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And if she hadn’t meant more? I hadn’t decided that yet either.

When I didn’t immediately peel away with the rest of the group, she lofted her brows. I met her challenge with an almost imperceptible casual shrug. “I thought you said Fae weren’t allowed?”

“That’s not what I said at all.” She turned her attention back to the owl Fae. “And she’s not in the village. Messengers are welcome unimpeded everywhere in this world so long as they abide by the laws of their pact. No violence. No alliances outside of the Crossroads. She stays outside of our walls as a show that she still abides by her pact.”

“Oour pact is ssaacred,” the woman chirped before digging into the leather satchel at her side and handing two folded letters sealed with wax to Cora.

“Thank you, messenger. We have a parcel for your Duchess as payment.” Cora gave a head jerk, and Rook handed the fabric-wrapped parcel he’d been holding to the messenger.

The owl woman brought it up to her head and she made a great show of sniffing and snuffling at it. I cut my eyes to those around me, silently asking if I was the only one who thought this was absolutely bizarre behavior. Cora and Rook seemed to barely notice, but my three human companions all shared my confusion and mild disgust.

When the woman found the package to her liking, she chirped a trill sound like bird song and stuffed it into her pack. “We thank you, Havenhome.”

“And Havenhome thanks the Crossroads,” Cora responded as if it was a small ritual between them that needed to be closed in order for this meeting to conclude.

Cora and Rook didn’t wait for the rest of us, dismissing the messenger just as a Fae would dismiss a human who had served their purpose, and walked away without further comment. My companions followed them.

“You staaay behhhind, lady?” the owl woman asked when I didn’t move.

“You’re a messenger? That’s all you do? You don’t spy?” I didn’t trust her to answer me honestly, but I watched the offense at the implication she might have an ulterior motive ripple across her face, and a tuft of feathers resembling horns shot out of the top of her head.

“Thiss wouuld breeak the paact,” she exhaled the words with her brows drawn down and the feathers shivering with annoyance.

“And you deliver messages and letters to whomever you are hired to do so?” I schooled my features, unwilling to let her know that hope was bubbling somewhere next to the knife in my chest.

“Yesss.”

“No matter the contents?”

Again, the horned feathers rippled with annoyance. “Weee do nott reeadd the meesssaggess. Thiss would br—”

“Break the pact. Yes, I get it. No interference. No alliances.” I watched the woman bob her head in a yes, the feathers still twitching with annoyance. “If I asked you to take a message to the Ard Tiarna of Tromluí Údramáil, would you?”

The woman paused for a moment, smacking her lips together reminding me of an owl perched on a branch, clicking its beak as it thought. “Therrre is noo Arrd Tiarrna of Trromluuí at thiss timmme. Ask aggain in a foortnigghht, and I willl take yourr message.”

There is no Ard Tiarna of Tromluí Údramáil. I repeated in my head. Did that mean that Brittle Spear had died after all? Did that mean he was no longer the Ard Tiarna? What did that mean?

I couldn’t ask for more details as the gate was filling up with humans coming in from the funeral, all red noses and puffy, suspicious eyes. When the last passed me, I turned toward the Fae, who still stood just where she had been, not moving a single inch except for her head.

“How do I call you or find you?” I whispered on a hiss.

“Find a wwwhhhistle, or finnd the Crosssroadss, lady.”

I nodded and pushed away from the gate to the flapping of wings. I didn’t turn around, imagining the girl both exploding into the body of an owl and also just flapping her arms to take flight. Either way, I wasn’t mentally prepared to see whatever it was that made the sound.

Owls were spooky creatures. When I was a child in the woods, they would sit on the branches outside of my window and sing me their songs. The way they moved through the trees on silent wings, gliding over head hunting their meals, had always scared me. To think that something so deadly and huge could move past me without a single sound to announce its presence was haunting.

As I moved through the village, conversations changed as my shadow slipped between them. Some stilled altogether, only picking up as I moved away. Eyes followed me closely, boring into my back and carving new ribs within me. I never caught any of them, not a single word. When I was a human, I had learned exactly how to slice off a word or two here and there to find the truth they were hiding. It had kept me alive when I lived in group homes too crowded for anyone’s benefit but the people who ran it.

But the people of Havenhome had learned from the best how to curve their words in on themselves so they never made it past their small circles. Each one slid unobtrusive eyes toward me and offered a thin, tense smile and a head nod in acknowledgement. It was strange to witness, after months at the palace without it. I had never noticed how strange it was that so many of us did that. It meant nothing. It said nothing. It was merely an acknowledgement of your existence. Fae didn’t do it. If a Fae didn’t want to be bothered with you, they just didn’t acknowledge you. There was no false pleasantry to their social gestures. And yet humans? They were full of false pleasantries.

There was the thin smile. The way their voice changed when talking to someone they wanted something from. The way they slightly hunched their shoulders when they knew they were delivering bad tidings, but didn’t care enough not to deliver it. The way they always maneuvered the conversation toward something about themselves. The way they apologized for everything and nothing at all—all at the same time.

The way they claimed they had nothing to do with the Fae and had Fae rune circles in their walls, spider silk bandages in their medic house, and Fae delivering messages to their front door.

The people of Havenhome were hiding more secrets than most Fae, and yet their human sensibilities justified and excused every single action to convince themselves they weren’t the bad guys, and they weren’t in league with the bad guys. They had it under control. They were justified in their use of the same tactics which made the Fae odious. They were the victims, after all. They were the ones who had been wronged. They could never possibly be just as bad as the Fae.

They could never be anything but justified in the way they used the Fae back.