Chapter 3
The Stabbing Of The Peas
The dinner was an assault on Eiko’s senses.
There were so many voices, so many tangential conversations.
She had never sat in this chair before. Never held this shape of cutlery before.
She wasn’t used to this table or having a person on either side of her, and even more across from her.
She didn’t know which voice belonged to which person, though she had been introduced to them all except the royal family.
They had arrived after her and Ky, and the only warning she got was the mass scraping of chairs.
She was several seconds later than everyone else and felt the burning in her cheeks when Ky whispered beneath his breath for her to curtsey.
“Sit, sit,” the King of All had called in a booming, jovial voice, before turning his full attention to the Lord of Stonesigh, with whom he had been in constant conversation ever since.
His voice was not quite the one she remembered, though it was just recognisable. The heavy edge of hammering violence was gone, replaced by smooth, hearty charisma. The change sat uneasily in her stomach.
She tried to follow the conversations, tried to weed out which male voices might belong to the princes and which female voice might belong to the queen, but soon grew frustrated at her inability.
“Miss Eiko, was it?” a man suddenly asked from across the table.
She thought it was one of Ky’s brothers but couldn’t be sure.
“Yes, my lord.” She lifted her head to look in his direction.
“What do you think of the new temple reforms?”
Some of the chatter died down, several chairs shuffling against the floor as though they were shifting to face her.
It was a loaded question intended to embarrass Ky, and she pressed her teeth together, her temper quickly rising to the surface, fury clouding her thoughts.
She tried to clear her mind enough to give a diplomatic answer.
Something that wouldn’t expose her for the cottage-dwelling, lowborn, public schoolhouse-educated commoner that she was, but the word that spilled from her mouth was … all of those things.
“Barbaric.”
There was now complete silence at the table. Even the King of All and Lord Erendi had dropped their discussion.
“Did you say barbaric?” the brother questioned, sounding outraged and delighted in equal parts. “Do you even know what that word means?”
“She’s blind, not stupid,” Ky growled.
So unbelievably stupid, she thought, hoping that at the very least, Ky’s mother and father were too far down the table to have heard her answer.
“That answer was blind and stupid,” a woman snipped. “What were you thinking, bringing such an uneducated girl to dinner, Ky? Truly.” The woman made a tittering sound beneath her breath, and Eiko’s face flamed hotter.
“Forgive me, I misspoke,” Eiko whispered, ducking her head.
Ky took her hand under the table, squeezing her fingers.
“I didn’t notice you were blind, Miss …”
“Eiko,” Ky supplied.
Eiko looked up again. The voice came from the other end of the table. Ky had stiffened, squeezing her hand so hard her fingers ached. Either the Lady of Stonesigh was speaking directly to her, or … it was the queen.
She began to sweat, unsure how to address the speaker.
“She is, Your Grace,” Ky answered for her.
“I don’t see any scarring,” the queen mused. “Your eyes are such a striking colour. Like pearlescent clouds. Positively frightening.”
Eiko’s mouth popped open. She was at a complete loss for how to respond. Pearlescent clouds? What the fuck? Who speaks like that?
“Was it an accident, I wonder?” The queen spoke mildly, apparently not done with the subject. Was she just musing out loud, or asking?
Eiko had the distinct impression that the queen had become so bored over her husband’s discussion with Lord Erendi that she had decided to turn Eiko into her dinnertime entertainment.
She assumed she was supposed to supply an answer, so she did. “Yes, Your Grace.”
She waited.
The rest of the table waited.
They were all so quiet. Nobody was eating anymore.
“Well, go on.” The queen laughed, the sound a delicate tinkle. Eiko wondered if she also had another voice, like the king. She wondered if it would be as sharp as his, as heavy, when only a select few were listening.
“It was an encounter with the Quiet, Your Grace.”
The room had been silent before, but now it was worse. It almost sounded like everyone was holding their breath.
“You Silenced a monster?” the king demanded, his voice more distinct than anyone else’s at the table, a drop of sharpness leaking into his tone.
He had Silenced. She wasn’t sure why that thought occurred to her at that moment. Everyone knew the king was the most powerful man alive, that his monster was the most powerful monster alive, that his monster had gifted him more powers than she had fingers on her hands.
She hadn’t ever actually met a person who had successfully Silenced a monster. His tone had her questioning if there was some sort of law about it she wasn’t aware of.
“No, Your Grace.” She swallowed, so nervous she could be sick. “I refused to. The monster blinded me in retribution.”
