33. Morgoya
Chapter thirty-three
Morgoya
M orgoya joined me for breakfast the following day, wearing a lime green dress that was far too bright and sparkly for first thing in the morning.
I fretted that she would wrinkle it when she sat down on the end of my bed, but she waved me away and adjusted her skirts as I scrubbed the sleep from my eyes. She hadn’t said anything about what had transpired between myself and either of the men in the House, but she had a knowing and sympathetic look in her eyes as she extended a tall glass mug of coffee topped with whipped cream, strawberries, and chocolate sauce to me.
It was a peace offering, as though she had been a fly on the wall during my disastrous encounters with the men in the House last night—or perhaps the arrogant High Fae bastards had also likened her to a whore at one point or another, so the look in my red-rimmed eyes was familiar.
Delia wheeled in a small silver cart about ten minutes later with two breakfast trays instead of one. She was in on the apology tour, too, though why either of the women should feel obliged to take responsibility for the behaviour of the men was beyond my comprehension. Her hair was still black, which unnerved me, but I tried not to think about it because it seemed that no one else—not even Delia herself—was concerned.
“Is it rude for me to ask what happened to her?” I asked at last, after Delia had bowed her head to us in goodbye and disappeared through the door into the hallway.
Morgoya’s mouth quirked to the side. “Happened to her? You mean the stitches?”
I nodded, taking a bite of generously buttered toast.
“They didn’t tell you,” she realised, rolling her eyes towards the ceiling. “Delia is a Secret-Keeper, one of the more curious of our kind. She traded her voice to the High Mother in exchange for answers to all of life’s greatest questions.”
Frowning, I took another bite of toast and chewed thoughtfully. “You mean she consented to the stitches?”
Morgoya looked a little insulted, but she smiled at me and replied, “Of course. Wren and Lucais might behave like beasts around you, but we’re not barbarians.”
So she did know .
I decided that I wouldn’t ask how and instead steered the conversation back to Delia. “What’s the Secret-Keepers, exactly?”
My companion took a deep, considerate breath. “Well, the High Fae date back to the dawn of time, when the High Mother granted the original-blessed the gift of magic. Everyone from that era is worm food nowadays, but our history claims that the Temple of All is the last remaining relic.” Her emerald green eyes drifted towards the window wistfully. “Legend says that if you go there, pure of heart and sound of mind, and ask the High Mother to share her knowledge with you, she will. But, in return, you must leave your voice in the Temple and sew your mouth closed with iron-thread to ensure that you keep the secrets of creation to yourself.”
I couldn’t prevent the grimace that warped the features on my face at the very thought. Iron was toxic to faeries. Painful.
“We can’t have the knowledge of the universe landing in the wrong hands,” Morgoya explained, noticing my expression. “The iron-thread ensures that, even if magic is used to somehow give the Secret-Keeper a voice again, they won’t be able to use it.”
“So why offer the secrets at all, if it’s so risky?” I asked, reaching for a moon-shaped slice of juicy orange fruit.
Morgoya shrugged delicately. “Faith, I suppose. The world simply cannot sustain every being knowing every detail because that would starve it of passion. Still, people like Delia are a symbol. They prove that there are answers to our questions, even if we aren’t supposed to know what they are. The Secret-Keepers are, in a sense, the wick allowing the candle to burn.”
“Couldn’t she just write it all down?”
She arched a perfectly curved eyebrow at me. “Haven’t you noticed her hands?”
I shook my head.
“They break their fingers and seal the damage with an enchantment,” she murmured, tilting her face towards her breakfast tray. “I’m not doing a great job of convincing you that we aren’t barbaric, am I?”
Delia’s hands.
If I was honest, I hadn’t actually paid attention to her fingers. When she had carried the bucket into my room the morning that she had manually filled the marble tub, she kept one palm flat against the bottom and one obscured from my view on the other side. Ever since then, I’d been too preoccupied to notice any of those details.
Shuddering, I tried to offer Morgoya a placid smile, but something wet and cold was curling up in the bottom of my stomach. “Do you think it’s worth it?”
“To me?” Morgoya’s catlike eyes widened, long lashes fluttering. “No. To others? Every Secret-Keeper I’ve ever met has gone back to their normal lives, and they don’t seem disappointed.”
“Would she know about the Malum? Is that the sort of thing you can ask?”
Morgoya shook her head. “Delia hasn’t gone back to the Temple since her initial visit long ago. Some do return. So, theoretically, there could be someone out there who knows the ultimate fate of the Malum. I doubt it, though.”
For a fleeting moment, I actually entertained the thought. I considered what it would be like to give my voice up in order to receive answers, and if it might even be worth it, simply to avoid having to deal with Wren while I searched for them the old-fashioned way.
I had not seen or heard from him or the High King of Faerie since our humiliating confrontations. The lingering traces of anger still itched in my veins, but it was a small comfort to discover that they were not responsible for the stitches on Delia’s mouth.
