Chapter 16
Sixteen
Small Truths
The washrooms, like everything else in the palace, were polished and grand.
The room next to them was a large bath, open for anyone to use.
I peeked in while Schula took a turn at her business, and it might as well have been a pond for as big as it was.
Fragrant steam misted the room, adding an air of mystery to the dark corners where I couldn’t see.
Small trays of candles floated on the water’s surface, flickering and dancing with each ripple.
I will never get used to how these people view the ritual of taking a hot bath, but I think I’m starting to agree with them.
“Welcome to the bath, may I get you a towel?” A water nymph stood in attendance near the doorway.
“Oh, no, I was just looking. Sorry, I’ll go,” I muttered and began backing away.
“Wait.” A commanding voice echoed off the polished stone room. “I smell something interesting. Please, come closer.”
I looked to the attendant, who seemed cautious but nodded me in.
My footsteps rattled around the room as I skirted the pool and went to a flickering corner of candles.
The smell of damp wood, the one after a summer rain on the forest floor, perfumed the air.
The sole bather in the grand bath was a pink woman, with black hair no longer than the boys’ of the mountains.
Her eyes were solid white, and she didn’t follow my movements with them.
“What can I do for you, lady?” I hoped I wasn’t calling her the wrong title, though other than the king there seemed to be only lords and ladies here.
“Ahh. The reason I was called to counsel with the Autumn King and the other two dignitaries last night. The youngling.” She tilted her head back against the side of the bath, stretching her arms out with no concern about her nakedness.
She gave off a dangerous aura, not unlike Thain when I’d first met him.
Something feral. Maybe something a little bit like the wraith.
“Not so young right now, though, are you? I wonder if I could taste your sire on you.” The way she grinned at her own words made me nervous.
“Wren, there you are.” Schula had found me in the bath. She stood in the doorway, arms crossed.
“Wren, is it?” The strange fae’s lips curled upward, and she licked them. “Wren.”
Schula froze when she spotted the fae in the bath, then she nodded to her. “Krissaph, if you’ll excuse us.”
“Ah, the frigid bitch is here. Run along, little Wren, I’m sure we’ll meet again when it is my king’s turn to entice you.” She stretched again, chuckling to herself.
I didn’t need to be told twice. Schula let me out before her, and the water nymph bowed us out.
“What were you doing?” Schula hissed at me.
“I was just looking at the bath!” I said. “I didn’t know anyone was in there.”
“It wasn’t your fault.” Schula sighed, raking her fingers through her hair. “I’ll take you to a bathhouse later, a nice one without Spring Court rubbish in it.”
“She was Spring Court? What was that talk about her king?” I looked over my shoulder. “I thought the Spring Court would be different.”
“Warmer? Pleasant?” Schula began walking us back to the throne room. “Krissaph is a succubus, one of the unseelie fae.”
“Unseelie?” The word tickled at the back of my mind; I’d heard it before. Possibly from Mila.
“No matter what kind of fae creature you are, from sylph to fae to wraith, you can be classified into one of two categories.” Schula grimaced.
“The seelie are mostly what you’ve encountered so far.
Fae who are essentially considered of a good nature.
Well, by the standards of the Wyldes. We don’t have the same morals as the humans, but for the most part, we could get along.
“The unseelie, though, are all made of something just a little darker. Always something greedy about them, but they all want different things. Let’s say Eberon was made to be sociable, and Thain was made to be contemplative.
I would say the unseelie were made to be wrathful or envious.
Enough so that their baser instincts could be to take something or harm someone.
That wraith you encountered in the mountains with Thain, that was something unseelie. ”
“That’s right, Mila told me once.” I gestured to my back and whispered, “The witch.”
“Anyway, don’t listen to Krissaph, but if you run into her again just—” Schula cursed. “Of course you will. Wren, she’s an ambassador from the Spring Court. Just try to stay out of her way as best as you can.”
I grimaced. “Do all of the courts have unseelie fae in them?”
“Everywhere in the Wyldes,” she said. “Some can actually be pleasant. Born unseelie but who keep a firm grasp on their behaviors to blend into society better. Most of the unseelie, if they belong to any court, are in Winter.”
