Chapter 46 Cass
Ispend days in the library, listening to Dain read, cursing my inability to do this task by myself. Dain must know what I’m searching for, of course, but he says nothing.
We can’t find any record of a fey creature that can lie and withstand iron. All high fey are bound by these laws. There are many other kinds that might not be, but most of these can’t communicate.
“What about a dryad?” Dain asks. “They can talk. No record of whether or not they can lie.”
I sigh. “Dain, would you kindly read aloud what a dryad is?”
Dain clears his throat. “A dryad is a type of nature spirit or tree nymph. Dryads take the form of beautiful young women. They are shy, elusive beings who protect their trees and the forest. They may punish those who harm nature.”
“Does that sound like Wren to you?”
Dain pauses. “She is rather beautiful, but shy is not one of the words I’d use to describe her.”
“There we go.”
I fold my arms against the table and rest my head. “Have you found anything bird-like?”
“Bird-like?”
“Wren has always given me the impression of a bird,” I tell him. “I’m just wondering if there’s anything that might fit.”
“Well, there’s harpies,” he says.
I wrinkle my nose. “I don’t see Wren as particularly harpy-like.”
“You did when you met.”
I almost smile at that. “Anything else?”
He thumbs through the pages. “A siren, perhaps,” he adds. “Though I don’t think we’ve ever had any on our shores. I assume that they must be able to lie, if they’re capable of luring folks to their deaths, but… iron should still affect them.”
It’s a possibility, but Wren doesn’t feel like a siren to me, no matter how much I may be under her spell. I don’t think I’ve ever heard her sing before, either.
There’s so many things we’ve never had the opportunity to do. So many things I don’t know.
So much I want to do, want to discover.
Dain finds some other suggestions. “Swan maiden? Thunderbird? Firebird? Ooh, I quite like that one—”
I flex my fingers. I’ve removed the bandages, now. They don’t hurt anymore, and I’ve been told they’re healing well.
Perhaps too well, even.
I stand up abruptly.
“To the training hall,” I declare. “I wish to spar.”
Dain doesn’t argue with that request, either. We head down to the hall and clear it. Dain collects the practice swords, passing one into my hand.
Wren used to throw them. I miss the bruises I used to wear from her first attempts at teaching me to catch.
I miss catching them, more.
The amount I miss her defies all measures. The scales would break with it.
Dain waits until I attack. I catch him off guard, and he stumbles back. I push again before he recovers, smacking him on his calf with my wooden blade.
“In a real battle, I would have won by now,” I tell him. “But in a real battle, you wouldn’t be holding back.”
“You caught me off guard,” Dain insists.
I take another swipe at him. “Wren never held back.”
“Wren doesn’t live in fear of your mother.”
I almost want to laugh. I like that he’s using the present tense, like she’s still here, like she’s just in the next room.
Wren, Wren, please come back.
We trade blows. Dain fights back this time, gaining ground.
“Why haven’t you asked about her?” I push him. “All this research we’re doing, surely you must—”
He smacks my hand. I fight back wildly.
“If we find anything, will it change how you feel about her?” Dain asks.
“No, of course not,” I answer far too quickly. Should it? Yes. Will it? Unlikely. I can’t imagine anything changing how I feel about her. Whatever she is, Wren is Wren.
Dain swipes at my head. I duck to avoid it.
“Is it so hard to believe others feel the same?” He takes another jab.
“The common folk… we don’t tend to mind magic as much as the nobility,” Dain continues.
“Not all of us, of course. If there’s one sad certainty of life, it’s that all people will have their prejudices, but as a rule, we care a lot less. ”
“Why do you think that is, do you wonder?” I ask, catching him on the hip.
Dain dodges before I can strike again, moving left. “Why do you think you hate the fey so much?”
“Because they killed my father and blinded me?”
“Good reasons to hate someone,” Dain counters.
“But the fey have never been the enemy of the common folk. They heal us. They help us. They don’t place us under curses or kill our family members…
we’re more at risk of each other than the fey.
