Chapter 8
Spirits were notorious gourmands. After all, food was a universal language of love, and perhaps they, too, sought the warmth of what it meant to be alive.
ARAWN
My Spirits bristled at the sight of the confectioner.
And for good reason—she’d just stepped out of the undergrowth. She, with her candy hair, was like a pink thorn that burned far worse than this cursed wound.
“Why do you talk to them like that?” She didn’t even bother to hide her intrusion. Because of course, spying on what I’d never shown to anyone but the dead wasn’t enough—she had to add insolence to it.
I straightened, leaning an elbow on the lake’s edge, fingers trailing along my cheek, chin resting in my palm. “They’re not like you. They don’t have a heart.”
The Spirits beside me growled. Two rippled across the lake, and the third shot toward her.
I raised a hand. “Enough.”
They folded in on themselves before sinking into the lake, curling under the lily pads.
“Your sweet scent disturbs them.” I tilted my head, a vague smile tugging at my lips. “Like an overripe fruit just out of reach.”
She clutched the hem of her skirt against her, visibly ill at ease, which only widened my smile.
“In other words, you have no business here. Unless you’d like to get yourself eaten and turn my Spirits into a pack of sugar-drunk fools.”
“I didn’t do it on purpose,” she protested. “It was the boy Spirit who brought me here, I—” She turned and realized she was alone. “Oh.”
A dry laugh escaped me. “Gone, hmm? You’ve been here barely a night, and already you sow discord, frightening my Spirits. What fascinating skill.”
She shot me a look so outraged it might have killed me—if I still had the right to such luxuries. “Me? Frightening? You’re joking?”
I stepped out of the lake, black water sliding down my torso. She turned her head away, too late for me not to notice. So this was what it took to make her avert her gaze. Curious.
“You could warn me before you… you…”
“Before I what?” I asked, amused, as water dripped behind me while I tied the black silk kimono that an obedient Spirit held out. “You’re still here, after all. Which means I’m not that terrifying.”
She risked a glance over her shoulder.
“Better, like this?” I asked, a smile in my voice, wet strands clinging to my brow.
She crossed her arms, and for some reason, she narrowed her eyes, forcing herself to keep them fixed on the foliage behind me.
“Was your bath at least pleasant?” she muttered. “I’m sure you’d curse it yourself just to make sure it stayed for your exclusive use.”
I took a step toward her, crossing to the opposite bank.
“Even if confectioners’ sucre d'or restores my magic, it can still turn unstable or tainted. Every transformation leaves traces of black magic. They must be purged.” I bent down, tilting my head to meet her eyes.
“Unless, of course, you’d prefer to be suffocated by the mist.”
She bit the inside of her cheek. With a finger, I opened the apron she guarded so closely at her stomach to see her bundle of apples.
“Ah. You succeeded. Against all odds.”
“I spoke to the child Spirit. He let me take them.”
“And now they speak to you,” I murmured, more to myself than to her.
Since when did they take anyone’s side but mine? Even the boy Spirit avoided everyone. The gong sounded.
“You should move, Confectioner. You’re in their way.” I nodded toward the black water that shivered at the surface. “The lake. It belongs to the Spirits.”
I turned away without waiting for her, my steps leaving wet prints on the few warm stones. The branches above us sagged, weighed down with lanterns that flared to life one by one, like drops of amber suspended in the mist. She hurried to catch up.
“I can smell… warm honey… pumpkin soup? And candied ginger?” she breathed, her words chased by the growl of her stomach.
A second gong.
And this time, they emerged from the steam, detaching from the water in coils of smoke.
The confectioner ducked behind me, tucking her face just behind my arm, gripping it as tightly as she could. Every muscle in my body tightened. My fingers twitched in the air, searching for the lighter I’d left in my quarters.
The Spirits stretched into long, fluid ribbons. Others floated small and round. A few larger ones tried to find a human shape before abandoning the idea and letting the wind take them. It was the same show every night. They slid silently over the damp mossy grass in a slow procession.
“You can stop hiding,” I said.
She jumped, then let go of me as if just realizing what she’d been doing, and bent over the lake. Her sugared skin shimmered, traced with veins of gold, as though someone had blown light into her bloodstream. Even her neck glittered with a crystalline web that crackled faintly.
“It’s showing you what you’ve lost,” I cut in before she could be tempted. “Memories, pieces of yourself, anything that might lure you in. But if you touch its water, it will drag you into a nightmare without end.”
She jerked back, then trotted at my side like a sugared shadow. We merged into the line, gliding behind the Spirits. Yeun’s lanterns floated like little humming islands in the fog.
“And you?” she asked.
A small laugh escaped me. “There’s nothing I want badly enough to fall for.”
But she wasn’t listening. Her eyes were roaming everywhere, devouring everything. “Where are we going?”
I sighed, glancing back at her over my shoulder. Always the need to talk when silence was called for.
“You must be hungry.”