Chapter 21
ARLET
The Day of the Formal Presentation
The night begins with me being brought to the lower city, that I might be transferred to a platform and paraded through the main avenue. A host of guards surrounds the carriage, and Thorne and my ladies-in-waiting sit in the coach with me.
As we make our way to the starting point, I am impressed by the lights and banners strung up between the streets. I see elven citizens dressed in a wide array of costumes. Foxes, dear, elves, and important figures I don’t recognize.
My gown is fawn-brown silk dusted with pale spots at the hem, the neckline modest by their standards, the back cut to reveal the slope of my narrow shoulders. They decided this would make me look “gentler.”
The mask I’d been fitted for several times sits on the top half of my face. It does bear a striking resemblance to a doe’s face, though one artfully rendered in gilt and white. It has painted lashes and a demure nose. The ribbon bites behind my ears.
It’s beautiful, but a reminder of something awful. Like everything else in this place.
They have turned the palace into a forest, and me into a small, shallow shell of the woman I once was. Every day, I require more sleep. Even now, I feel tired and frail.
Being useless stings, Cursed One whispers. You said that not too long ago, but I can’t help wondering if you still feel it—or if they’ve beaten you down to a pulp so that every nerve ending connects together. Do you feel anything anymore, Red?
I ignore her voice.
Then the carriage stops. Thorne exits first, then Merlina, Eslina, and Kiala. Finally, it is my turn. The guards form a wall around me as I step out of the carriage, and I am guided to the gilded platform, covered in flower arrangements.
And then, I am sent off through the city. The roar of applause and delight drones on as I move back to the palace. I smile. I wave.
The word “consort” echoes in my skull, shouted in so many phrases I feel I might burst.
Everything passes in a blur—the buildings and people. I can’t say how long it takes for us to make it through the whole city, but I recognize the way to the palace immediately.
We stop in front of the main entrance, and I am led into the marvelous spectacle.
Silk banners droop from the rafters in long, moss-green falls, painted with stags whose antlers stretch up to the moon and wolves whose teeth shine like pearls of light.
The floor is scattered with crushed mint and marjoram so that each step releases their scent into the air.
Lanterns hang like low stars. Between them, the hall glitters with candlefire and polished gold.
At last, we arrive at the place where I am to make my entrance. There is a webbed screen in front of us, obscuring me from view. But I can see the grand hall and all the hundreds of visitors waiting for me to be presented to Arion.
Masks tilt, feathers shiver, and jewels wink in the low lights. I can’t deny it’s beautiful.
I just wish beauty meant something to me like it used to.
“It will be charming to finally see you next to the king,” Merlina says, voice quiet under her gold veil. She adjusts the last pin near my temple, then draws back to see whether I’ve become the thing she was assigned to create.
Kiala checks the fall of my train. “Remember to breathe and smile,” she murmurs. “Kind, fawning words should just spill out when you’re in his presence!”
Eslina brushes my shoulders with a sheen that glitters in the low light. “Remember, do not touch your throat once the collar is on,” she warns, like someone coaxing a patient to hold still through a needle.
I nod.
The tapestries have been changed for the theme, with many other bloody displays of “hunting” scattered around the room. I hate them all. The guests who crowd the floors gawk at them, pointing, smiling, and laughing.
Over the last week, I have been trying—genuinely searching—for redeemable qualities in those who orbit within Arion’s court.
But they are cruel to each other, to others, and definitely to me.
Besides Thorne, I have found no allies, no friends outside of the loud voice in my head that can’t seem to do anything to help me against those who cage me, and I spend each moment clawing my way to the surface of the stinking shit, trying to find fresh air.
All I am learning is to grin and bear this life.
Then, finally, a bell strikes once, and the crowd hushes. The double doors at the far end of the hall open on cue.
Here we go.
Arion enters without a mask.
Instead, he is dressed like a man prepared for the hunt. I bite back an ironic chuff.
Of course.
Interestingly enough, Cursed One sneers as I take in the king. He sports a bow on his back, tight leathers across his body, and an impractical silver crown upon his brow. His smile is measured in degrees.
He walks easy, and at least those in attendance look at him like someone who is prepared to grant them salvation. Interesting, especially since I know just how many are vying for his downfall.
