my hunt, one of the guards stopped me, tapping my elbow politely and with all the courtesy afforded to one of the courtiers.

“Excuse me, Miss Cricket. The Captain has advised us that you are to be reassigned. As the Ard Rí has not yet been in his quarters since the incident, you are not needed there.”

I looked down to where his gauntleted hand touched delicately to my elbow and then up into the turbulent grey skies of his gaze. “Would I not just sit around in the King’s chambers as he’s ordered in the past?”

The soldier squirmed under my regard, as if I might slice him down where he stood. “Sorry, miss, the Captain’s orders were very clear. You were to be sent to the salons to dust.”

“Is a hunt not already assigned to that sector?”

“Yes, miss, a rather diligent hunt. You’ll find very little in need of your touch. Even less with the entire court out.”

“The entire court?”

The slightest pressure at my elbow, and we were moving away from the chirping swallows of my own hunt in the opposite direction. I let him guide me. The way was much easier to memorize now that I could find the marks that were as clear as neon signs.

“Aye, miss. It’s the solstice. The Bandrui has taken the court down to the well spring to observe the rituals.” I noted the rank etched into his ear guards and smiled. The Raven had sent his right-hand man, the second-in-command, to escort me. “While there are no courtiers in the salons, the Captain wanted me to remind you that the rules remain the same. You are to stay in this sector. You’ll know the boundaries by the carpet. Stay in the rooms with the green carpets. I will be stationed at the entrance to the salons. If you need anything.”

“And why are you not down at the well with the rest of the court? I assume the Captain is down there, too?”

“Yes, miss. He and his betrothed lead the ritual in her brother’s stead.”

A crack ran down the center of my face and burrowed into my heart.

His betrothed.

The casualness the soldier had said it was worse than had he been trying to be malicious. Those two words were a searing hot knife that sliced me in two, and this soldier had wielded them like they were but simple daisies he laid at my feet.

He forged on, as if he had not carved the soft tender center of me out and fed it to the wolves.

“I do not join them because the Captain asked me to guard you. As you are the King’s prized Pearl and cannot be assigned to just any guard that might allow you to be harmed and the King is still abed, the Captain was needed and could not do so. My wife is with them to represent our household. It will be enough for the gods to look favorably on our family this coming year.”

“Does . . . does he do this often?”

I could barely hear anything over the thundering agony pounding in my ears. I could barely focus on anything the soldier was saying beyond the sheer willpower it was taking not to collapse.

He had told me that the engagement was called off. He had told me he didn’t care for her. He had told me he chose me.

I had believed him. Fool that I was had believed him. I let him work his way into my heart and take roots there in the space where I had left a void.

What did I expect? What did I really and truly believe would happen if I trusted a Fae? Had he not shown me that he was not above the same trickery and duplicity that all the rest of them were capable of? What had made me think I was so different? What had made me believe that, for once, just for once in my miserable life, someone would treat me with kindness and honesty?

“Not really, miss. But it is rare that the Ard Rí is poorly or shirks his duties to The Lady Oaken Rose.”

I wished he would stop talking. I wished he would just shut the fuck up and stop saying her name. Stop reminding me that either of them still existed, still drew breath in the wake of the utter destruction that The Raven left me in.

I gave the soldier a wan smile. Rule #10: No one sees it. No one is owed it. No one is allowed to reach me like that again.

Never again.