“Oh.” We stopped talking as we rounded a corner to the main hall of the palace.
“Well, that’s a conversation for another time.” She put on a smile and took my arm. “Are you ready to endure our beloved king a little longer?”
“I just wish it wasn’t all so false,” I grumbled.
Schula’s brows pushed together. “What do you mean?”
“All the honeyed words, the sympathetic gasps. I feel as though I’m a player on a stage,” I clarified.
Schula softened. “The fae are rarely so false with their reactions. This is a people of displayed emotions. A people who were all touched by terrible loss just a few decades ago. All of them are genuine, including King Baeleon.”
It stunned me to silence.
“So, ready?” she asked, beaming at me.
A deep breath steadied me, and another prepared me for the room.
“As ready as I can be.” I put on a smile myself, and we were saluted into the throne room to fend off more courtiers.
The celebration went on for hours. The king kept us near him, but I felt more like a trophy to display than a guest. He didn’t ask me many more questions, the odd one here or there when he wanted to know what kind of wine I liked or if I preferred the architecture of Thanantholl to my home.
Nothing of much consequence, though. But plenty of the other fae took an interest and paid their respects to Baeleon before approaching me.
Thain grew unsettled as the party went on, probably annoyed that he was here for so long.
He even glared at a visiting lord who had only stopped to greet me.
Schula shot him a look, but I didn’t blame him.
I was getting restless too. As thankful as I was for the new clothing, I was ready to yank off the silky attire the moment I got to my bedroom.
I worried with every movement that I would ruin it somehow.
It was late before Baeleon let us leave. With the constant flow of food and drinks, none of us were hungry. All I wanted to do was go to bed.
Stumbling home, Schula said her goodbyes and turned down her road. Eberon was still at the party, enjoying himself, or so he claimed. The socialite. That left me to stumble after Thain, trying not to yawn too loudly as he wound through the sleepy streets back to the house.
The night air was cold, but not so much that it bit and nipped like a winter’s night.
The road was paved with wet leaves that had fallen during the day, waiting for a good rain to sweep them to the sides and away into the waters that veined Thanantholl.
And tired as I was, the sensation of being alone in the quiet with Thain felt good.
Comfortable in a way that I didn’t feel with anyone else.
Maybe Mila, but she would find a way to insert lessons if the silence went on for too long.
And Bryn couldn’t let any silence fall without digging up an amusing story I’d already heard a dozen times over, but he loved to tell them, and I loved to listen.
With Thain, the quiet peace that was usually mine to bring to the room was both of ours, and I found it more than pleasant to share it with someone else.
We arrived at his tree-twined home with nothing to welcome us but the rustling of breeze-addled leaves. Thain opened the door, having me walk into the warmth first.
“Are you going to make it up the stairs?” Thain teased.
Too tired to engage in the banter, I gave him a rude gesture, and he laughed at me as we climbed the staircase, parting as I found my way down the second-floor hall while he continued up to his third-floor quarters.
The room was dark and quiet. The curtain was pulled back enough at the balcony that I could see Puko had found himself a comfortable bed in the ivy-covered railing, so I turned my full attention to drawing a hot bath.
I left my underthings on the floor and sank into the water with a sigh.
I was drained from the party, which is what it must have been.
If that was a party, I was completely on Thain’s side about avoiding them in the future.
Eberon ate it all up, not that it surprised me.
Schula had told me she liked dressing up and didn’t mind the small talk, though she didn’t go looking for it either.
My idea of a party was dancing with no more than three witches from around the mountains on midsummer night, and none of them cared who my parents were.
They simply traveled at Mila’s invitation and celebrated the night together.
Especially Gilly, when Bryn would let her into the cabinet of spirits he kept for special occasions.
But none of them held anything against me that was so far out of my control as my blood.
The bath did wonders for me, and combing my hair out was soothing. I braided it like I always did and put on my old clothes. I went onto the balcony to do some stretches and found Puko gorging himself on a plate of walnuts.
“I’m not entirely sure you’ve had the healthiest diet for a bird. What would Mila think?” I looked at him. He eyed me and cawed.