“Refused, did you?” The king laughed like she was the funniest thing he had seen all day, even though most people’s first instinct would be to refuse an all-powerful, murderous monster attempting to fuse with their very mind and soul. “What did they offer you?”
That was extremely personal, but nobody at the table dared to intervene.
“A horse, Your Grace.”
“Just a … a horse?” a woman from across the table balked. “Light protect us, how disturbingly simple.”
Someone scoffed quietly towards the front of the table where the king and queen sat. “She speaks half-truths.” His voice was a deep roll of sound: velvety, lazy, bored.
“Where was the horse taking you?” the king demanded, catching on to the meaning of whoever had seen through her words.
“Anywhere,” she answered honestly, since the man with the deep, velvety voice had already called her out on her white lie. “Everywhere.”
“She wants to see the world.” That same snippy woman as earlier—most likely Ky’s sister—mocked her from across the table. “No wonder the Quiet blinded her. How … underwhelming. How simple.”
Eiko slipped her hand out of Ky’s and picked up a fork, holding it in her fist.
Call me simple one more time. I dare you, bitch.
Ky quickly confiscated the fork and recaptured her hand, his grip tight as he held it hostage beneath the table. She picked up her knife with her free hand, palming it in her fist and planting her fist against the table.
Go on, open your mouth again. Do it.
Further down the table, she could have sworn she heard a low male chuckle.
That same velvety register as before. Whoever it was, there was something very magnetic about him, and she couldn’t even see him.
All she knew was that her ears were pleasantly pricking, straining to hear more of that deep cadence with the rich, fluid Goldmoor accent.
But he didn’t speak again, and they seemed to forget all about her after that, growing bored and moving on to other matters.
As soon as the royal family gathered to depart, Eiko and Ky slipped out, avoiding any parting words with Ky’s family.
“That was awful, as expected.” Ky spoke flippantly as they hurried down the steps again, Eiko’s cane knocking lightly against each one.
“I didn’t stab anyone,” she said. “That has to count for something.”
“You stabbed me. With a fork.”
“What a stupid place to put your hand. Right beside a blind person’s plate. I thought it was a pea.”
“You’re supposed to scoop peas. Not stab them.” He broke off into laughter. “It was hilarious to see their faces when you just kept stabbing your plate like that, sending peas scattering everywhere. You should come to every dinner party. I’ll never forget that. Thank you, Eiko.”
“Oh my god, stop being so serious with all your ‘thank yous’ and ‘will you marry mes.’”
“I haven’t once asked for your hand.”
“You didn’t ask for it. You just kept it prisoner half the night. I want silver for the healer, by the way. I think several of my finger bones have been crushed.”
“I literally bled.”
“So you say. I saw no blood.” She sniffed, ignoring his sound of exasperation. “So, what did they look like? Tell me everything.”
“Queen Noemi is still the hottest woman in Lyra, and King Grigori is still the hottest man in all of Lyra, but his sons are coming in close second. I’m not a total fucking pervert, but if I was—”
“Yes, you are—”
“If I was, I would say something right now about making family reunions clothing optional.”
“You should float the idea to them, see how they feel about putting you in charge of organising their seasonal gatherings. So what do the princes look like, now?”
“If Prince Corvan didn’t blink, birds would mistake him for a gold statue and perch all over his shoulders.”
“How nice for him. And for the birds. And the others?”
“Prince Ceran is … unique. He’s the one who exposed you when you claimed you asked the monster for a horse.”
“Unique? Like ugly?”
“No, not like that. He’s just … there’s a sharpness in his eyes. It’s … a little terrifying. My sisters stared at him through the whole dinner, trying to get his attention. He only perked up for you, though.”
“And by for me, you mean—”
“To expose you, yes.”
“And the youngest? Prince Chasin?”
“Wasn’t there.” Ky squeezed her hand in silent acknowledgement, but neither of them would talk about the cave incident from ten years ago. Not with so many ears around. Not inside the mountain.
“Eiko! Ky!” Rion called out as they stepped from the mountain and into the frigid night. She happened upon them in a rustling of skirts. “How was dinner?”
“Barbaric,” Ky said, a smirk hiding behind the word.
“You’re a dick,” Eiko grumbled.
“So …?” Rion pressed. “Good? Bad?”
“Could have been worse,” Eiko admitted. “Nobody got stabbed.”
“Once again, I got stabbed,” Ky insisted.