Chapter 26 Deities & Dust Motes
Chapter twenty-six
Deities & Dust Motes
Oberon greeted me with a pleasant smile when I met him in the library for breakfast, completely famished from the overwhelming amount of magyk I’d encountered the day before. He was drinking tea and reading a small book, but set down his cup when I approached the table with Sir Toby beside me.
“Good morning.”
“It is, isn’t it?” I replied, pulling out the chair opposite him and surveying the food spread out before me.
Tall, fluffy biscuits with little dishes of honeyed butter and raspberry jam beside them, balls of brown sausage rolled in sage, poached eggs smothered in a creamy, green sauce, and an entire bowl of dewy forest berries.
I began to fill my plate as Oberon silently poured a second cup of tea and put it in front of me, then closed his book.
Mercifully, he waited until I had stuffed half a biscuit into my mouth and swallowed before he asked, “Did you sleep well after your visit last night?”
“I…uh…”
“Marina,” he said gently, “you might find it hard to believe, but I was also young once, and I did raise a rather headstrong daughter.”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “He was just…checking on me. Isn’t that what you made him for?”
“I made him to keep an eye on you, yes, and to protect you. Not to spend hours in your bedroom in the dead of night,” Oberon said in a stiff voice.
“It isn’t like that!” I insisted, cheeks scorching. “I swear, it isn’t. I had a nightmare…about the Rot. He just sat with me and used his magyk to stop more from coming.”
Oberon eyed me carefully for a moment, but apparently decided I was being truthful. “You told me you would take charge of him now. I expect that means you will teach him some basic manners, such as not breaking and entering into young ladies’ bedrooms.”
I let out an involuntary laugh. “Are we speaking of Devil or Sir Toby?” The hound raised his three heads off the rug and I tossed each one a ball of sausage, then looked back at Oberon, who was still frowning.
“Marina…”
“Why must I teach him?” I snapped. “Perhaps you should not have let him run completely feral the twenty-two years he’s been under your authority.”
Oberon raised his hands and sighed in defeat. “You are right. I only want to–” He stopped speaking and squinted at the window, where something small was buzzing against the transparent barrier of magyk. I shoved my chair back and went over to inspect.
“It’s Primrose!” I cried. “Let her in!”
Oberon waved his hand, creating an opening for Prim to zoom through.
Deftly avoiding Sir Toby, who leapt to his feet and snapped at her, she flew straight toward the faerie king and hovered in his face, chittering angrily.
He listened with a rather bemused expression, and as I sat back down, I realized that some of her shrill speech was finally intelligible to me.
I made out words like ‘rude’ and ‘everything I’ve done’ before she fell silent and dropped onto the table, strolling between the breakfast plates and examining her options.
I leaned forward and grinned. “Hello, Prim. Would you like some tea?”
She made a face, then hopped onto the edge of a biscuit and crossed her strange, scaly legs before breaking off a tiny chunk to eat.
“Apparently, I am a monster,” Oberon chuckled, “for not keeping my barrier open specifically to her.”
“Is she your spy?” I asked. “Is that how you know what Titania is up to all the time?”
“‘Spy’ is such an…uncouth way to phrase it,” Oberon sighed, “but, yes, I suppose she is.”
Having eaten her fill of biscuit, Prim took her time selecting a large raspberry and carried it over to my plate, then kicked at my fork.
“Cut it up for you?” I asked, and she nodded. “Why can’t I understand her yet?”
“You should be able to once we unlock more of your…other side,” Oberon said. “Her speech is so fast and high, human ears cannot pick it up.”
“When will we be doing more of that?”
“Today, hopefully,” Oberon said, draining his cup of tea and standing. “But first, I have other duties to attend to. I thought you might like to explore the library while I’m gone.”
“Yes, please.” I let my gaze roam over the almost never-ending shelves of books and a little bubble of eagerness appeared in my stomach.
“Wake Simeon if you need assistance,” Oberon said, motioning to the owl-man’s nook between bookshelves.
He came around the table and leaned down to briefly kiss the top of my head.
I was taken aback, but the gesture also flooded me with emotions, which were only enhanced by my new magyk.
Once he had left the library, I took a moment to blink tears from my eyes.
