Chapter 38 Wren
Afew days later, Cassiel announces his intention of going to visit his former mentor, Benedict Greenvale.
He lives just south of the village of Greenvale, a town an hour or so away by carriage.
Guards, I’m fairly sure, are supposed to ride with the driver so that they can keep a lookout, but Cassiel refuses. He insists I sit inside with him.
“It’s cold,” he tells me.
“I can handle it.”
“I can’t.” He pouts a little, and I do as he says, climbing into the carriage with him. We set off seconds later, riding under the portcullis. Every time I enter or leave this place, the gates remind me of how little I belong. Designed to keep my kind out.
I used to laugh at the idea of how easily I could slip in and out.
I’m not laughing anymore.
Cassiel sighs. “Come and sit next to me,” he asks.
“I’m arching my eyebrow at you,” I tell him, “for I don’t know if that’s a request or an order.”
“It’s never an order,” Cassiel insists. “You won’t follow them anyway.”
I inhale slightly, mulling it over. “I shouldn’t—”
“I’m cold,” he says. “I imagine you are too. Please, Wren.”
One day, I hope, I’ll not be undone by a simple request from him… but it isn’t today. I relent, sliding into the seat next to him. I’ve barely sat down before Cassiel has drowned me in his blanket and taken my hand in his.
“This was all a cunning ploy, wasn’t it?”
“I just want to know where you are.”
“Isn’t it fairly obvious?”
He squeezes my fingers. “A little more reassurance wouldn’t go amiss…”
I don’t quite manage not to squeeze back.
“Describe the scenery for me.”
“Misty,” I tell him. “I can see a little of the trees—red and gold, now. The grass is covered in dew. No frost yet, but… I imagine it won’t be long.”
Cassiel leans against my shoulder, eyes closed, face pale.
“Are you all right?” I ask him.
“Dizzy,” he says. “Cold. This is perhaps not the most pleasant of weather to be travelling in.”
I can only imagine how dull it must be to ride along in complete darkness, and I can’t imagine the jolting of the carriage is particularly fun. I reach for my hip flask and offer him a drink. He takes it, and lies back against my shoulder. “Talk to me, Wren,” he whispers. “Banish the dark.”
“What should I talk about?”
“I wish to learn more about you.”
I hate requests like those. I never have any idea of what to tell him. I can hardly tell him about the Moonhollow. Even if I try to tell some childhood tale, magic trickles into far too many of them.
“My mother,” I say at last. She’s the safest topic I have, and I was rarely allowed to talk about her in the Moonhollow…
or perhaps I just didn’t want to. “She used to braid my hair before bed. Not just a single plait, but little woven twists all along my scalp. She’d hum while she did it—softly, like a lullaby.
Sometimes she would make up stories to go with the patterns in my hair, telling me they were spells to keep my dreams sweet.
I believed her.” I let out a quiet breath.
“I slept soundly, every night, while she was alive.” Unless I scorched the bedsheets and woke to smoke.
Cassiel shifts slightly against me. “She sounds… warm.” His voice is slow, like he’s turning the thought over carefully in his mind.
“She was.” I swallow, willing away the ache of longing.
“There was one winter—an early frost had come, and the rivers froze before the traders could get through. I must have been five or six. There was hardly anything left to eat, but my mother somehow managed to make a feast out of scraps. She told me it was a royal banquet, that we were queens and princesses dining in a great hall. She made me sit up straight and sip my broth from a cracked teacup as if it were the finest wine.” I laugh, just a little. “I believed her then, too.”
Cassiel exhales, his breath warm against my shoulder. “You were loved,” he murmurs.
I close my eyes. “I was.”
I don’t say the rest—I was, until I wasn’t. Until she was gone, and I was sent to my grandmother, who turned lullabies into lessons, braids into bindings, childhood into duty.
I think she loves me too, but it’s very different from the way my mother loved me. A deep lake and feather bed are both inviting, yet only one will keep you warm.
“My father died when I was ten,” Cassiel tells me.
I swallow the lump in my throat, hoping he can’t hear it. “I know.”
“Ru wasn’t even born then. She’s never known him. Sometimes, I used to envy her for that—that she’s never known the pain of losing a parent. I don’t envy her now, though. I’m glad I knew him.”
“I’m glad I knew my mother, too.”
Cassiel squeezes my hand.
“The fey killed your father, didn’t they?” I ask him, as if I wasn’t there when it happened, as if I haven’t started to have dreams when I’m there in the glade, cutting him free, forgetting that he killed my father, and only remembering that he’s Cassiel’s.
Cassiel nods silently.
“Do you know why?”
