Chapter 7 #2
My eye locks on those colorful splats of powder staining their clothes. Now I know what it is. It’s rapture, a fae aphrodisiac that the nobles of certain courts sniff. It’s also a little dangerous, because it strips you of your control and makes you desire nothing more than hedonistic pursuits.
Tomorrow that serving girl is going to wake with a giant’s hammer of a headache and possibly the butler in her bed.
“I’m afraid I prefer my targets to be a little less love-drunk and a little more in control of their faculties,” I reply. I hate such mindless cruelty. The servants have little recompense here. They owe their lives to Malechus—and his guests’—favor.
They can’t refuse to play.
And the appearance of the drug strips them of any remaining choices in regards to their bodies.
“Oh, pish,” says the woman. I’m starting to put a name to her face. Rhea, perhaps? She belongs to the Court of Whispers, though I can’t remember whether she’s part of the ruling family there. “Where’s the fun in that? If she wanted to avoid her current situation, then she should have run faster.”
I should give a shrug and laugh before slipping amongst the women.
I have a reason to be here. I want to find out exactly what the relationship between Belladonna and Anissa is.
Because if Anissa is Malechus’s lover, then I doubt she’d be friends with Belladonna.
To all appearances, Belladonna is displeased with her cousin’s efforts to push her into marriage.
But it’s that callous disregard for a servant’s choice that rubs me the wrong way.
I’ve disguised myself as a servant before.
I’ve had lords’ corner me in darkened rooms, their faces twisted with malice and dark desires before I showed them the error of their ways—and the pointy end of a knife.
I’ve had fae ladies play similar games with me, as if I’m a mere amusement and not a woman with my own hopes and dreams.
I’ve been able to avoid such vicious endeavors purely because my role in their worlds has been a ruse and I’ve been able to escape.
The serving girl with the fox tail has no choice. She has no escape from this.
I turn toward Rhea. She wants to play games? Okay. We’ll play. Right now, I have a position of power, even if these women would tear me down if they knew the truth.
“Your bow?” I ask Rhea, who was the same female I saw sliding her hand over Keir’s sleeve.
I can’t help myself.
I take the bow and arrow from her hands.
And then I smile at her. “Indeed, let’s make this a little more challenging. Let’s see if you are faster than the serving girl.”
Every head in the vicinity tracks toward me. The other ladies look delighted. Some whisper behind their hands, and I can see they think me jealous of Keir’s attentions toward Rhea.
“You wouldn’t dare,” she snaps, backing away from me.
“What’s wrong?” I set the arrow to the bow. “Do you prefer to pick and choose your own partners? Would you perhaps desire a prince? Would you try to steal him?”
Jealousy is a lovely little motive to hide behind.
And maybe there’s a little bit of truth in it.
“Run,” I suggest. “Run fast.”
Rhea takes off with a squeal, shoving her way through the horde of silk.
“Doesn’t she make a fine rabbit?” I ask the woman beside me as I draw the bow back. If I hit her, then I’m virtually declaring war on the Court of Whispers. “Let’s make her think I have her measure. Where shall I aim? That tree in front of her?”
“Right in the back,” the woman replies with a malicious smile.
I loose the arrow, and it hits the tree right in front of Rhea. She squeals as she darts to avoid the puff of pretty pink powder that explodes into the air.
I lower the bow. “While I would love to send that smirking little wretch to her knees, I think a warning sufficient for the moment. But perhaps you would care to do the honors?”
With a wink, I pass the bow to my crestfallen partner.
It breaks up the gaggle of predatory women. They’re no longer focusing on the servants, and the servants—with some relief—are slipping away while they’re no longer visible to the gathering.
I laugh with several of the ladies who think my ruse was amusing to watch. They’ll turn on me in an instant. But for now I’ve won entrance into their little group, which was an unexpected advantage.
And as I watch the serving maid, I see the moment where she staggers against the hedge, feeling overcome with rapture.
Slipping out of the group of fae women as refreshments are brought, I pass behind a tree and vanish, reappearing at the girl’s side where I capture her in my arms.
She looks at me in a mixture of glazed shock and hunger. Even the simple act of my hands on her skin have set off the rapture coursing through her veins.
“Let’s get you back to your rooms,” I murmur.
“No, please, my lady. I don’t….”
I understand. She thinks I intend to overwhelm her. “You’re safe,” I whisper. “You need to sleep it off. I’ll get you out of here.”
