6. Elim
The Bright Court was absolutely nothing like what I’d expected. No one would consider the Seelie and Unseelie particularly close, but I’d still been brought up on tales of Seelie opulence and sun-drenched gardens, gilded architecture and plush areas of repose throughout the realm. This, which I could only imagine was a receiving room for the lowest caliber and most hastily-welcomed guests, was dark enough to put my own Court to shame. It seemed at direct odds with Perikar’s poetic waxing about his golden-haired lover, as well as the jewelry and trinkets he mentioned she wore to their forbidden trysts, and her well-appointed bedchambers.
Sensuality was a hallmark of the Bright Court fae, but the sudden appearance of a scantily-clad human offering me some sort of drink was still a shock. Suspicious her semi-exposed chest and half-bared ass was sent as a test of loyalty to my brand new bond of intention, I politely declined, diverting my eyes to a lighted platform in the center of the room as music swelled from somewhere unseen. Fine magic, that. I couldn’t spot so much as a hint of a crouching bard.
When my intended—Melisandre, as the drink-offering human had cheerfully mentioned in passing—finally parted the curtain, my breath caught in my throat. In what I could only imagine was ceremonial Bright Court wedding garb, she sparkled like the finest jewels in the seven soils. The music was unfamiliar and a bit grating, but she seemed to know it well, undulating her body and using a slender ruby-gold post to balance herself on elevated shoes as she spun. The dance, clearly one made to overtly mimic our later activities, held my attention effortlessly and required me to cross one leg over the other soon after she began.
The tension of my escape and worry over my niece seemed manageable in light of my unexpected luck, and I allowed myself to relax, if only for a moment. As I watched my bride spin and send seductive, teasing looks out across the sparse audience, my fantasies wavered between thoughts of making use of her obvious flexibility and setting a proper crown on her head once I’d ousted Gretvir. She was magnificent, and if such a beautiful specimen of the Court proposed to me so boldly and swiftly, perhaps the animosity between our Courts was more rumor than fact.
I sighed fondly as she inverted herself on the shimmering red-gold pole as the music slowed. Her silken red hair—short for a fae, but nonetheless beautiful—hung downwards like my favorite type of tree moss, and I wondered how it would feel tangled in my fingers as I claimed her after we were bound. I hoped she’d give me that same hungry look she sent my way now, perhaps even some pretty little cries of pleasure as I took her with me to ecstasy. Yes, I thought fiercely as I discreetly adjusted myself, nearly shoving through my trousers at the image. She’ll sing for me.
My hand froze, cupped in my lap as I shifted myself for comfort, as Melisandre’s dance took an alarming turn. As she righted herself, a lock of her hair slipped free, and she tucked it behind her ear absently. I’d been so enamored by her beautiful eyes and lusciously curved body that it hadn’t registered that she seemed different somehow, even for a Seelie. The curved, rounded edge of her newly-exposed ear was as foreign as those on the man I’d spoken when I emerged, as those on the short woman that had offered me a drink. Panic set in as I glanced to my right and left, confirming the men I’d mistaken for disinterested, poorly-dressed royal guards sporting the same unfamiliar features. Humans. They were all humans.
Looking through my surroundings with new eyes, I came to an absolutely devastating conclusion: This wasn’t the Bright Court.
I’d let my guard down and celebrated my seeds before the soil was turned, and now every bit of certainty tasted like ash on my tongue. The insistent tug of my magical bond with Melisandre sent my stomach spinning with another, more troubling revelation: I’d bound myself to marry a human.
An exceptionally beautiful one, yes, and I’d been too hasty from lingering desperation for my life and Glade’s, but still. Unseelie did not have the history with humans and the human realm that the Bright Court did. Our agreements were rare enough that each case was its own story in lore, and the vast majority were cautionary. The stories warned our young of how easily humans broke their word, used loopholes and tricky language, and cast us as villains.
The danger now was the one-sided nature of those arrangements. Until Melisandre and I were bound and bedded—her duties as the human that initiated the bargain—she could ask anything she wanted of me and I’d be compelled to present it as a dowry.
Anything.