“Retaliation,” he tells me. “He’d killed enough of their kind.”
“Do you ever wonder what they want?” I continue, because even though I know, I want to know what he thinks.
I want to know if he truly hates all of us.
“The fey, that is? Why do they do what they do?”
“Power,” he says quietly. “Or lack of it. That’s why anyone does anything.”
“Is that right?” I ask. “There’s love, too.”
“Now who’s the poet?” He smiles against my shoulder. “I think it’s still the same thing,” he remarks.
“What?”
“Love. We do crazy things for it because of how we’ll feel without it—the utter powerlessness of it all. Or perhaps it just makes us feel powerless to begin with.”
“Perhaps?” I query.
“It does,” he says more solidly. “It does make us utterly powerless.”
I think I understand what he’s saying, but I can’t let him know that. It’s far too dangerous. Instead, I squeeze his hand and lean my head against his. Surrendering, just for a moment, to the feeling of being powerless.
It feels a lot like being free.
The carriage slows, its wheels crunching over gravel, and I lift my head to peer through the rain-streaked window.
Benedict’s residence is a crumbling manor, weathered by the years.
Ivy crawls up the walls, reaching long fingers toward high, mullioned windows.
Light spills from them, golden and inviting against the gloom.
Cassiel shifts against me, rousing as the carriage jolts to a stop. I place a steadying hand against his arm. “We’re here.”
He exhales slowly, gathering himself before the door swings open. A gust of cold air sweeps in, carrying the scent of damp earth and woodsmoke.
A figure appears at the top of the steps as we clamber out.
“Cassiel! My good man!”
Benedict Greenvale sweeps down the steps with all the grace of a courtier and the flair of an actor stepping onto a stage.
His coat—emerald green, lined with gold embroidery—flutters dramatically behind him.
His dark hair is loose, curling just past his collar, and there’s a streak of silver at his temple that adds to his roguish charm.
His boots shine despite the mud, and a ruby ring glints on his finger as he extends a hand.
Cassiel chuckles, a smile tugging at his lips. “Benedict.”
“I cannot tell you how delighted I am that you took me up on my invitation.” Benedict claps his hands together. “Though, stars above, you look like death warmed over.”
“Charming as ever,” Cassiel mutters, but he takes the support when I whisper to him that Benedict’s offering it, and steps unsteadily towards the house.
Benedict studies him, his sharp gaze flickering over Cassiel’s pale face, his stiff posture. “Inside with you, before you freeze solid.” His attention shifts to me, and he grins. “And you, good ser. I don’t believe we’ve been formally introduced?”
“Serawen Thornvale,” I tell him, offering a bow. I’m amazed at how easily the name comes to me, now. How much longer until I believe the lies myself? “My friends call me Wren.”
“A lovely name,” he says, although I note he doesn’t repeat it. “Come in, come in.”
He turns on his heel and strides up the steps, clearly expecting us to follow. Cassiel moves after him, slower, and I keep close.
The moment I step inside, something shifts.
It’s subtle—just a whisper at the edge of my senses—but unmistakable.
The air feels heavier, charged, like the moment before a storm.
A faint hum threads through the space, something I can’t quite place.
It’s not the warmth of the fire crackling in the hearth, nor the scent of old books and spiced wine.
It’s something else.
Something almost… magical.
I glance at Cassiel, but he’s already sinking into a chair by the fire, his exhaustion evident. Benedict is pouring wine from a decanter. “Will you take a glass, Ser Thornvale?”
“Not while I’m on duty, I’m afraid.”
“Very well. Let me send for some tea, instead.”
Benedict rings a small silver bell, and within moments, a servant appears—a middle-aged woman with sharp eyes and a no-nonsense air.
She nods at Benedict before sweeping away, returning not long after with a tray laden with a steaming teapot, delicate cups, and an assortment of bread, cheese, and dried fruit.
Cassiel perks up almost immediately at the scent of fresh tea, his earlier exhaustion ebbing. He accepts a cup gratefully, blowing on it before taking a sip. Some colour returns to his face as the warmth spreads through him.
“I must say,” Benedict muses, settling into the chair opposite Cassiel and helping himself to cheese, “It really is good to see you out and about. The rest of court claimed you’d become something of a recluse.”
“Travelling when you can’t see anything doesn’t quite hold the enjoyment it once did.”
“Well, quite,” says Benedict, smiling for some reason, “but I do plan to make this visit worth your while.” He takes another bite of cheese. “Ser Thornvale, allow me to regale you with some tales of Prince’s Cassiel’s youth—”
Cassiel groans. “I beg you, no—”