I hate the fright in her eyes, but this one time, I have been able to use my power for good.
Even if it makes me a powerful enemy.
* * *
By the time I’ve set the little maid in her bed and returned to the gathering on the lawn, the bows and arrows have vanished and the men have returned. There’s no sign of Keir. Perhaps he’s cleaning up after the hunt.
A blur of darkness captures my attention.
The Lord of Mistmark slips away from the party as if he’s heading toward the castle to refresh himself—but halfway there, he takes a sidestep and vanishes into the maze.
“Excuse me,” I say to a princess who’s trying to insult me. I think she’s one of Rhea’s friends. “I have to… fix my hair.”
And then I walk away from her, ignoring her shocked gasp and her pointed “how rude.”
I slip into the shadows as I enter the maze.
The world is abruptly muted. It’s like looking at everything through a diaphanous gray veil.
Fine details are lost, and everything becomes soft and blurred.
It strips the hard edges from a fae prince’s face and eases the harsh lines and avarice in a princess’s expression.
I steal from shadow to shadow, tiptoeing along in the wake of the Lord of Mistmark.
He’s the one mystery I haven’t been able to solve.
He reaches one of the final turns of the maze and glances over his shoulder. A lock of raven-dark hair tumbles over his brow, and I catch my first glimpse of alpine-blue eyes. They’re amazing eyes. Even with a veil of shadow between us, they make my breath catch.
Okay, maybe it was the eyes that caught Soraya’s attention.
She’s always had a thing for pretty fae lords with sulky mouths and dangerous intensity. Or lords who are clearly up to no good, because Mistmark is obviously meeting someone here. Someone he shouldn’t be.
Maybe someone female?
I wonder what your dearest Belladonna will think of this….
We slip through the maze, and Mistmark clearly knows where he’s going, because within minutes he paces into a clearing where a hundred oak trees stand apace, clipped into uniform precision.
It’s not the heart of the maze, but one of the “rooms” inside.
We passed dozens of them: a fountain carved of alabaster—shockingly white against the reddened leaves of the maze—stood alone on a field of lawn carefully mown into checkered squares akin to a chessboard; a water garden edged by hedging caught my eye; a dozen cascading pools babbled like a brook in another; a folly; a grotto; even a spun-glass butterfly house, with dozens of tiny winged fey trapped inside.
“Where are you?” he calls softly.
A figure appears from around the trunk of one of the mighty oaks. I start, because although I’d scanned the garden the second I approached, I didn’t see him there.
It’s a fae male I don’t know.
Someone fairly prominent, judging by the dark green velvet coat and the diamond earring stabbed through his ear.
It glitters like a star. Despite the clean lines and cut of his clothes, the way he wears them tells me he likes to look good.
His cheeks are so smooth I want to run my hands over them just to check if he even grows stubble, and the way his hair is raked back looks like he’s spent a decent allotment of time soothing it into place.
Mistmark, on the other hand, is simple good taste.
Black velvet. Black leather gloves. Slightly scuffed boots. Careless hair.
It’s all expensive—and I’m fairly certain I recognize a glint of demorari silk embroidered into elegant roses in the weft of his coat, which is the latest of fashions in the southern courts—but Mistmark looks as though he paid good money to a tailor or three, and simply let them loose on his wardrobe.
Something simple. Something fashionable. Make me look like a groom who’s comfortable in his own power, and not someone forced to bend knee before another court…. Nothing too fussy….
Whereas the blond looks as though he made half a dozen tailors and their assistants sweat as he pored over every scrap of fabric, and then fingered the seams before sniffing and insisting they did them again.
My eye lingers on the newcomer. Even from the shadows, his hair gleams like spun moonbeams. There’s an uneasy sensation within my breast—a feeling I know this stranger, when I could swear we’ve never met in our lives.
I study his face, but no recognition dawns.
I’ve never seen him before. I’m sure of it.
“Well?” Mistmark tugs his leather gloves from his hands, finger by finger.
“It is done,” the stranger says. He tosses Mistmark a scroll of paper. “You’re playing dangerous games. Malechus won’t appreciate it.”
“Malechus started the game,” Mistmark says coldly. “If he doesn’t like my rules, then he shouldn’t have challenged me.”
Ooh, interesting.
The stranger laughs under his breath. “I admire your brashness, Alaric. Very few seek to take on the Prince of Knives, and few do it out in the open like this.”
Mistmark unfurls the scroll, a faint smile edging his lips as he examines it. “You found the questing beast.”