“Well.” I sighed. “At least she did it to herself. On purpose.”
Morgoya chuckled, the sound deep and throaty. “You really thought it was one of us?”
“Wren, actually,” I confessed. “He used her as part of some sick joke when he chose her to send up here to be my maid.”
Her laughter quieted. “Delia’s the only maid in the House.”
“Yeah,” I scoffed. “Because he scared all the other maids away.”
This time, her laugh was loud and genuine. “Oh, darling. That man is all bark and no bite.”
Somehow, I doubted that, although I appreciated the comparison to a dog. And not just any dog, either. In my mind, he was a flea-ridden mongrel with a penchant for snapping at people who tried to feed him.
I hope he starves to death.
“You better wipe that look off your face before he sees you again,” she warned playfully. “You might hurt his feelings.”
Wren didn’t have feelings, but that wasn’t what gave me pause as I threw my legs over the side of the bed and made to stand up. “How do Secret-Keepers eat and drink?” I asked her.
Morgoya gave me a contemplative look. “We don’t really need to eat or drink, darling. Not if our magic is intact and thriving. We do so for pleasure. Most of the things the High Fae do, we do for pleasure.”
So, Wren is a masochist .
“Figures,” I muttered, striding over to the wardrobe.
All of the clothes provided by the House looked to me like pyjamas, so I wore them to bed every night and changed into a new set each morning. Dresses still dangled inside the wardrobe, pushed to the very end of the rack, and I quickly flicked through the varying shades of silk and velvet shirts.
“Wear a dress,” Morgoya suggested. “He likes the colour gold.”
I whirled on her, taken aback by the absurdity of the suggestion. “Wren?”
“No.” She smiled down at her tray, picking through a bowl of berries. “Lucais.”
I’d never seen him wear anything gold except for a jewel encrusted on the hilt of his dagger the first day we met, but Wren had golden eyes. Perhaps that was why Lucais continued to tolerate him—for his pretty eyes.
“I’m afraid that a dress might hinder my ability to run for my life,” I murmured derisively, eyeing off a sheer black gown at the end of the rack. “Or, High Mother forbid, give someone the wrong impression.”
“I’ll try not to be offended,” Morgoya said with a laugh. “You would do well to follow my lead. They mean no harm.”
Crossing my arms over my waist, I turned around again. “Why are you defending them?” I snapped. “You obviously know what happened. They were probably bragging about it to each other last night. Comparing notes on my—on my scent .”
“Aura.” Her beautiful and slim face widened as her cheeks rolled up around a sympathetic smile. “I can promise you that is not what happened.”
I glanced at the floor, shrugging half-heartedly as I considered how easily the High Fae could deceive me. “So, tell me what happened.”
Morgoya shifted, folding her manicured hands in her lap, and relaxed her expression into something of calculated calm. “Essentially, they stormed off into their respective quarters and were both brooding when I showed up to ask why neither of them were at dinner. It quickly became clear as to why you weren’t. If you can’t already tell,” she went on, glancing over her shoulder, “the High King in particular regrets his words dreadfully.”
Indeed, I followed her gaze to find that the light sky had been swallowed up by a melancholy grey. It was faint, as if the rays of colour had been washed out, and reminded me of an overcast morning in the human world, though there were no clouds at all this time.
“The High King’s Hand regrets his words, too,” she added softly.
I stared at the light grey sky until my eyes began to water. “Hand?”
Morgoya let out a disgruntled sigh. “Honestly, I’m not surprised you’re upset with them. They overlooked formal introductions completely. The proper title for the High King’s right-hand man is the Hand—of the King, to the King; it varies between Courts—and I am the High Lady of the Court of Light.”
“You are?” My nose screwed up. “But Lucais is the High King—”
“Of Faerie,” she cut in with a wry smile. “Someone has to tend to local politics while he manages the weather.”
I almost laughed, but there was still an awful pit in my stomach, writhing and stretching and seething. “Do you have an issue with my title, too?” I asked her instead, though the assumption that I even had a title made the sickness in my stomach rise up.
“It’s not at all what you think,” she told me, smoothing down her skirts as she rose to her feet. “But it’s a story for another time. We have a meeting to continue downstairs, and this time, I’ll sit in his lap.”
That dragged a laugh out of my mouth; it was a small, feeble sound, but it tickled my throat and loosened the debris left behind after the words I’d exchanged with Wren had triggered such an emotional explosion.
It wasn’t long at all before a strange bitterness took its place, provoked by the thought of anyone else sitting in Lucais’s lap. I refused the drop of jealousy—very nearly spat it out onto the floor of the wardrobe—and resumed picking through the velvet clothes. There was no way I’d risk wearing silk again.
“Wear a dress,” Morgoya repeated, sliding a hand through my hair as she sauntered towards the doors. Her voice had a little more command in it this time. “I’ll be in the hallway.”