“Have you seen Devil? I mean…Puck… or Robin? This morning?” I asked Prim quietly, keeping my eyes on Simeon, in case he had been instructed to eavesdrop.
The little faerie responded by putting her hands on her hips and waggling her feathered eyebrows.
“It isn’t like that,” I laughed. “I just wondered if you’d seen him.”
She nodded, stuffed a piece of raspberry into her mouth, and held up one miniscule finger. I waited as patiently as I could until she swallowed, then took flight and hovered beside my ear.
“Gone,” came her shrill, intentionally slowed-down voice. “Antidote search. A week, maybe two.” My heart sank, and I wondered if Oberon had warned Devil away from me…or threatened him.
“Well,” I murmured, “if you see him…give him my thanks.”
Prim bowed in midair, then flew in to kiss me on the cheek.
It was a strange sensation, like being prodded by the head of a pin, made all the more odd by the gentle breeze from her tiny, whirring wings.
Before I could say goodbye, she was gone, and I was left alone with Sir Toby, a silently sleeping owl, and thousands upon thousands of books.
The library was far more cavernous than I had originally imagined, filled with hidden nooks and crannies.
Along the far wall, carved into the back side of one bookshelf, I found a nearly-hidden staircase with a series of intricate tapestries displayed above it.
I carefully set down the small collection of books I had already accumulated to examine them.
There were twelve in all, each depicting a single individual, with writing at the bottom that I couldn’t decipher.
After sifting through my own books, looking for some sort of dictionary or key, but coming up empty, I walked slowly up and down the staircase, running my fingers over the indecipherable words.
“I see you’ve found the only thing that passes for a temple in the Arden.”
I turned to see Simeon standing at the bottom of the stairs, watching me carefully with his wide, yellow eyes. His words snapped the final piece of the puzzle into place for me.
“These are your fay deities, aren’t they? The Twelve?”
“They are also yours, my lady,” Simeon said. “We might have left behind the rigid, organized type of worship humans are so fond of, but they are still with us…in their own ways.”
“Were they real?” I asked. “I mean…I know that some gods, in other places, they were once men…”
Simeon gave me a knowing half-smile. “I am not the oldest child of the Arden, but I am quite old. I have seen many things, both magyk and mundane, but I have never seen a god with my own eyes.” I looked at the image of the Huntress hanging above me, depicted as a young fay woman with tawny skin and short brown hair, aiming her bow while running beside a stag.
“Are there any books about them? In my own tongue?”
“Certainly.” Simeon pointed up the stairs. “Lyric…I mean, your mother was…somewhat of an aficionado on the subject. The loft was where she kept her personal collection. Would you like assistance?”
“No,” I murmured, “thank you.” He bowed, the horned owl feathers on his head twitching, then retreated.
Faltering a little from nerves, I climbed the stairs, but stopped when faced with a thick black ribbon, tied from post to post across the top.
Before removing it, I took a deep breath and steeled myself.
Hearing about my mother, seeing the light-image of her Devil had created for me, was one thing, but this was her space.
She had spent time here, been happy here, maybe even with my father.
Setting my toe on the topmost stair, I gripped the banister to keep my hand from shaking.
My emotions were already turbulent from the release of magyk, and I could not help being afraid.
What lingering pieces of her would I find here?
Strands of hair? Handwritten letters? Her scent?
Would these remnants destroy me? Capsize the shoddy little raft I had built to keep myself afloat in this new life?
Or would they buoy me up, lift me above the waves and keep me sailing onward?
After a moment of deep breathing, I dared to take the final step, and found myself in a cozy, low-ceilinged loft.
The top of the library’s massive window let in a few golden shafts of sunlight, and there was a collection of round, tufted cushions strewn about the rug-covered floor.
The shelves here were much shorter and held much more haphazard stacks of books and scrolls, interspersed with blown-glass orbs, uncut gemstones, and pieces of petrified wood carved into small figurines.
It would have been completely welcoming, were it not for the layer of dust covering every surface.
With every footfall, a tiny cloud puffed up around my boots, and the motes mixed themselves up with the thin tendrils of shadow pouring from my hands—a manifestation of the heart-wrenching grief and longing and quiet joy all tangled up inside me.