“Beloved guests,” he says, and the word beloved fits in his mouth in a way that makes me want to spit.
“Tonight, we honor a truth older than song. The hunt has brought our people food and prosperity since Doros and Nicnevin graced our land with their first child. It allowed us to thrive among the forests and savage beasts. Today, that hunt continues as we prepare to save our people. Thank you for joining me in this great experiment, which, gods willing, will result in a sustained line that will stretch on for ages. Allow me to also thank the Royal Warden of my lovely human, Mr. Thorne.”
Everyone listens, rapt, then they dip their heads as they turn to face the area of the room where Thorne is carefully tucked away, already drinking from a goblet of wine. He gives a half smile, tipping his head and raising his glass to the king.
Hmm, the snake, Cursed One murmurs.
She seems just as angry at what he did—what he allowed them to do to me—as I am. She seethes during our nightly meetings.
Thorne has not spoken openly with me in days. I do not know what came of Arion’s march. But no one else is talking about it either.
I wonder if Mrath still stands, and if he was really able to get the entirety of the Cumhacht na Cruinne. I certainly haven’t heard anything about it, though everyone has been in an exceptionally good mood.
If Mrath is dead… The thought strikes a sad chord in me. She wasn’t so easily sorted into “good” or “bad,” but she had been helpful back home. She had been kind to me once.
I pause my thoughts and turn back to my future husband as he drones on.
“Now, the hunt reminds us that pursuit sweetens possession, and beauty is safest when kept. To a new age of the elves! Rounder ears, but stronger resolve and abundant generations!”
Laughter and delight travel through the ballroom, and several toast the king’s words.
There are those, however, who do not grant the king more than tight smiles and silence.
I watch them, studying their faces, partially or mostly obscured by their costume masks.
They, too, look like hunters, though of a very different kind.
The ones that seek to topple a power they do not agree with and fight like wolves over the bloody scraps.
Then Arion turns to where I stand. He lifts his hand as if he is summoning a bird that already knows the way to his wrist. “Come, my lovely human bride.”
Bride. That damned word is a stone. It skims once across the surface of my breath and sinks.
Still, I move. Still, I smile sweetly. The hem of my gown whispers like grass in a meadow. I step into the lane cleared for me by our rehearsals, and my pulse keeps time.
Another servant approaches Arion, carrying the collar on a velvet pillow the color of wet moss.
The king, with a great flourish of his tall body, retrieves his bow. He knocks an arrow, and the smile plastered on my face falters.
What is he doing?
Do not let him see you break, comes the reminder from Cursed One.
He pulls back the arrow, aiming it directly at my throat.
My breath quickens, and I try not to move.
He wouldn’t do everything just to kill me here, right?
Gods, he seems composed but I think he’s mad.
Then, with one swift movement, he lets the arrow fly free past me, out the window.
I let out a shaky breath, still smiling as the adrenaline pumps through my veins.
The crowd, once again delighted, politely applauds the absolutely ridiculous display of pageantry. Emboldened, Arion picks up the collar.
Emeralds alternate with peridot around the delicate velvet, but now I see its inner edge is lined with something glowing. The crowd practically leans, not with pity, but with a hunger for more theatrics.
At the foot of the dais, I kneel because I have practiced kneeling until the word does not make my body flinch.
Arion takes up the collar with both hands. He holds it at arm’s length so the stones can drink lampfire and give it back. “Forged for unity,” he says to them.
He lowers the circle toward my throat.
For a beat longer than a breath, he holds it just above my skin. I can feel the heat of his hands. He lowers it the last inch. It kisses the base of my neck, and I resist gagging.
The clasp clicks shut. The sound is small, but I fear I will never forget it.
Heat travels along the inner edge of it and into my collarbones as if it has decided to live there.
“Look at the crowd,” Arion says only to me, with the softness of a tutor who loves being obeyed. He tips my chin up with two fingers. “Let them see what is mine.”
As much as I hate it, I do as he says because I have learned the difference between obedience and surrender.
I stand and face the scene. All throughout the room, the elves begin to clap. A few even cheer. The sound is jarring next to the obvious frowns of others.