The nobility, though, they don’t need to turn to magic.
To them—to you—they’re a threat. To us, a lifeline. ”
It never occurred to me that our people don’t hate the fey as much as we do. But there’s a truth to Dain’s words I’d never considered before. Of course they’d see them differently.
I parry another strike. “If Wren is one of them,” I begin, pushing his blade away, “do you think there’s any chance…”
“That she was sent here to harm you?”
I swallow. I don’t want to give weight to the thought, but I’d be a fool if I didn’t consider it. “Yes.”
“I mean, there’s a chance,” he says. “But I don’t think so.”
“Explain your reasoning.”
“Well, first off, she’s had plenty of opportunities to kill you already,” Dain says. “And if she wanted to manipulate you… she probably would have been nicer to you at the start.”
I snort in response, striking him again.
“And then, of course, there’s the way she looks at you.”
“Oh?” I arch an eyebrow, ignoring the thumping in my chest, “How’s that?”
“I’m no poet, but it’s intense,” Dain replies. “A way most people would be envious of. I don’t think that’s the sort of thing you can fake. I don’t know how you’d fake it.”
A lump forms in my throat. I can feel that look, but I’ll never see it.
Only suddenly, I don’t care about seeing again.
I care about everything I have left to lose and everything else I might never get to experience.
I may never get to hold her again or touch her skin or fight with her or be with her—
I may never get to ask her if she meant what she said in the carriage.
My vastren.
My next strike misses by miles. Dain doesn’t lunge again. I stay where I am, my body trembling.
“Cassiel?” Dain starts, quite forgetting protocol. He hovers behind me.
The door opens. “Get out!” I bark.
The person hesitates. A knight, I think, by the sound of the footfalls.
“Your Highness.” It’s Captain Fellwood. His gruff, stony voice fills the hall. “Dain has been on duty for too long. He needs a break.”
I hadn’t once stopped to consider how long Dain had been on duty for. “Dain, I’m sorry, I—”
“I consider this my leisure time,” Dain insists. “I’m quite fine, Captain. Assign another guard if you must, but have them wait outside.”
I’m eternally grateful to Dain, but I can’t find the words to tell him that.
There’s another pause before the Captain speaks again. “Very well,” he says, yet he remains where he is. “Has there been any word about Thornvale?”
Her name plucks at something deep inside me, but it touches something else, too. Fellwood has never cared for her.
My throat aches. I can’t reply.
“She’s with her family,” Dain responds, repeating the not-quite-lie.
“In Thornvale?”
“Where else?”
“I know her mother died just before she came here. I’m just wondering who’s looking after her.”
I tilt my head at that, but say nothing. Wren’s mother died when she was a child. I know she did. And her grandmother is still alive, so Fellwood can’t mean her. Why had she told Fellwood otherwise?
“She’s with her cousin,” Dain goes on.
“I see. And they’ve not sent word?”
“I’m sure he will when there’s something to say.”
Fellwood makes some kind of gesture, but I don’t know what it is. “Very well,” he says. “I do hope you receive word soon, Your Highness.”
I can’t respond to that, and I don’t need to. The door closes a second later.
The lump in my throat has grown painfully, agonisingly big. My chest constricts. Fellwood doesn’t care. I don’t even know why he’s pretending to. But I care. And I need her to send word. I should be with her. I should…
“Cass?” Dain prompts again.
I don’t think he’s ever been so informal with me before. Cassiel was unusual enough, but Cass…
I need to hear Wren say my name again. I need to… I need…
Dain’s hand finds my shoulder. My lump doesn’t roll away, but I speak through it.
“I… I need her to come back.”
Dain inhales. “I know,” he says. He squeezes my shoulder. I spin around seconds after, flinging away my sword and throwing myself into his arms.
Dain freezes for a moment, and then softens. His hands pat my back.
Neither of us can think of anything else to say after that.