Chapter 2 Wren #2
“You can… you can sit in your room, if you like,” he adds.
“My room?”
“Next door,” he says, thrusting an arm out. “Just stay alert.”
I nod, realising a second later that that’s widely unhelpful. “Thank you,” I add, standing up.
The fey don’t often say thank you, because they can’t say it unless they mean it. I’ve never quite lost the mortal habit, though, and of all the ones to retain, I don’t think it’s a bad one.
I quite like being able to say it without receiving a raised eyebrow, as if the recipient doubts my words.
There are two other doors in the prince’s chamber. One leads to a bathing room—I already found that out. I’d assumed the second led to a cupboard or dressing room.
I push it open and find a tiny room barely large enough for a bed and a trunk. A single narrow window lets in the last golden light of the day, the view blocked by the towering stone walls of the castle.
It’s obvious this used to be a dressing room.
There’s a second door in it which leads straight into the bathing room, taking up too much of the limited space.
Wooden pegs line the walls. The shelves are empty.
There’s nothing here beyond the bare necessities.
It’s an afterthought, hastily converted, and I’m meant to live here now.
I drag my satchel from the prince’s chamber and sit down on the bed. The mattress is firm, the blankets scratchy. A far cry from my room back in the Moonhollow.
That had been inside a tree—carved into a great, ancient oak, its hollowed spaces warmed by fey magic.
I used to perch on the thick outer branches and watch the forest stretch for miles, shifting with the seasons, breathing with me.
Sometimes, when the wind was just right, I could imagine myself as a bird, free to soar above it all.
This, by comparison, is a box.
I exhale sharply, shaking the thought away. It’s not the first time I’ve left home. I’ve learned to live with less before. And yet, as I run my fingers over the stiff blankets, I’m surprised to find an ache curling in my chest.
It doesn’t matter.
I unpack quickly, setting what little I have into the trunk. A spare tunic, a belt, my favourite dagger, the rest of my weapons and whetstones. A nightgown and a few changes of underwear. Rags. A worn pouch of herbs. A folded scrap of parchment. That’s all.
Finished, I sit on the edge of the bed, rolling my shoulders. The quiet presses in from all sides.
I can still hear the faintest sound of the prince’s breathing through the wall.
Tiptoeing out of the room, I take one of the books from the desk. I never had much time for reading back home, but I need something to do or I’ll go mad.
The book is bound in deep green leather, the spine worn soft at the edges from years of use.
Gold foil still clings to the lettering, though some of the letters have faded into near illegibility.
There’s no title on the cover, but the first page names it The Wildwood Compendium, and beneath that, a hand-penned dedication: To Cassiel, Happy tenth birthday, love from Papa.
I almost shut the book. I don’t want to think about King Leonitus.
Instead, I find myself thinking about my own father, the one who died long before I could create any memories of him.
My grandmother kept almost everything that belonged to him.
His scent, she said, had long since fallen out of his clothes, but sometimes I would catch her rereading his letters late at night, tracing his words as if she could still touch the hand that penned them.
I would read his letters too, searching for a trace of me in him, but I could never find it.
She gave me one of his old daggers as a gift, once. It’s one of my most treasured possessions.
I only wish he’d been the one to give it to me.
My fingers tighten on the book. No wonder the prince hasn’t parted with this, though the contents are useless to him now.
The pages are filled with stories and sketches of plants and creatures I’ve only heard whispers of—some fey, some mortal, many somewhere in between.
There’s a section on moonlit rituals, another on weather charms and forest legends.
It’s been read often. There are tiny smudges on the corners and several places where the spine has been cracked open again and again.
I pause on a page half-covered in a charcoal sketch of a bird with antlers, its wings outstretched mid-flight. The detail is astonishing—delicate feathers and curling horns, wild and strange and beautiful. Someone cared enough to draw it this way. Was it the former kingdom?
A soft knock startles me.
I blink and shut the book, rising from the chair. The knock sounds again—gentle, not urgent. I slip through the prince’s chamber and open the main door.
Dain stands on the other side.
“Ah, Thornvale,” Dain says with a grin. “How was your first day?”
“Incredibly dull,” I admit. “Is he always so…”
“Short-tempered?”
“Yes.”
Dain’s smile slips. “Well, he wasn’t like that before, obviously.”
“What happened?” I ask. “No one outside the palace seems to know—”
“He wanted it that way. Him and his mother. Tensions between the fey and us are high enough as it is right now. He didn’t want to cause a panic—”
“What do the fey have to do with—”
“Well, they’re the ones who blinded him.”
I go still. My people? That can’t be right. My grandmother would’ve told me—wouldn’t she? Unless this is why I’ve been sent here in the first place. To find out who else might be working against the Crown. Not all the fey hail from the Moonhollow, after all.
But then why keep it from me?
Grandmother, what are you planning?
“I know, it’s a bit shocking, isn’t it?” Dain goes on. “Ever fought any of the fair folk before?”
“Once or twice,” I manage.
“Well, you may not have to fight them again. They can’t get past the iron gates, and he never leaves this room.”
“What—never?”
“Not since the accident, no,” he says. “Actually, that’s not quite true. I think he did leave once or twice, right after he recovered… but not much since.”
I nod, unsure what else to do. My eyes flick to the sleeping prince, his figure barely visible beneath the covers.
“You must be tired, Thornvale,” Dain says gently. “Try and get some sleep. I’m on duty now. I’ll be right outside until morning.”
“Thanks,” I say.
I slip back into my room, change out of my clothes, and crawl beneath the covers. I read a few more chapters of the book I borrowed—just enough to keep my mind from spiralling—and then snuff out the lamp.
The dark wraps around me like a second skin.
I try to picture living like this. Day in, day out. Shut inside stone walls, cut off from the sky.
I can’t.
I don’t want to.