Chapter 9 #2
Desmond glances out the window. “Norwynhald is starting,” he says with gravity like he’s spectating a funeral procession.
“What’s the matter? Not in the mood for merriment?”
A dark aversion flashes in his eyes, gone in a blink.
“I’ve never been to a festival in Mythos.” I don my pack and weapons, then look out the window with a pang of longing. “We’re missing out. I’ve heard the sweet rolls are delicious.”
Desmond says nothing as he packs up. Instead of a sling against his back, he fastens his sword’s leather sheath to his belt. The pommel is a black metallic skull, something I’d expect an orc to own, not a fae.
I follow him downstairs to the tavern counter. The fae servant glances up from the pot he’s scrubbing. Desmond hands him two gold marks. “Two apples.”
“Are you crazy? Apples don’t cost that much,” I blurt out. My family would make less from selling a bushel of apples. Yet Desmond glares at me as if I’ve said something asinine.
The horned fae collects the coins, uneasily looks around, and hands Desmond two apples. His silver eyes blink sideways.
“May Danu be with you,” Desmond says. I flinch at the blatant treason, but Desmond strides outside with a steady calm.
When I’m through the threshold of the door, he whips around and hisses into my ear, “If you want this to be an easy four weeks, don’t ever question what I do. You’re traveling with a fae prince whom your queen would love to arrest. Do you want to draw attention to us?”
A shiver ices down my spine at his warning. His tone is abrasive, foreboding. The voice of an employer commanding his hirelings. “No,” I bite back, my hands clenching.
“I give the orders. You follow them. Understand?” His cold ire trickles into me, a portent that no isn’t an answer he’ll accept.
I agree that he needs to be inconspicuous, but his tone is uncalled for. “I understand, Your Highness,” I reply, drenching the words with sarcasm.
“Then you’re more obedient than I gave you credit for,” he whispers, the harsh words honed to cut.
The soft tickle of his breath against my ear makes my core squeeze. I hate it. How dare he belittle me?
“Back off before you meet my dagger again,” I warn. It’s an unwise threat, but I refuse to be looked down upon. Especially by royalty.
He pulls away from me, sneering as he snatches my wrist. My pulse quickens as he turns my arm so the crescent moon faces up. “You and I both know that threat is empty.”
“You gods-damned—”
He lets go and strides ahead, his cloak snapping behind him. He doesn’t look back once.
“Asshole,” I mutter, livid that he’s treating me like this. Last night, he gave up his bed for me. Today I’m muck on the bottom of his boot. He’s just as mercurial as the fae in stories, and I can’t forget that.
I rush to catch up with him, having to step twice for one of his. We bypass the main streets and instead pass squat stone homes with birds twittering atop their shingles. Orc and human children chase chickens around a well. A mother drawing water tells them to settle down, but laughs.
He darts down another street, two-story homes now towering over us.
Some have glass windows, many stained in patterns of roses, sunbeams, and swooping doves.
Glass is unheard of in Nettlerock. I look into a window and see a resplendent couple dining on sugary figs and fried venison strips. My mouth waters.
Desmond is already halfway down the street. I tear myself away and jog to his side. “You’re holding the apples hostage. Afraid I won’t leave one for you?” I ask him. The eggs were delicious, but I’m still hungry.
“They’re for the horse,” he says flatly, his anger already gone like a mercurial summer squall.
“The horse? As in one horse?”
A messenger with the Gift of speed races toward us. Desmond doesn’t falter, pausing only long enough for the messenger to pass before resuming his quick weave around pedestrians. “You initially refused the job. I wasn’t expecting to bring someone back.”
“If we go to the docks, I can sell something and rent another horse.” No way do I want to be that close to someone whose mood seems to change with the flip of a coin, even if we cuddled last night.
“The last thing I want is someone else’s horse knowing the way to our destination.” He furtively glances around us, pausing to examine a wall.
Paranoid, much?
“And what destination would that be?” I ask.
“Move along!” someone shouts. The crowd slows as a guard shoves a lilac-skinned pixie.
Torn wings flutter against her back, and her burgundy hair is matted into knots.
Her hands are shackled, and she stumbles on limping feet, then spits at the soldier.
The guard’s face reddens. He knocks her to the cobblestones with a backhanded slap.
I wince. Others watch, but most continue walking.
“Did you really think you’d get away with it? Worshipping false gods in your shack of a home?”
“The harvest is nigh,” the pixie says. Her hands tremble, revealing wrists worn raw by the cuffs. Rage simmers in her yellow eyes. “You can forbid us from singing and dancing if you wish, but it will not change that Danu birthed us all.”
The guard kicks her face. Blood spurts from her mouth, and a pointy tooth clinks onto the ground. It’s gruesome, and my gut roils in revulsion. This doesn’t happen in Nettlerock. There’s no fae living in Nettlerock.
“Do something,” I hiss to Desmond. “You’re her prince, right?”
Desmond’s jaw clenches. “I can’t. It would break the treaty.
” He grips his sword, knuckles white like he wants to run it through the guard.
But instead, he slips into the shadow of the buildings, his eyes narrowing as he studies him.
I follow, close enough to hear him whisper to himself, “He’s weak in his right knee. ”
The guard laughs and shifts his weight to his left leg as he leans over the pixie.
“You can help,” Desmond says.
“Help free the pixie?”
“No, you could help me admire this touching scene,” he snipes. “With your Gift, you can—”
“I know how to use my Gift! Why don’t you use yours?”
He shakes his head. “It’s inapplicable.”
A brick in the wall is loose. I pull it free, then snake it through the crowd. The guard is too busy mocking the pixie to notice it. I pull the brick back to build momentum, then wham it into the guard’s right knee. He howls as his leg buckles, and he crashes to the cobblestones.
The pixie shakily rises, then scampers into the crowd.
“Hey! Stop that prisoner!” the guard yells. He staggers to his feet, but the pixie is out of sight.
Desmond’s cold smile makes me shudder. Our shoulders brush when we resume walking, and I feel his dark emotions. He would’ve slain that guard to protect the pixie if it wouldn’t have violated the delicate treaty between the Hollowlands and Avedor.
“Your reward?” he asks me, so quietly I’m not sure if I heard correctly. My brows rise in question, and he says, “You gifted me a favor. Now I owe you one in turn.”
A favor from the fae Prince of Death? I frown. That’s exactly the kind of temptation the village elders warned us about. Fae favors are no different than poison that tastes sweet.
But an unpaid debt from a fae isn’t something I like the sound of either. “Give me an hour at Norwynhald,” I propose. It’s something immediate with no magic involved.
He watches me with narrowed eyes, like that’s not the answer he expected. “Fine. I’ll even buy you one of those teeth-rotting sweet rolls.”
As if on cue, my stomach gurgles. “Sorry,” I blurt out, then blush as I catch my mistake. Do not apologize to fae. They take it as an acceptance of blame, an offer of reparation.
I wait for Desmond to demand something of me, like all the stories say he will. Maybe he’ll ask for something precious to me or order me to speak in song until sunset.
Instead, he sighs. He combs his fingers through his curls, which only makes them messier. “Come on,” he says, already picking up the pace. “We were running behind schedule before you bartered for a delay.”