Page 29 of The Crown the Fae Forgot
I knowthey saw me and Finch, but there was no time to address it.
There isn’t even time for me to truly process it.
Together again, at last, all three of us began forcing our way through the crowd, towards the balcony where we last saw Lady Phyrra. Shiel finds his way to my side, and though he says nothing, I see the bag he has slung over his shoulder—and the two now hanging at Zev’s side. They were brightly colored, clearly purchased from the festival on Zev’s journey back towards the house, but like the clothes I wore beneath the flowing gown I too had purchased, what was stuffed inside was far more utilitarian in purpose.
The sight of it sobered me slightly, pulling me the final rung off the heady ladder Finch had climbed for the both of us.
Offerings had already begun to pile up at the door to Lady Phyrra’s dwellings, gifts of an early harvest, crafts, charms, boxes and bags and swaths of fabric that already could be measured by the acre instead of yards. The lady herself sat on a throne of sorts, her head bowing slightly to each fae as they approached, her face formed into an expression of contritethanks—right up until she caught sight our sorry band pushing its way through the crowd.
I was under no illusion that we looked anything other than a mess compared to her court, to say nothing of how I’d look if I stood beside the lady herself. We’d been here for long enough that we shouldn’t have looked like the ragtag band of ruffians that we did, but no amount of colorful silk could make up for the dark circles that had taken up permanent residence beneath my eyes.
It was a small wonder she looked at me at all, even more that she’d agreed to help me take my throne. Compared to her, I was nothing. More than the obvious physical difference, with her encapsulating the pinnacle of fae beauty and me remaining firmly at the bottom of human’s far inferior version, was the power she commanded.
If she’d wanted to, all she’d need to do is reach out one hand and snap her fingers, and I’d be gone.
If her guard didn’t do it, then her people—devoted as they were—would do it for her.
But she didn’t. Instead, she reached out her hand in a gesture of greeting, beckoning me closer with a welcoming smile.
I did as I was told, not that I could have resisted her pull if I tried.
As I did, however, something in the corner of my vision caught my eye. There, amongst the brightly colored silks and satins of the court, a fae child darted between the onlooking figures. I’d only spotted a few other fae young enough to be called children, but that wasn’t what drew my attention to this one. This boy was alone, his face smudged with grime and his eyes wide with hunger—and from the way his dark clothes hung off his frame, it wasn’t the first time that feeling had gnawed at him.
I’d reached the lady, her hand reaching out to cup mine gently, her face tilting down slowly from her elaborate throne to look at me as if just being here, in here presence, was the greatest gift of all.
She pulled me a little closer, her voice dropping slightly so she could speak to me without being overheard.
“My advisors are waiting for you inside,” she said. “Go to them, and as the magic of Midsommar reaches its peak, they’ll try to channel the glamour to break the illusion over you.”
I felt, rather than saw, Shiel step up beside me.
For a second, Lady Phyrra’s hand tightened a little too much where it held mine.
“I’ll be channeling my own magic from here,” she reassured us both. “But this way, if the magic works, you won’t be revealed to the entire Southern Court. Unless, of course, you’d prefer it that way?”
Her eyes sharpened a bit on mine before she added, with none of the reverence or affection I’d heard before, “Princess?”
It was a challenge, I knew, a mockery as much as it was anything else.
But what was I supposed to do?
She held the power here yet, not me, and she was making sure I remembered it.
Behind her, the clock tower ticked ever closer to the place where all three hands would finally meet. As much as I could feel Shiel beside me practically bristling to do something stupid in defense of my honor, I just gave Lady Phyrra a nod of thanks and stepped back as she finally released my hand.
We were ushered around the throne towards the manor behind her, the next all-too-excited fae stepping into our place to greet their lady next as soon as we’d vacated the space. The four of us were invisible as slipped behind the throne and into the manor behind it, all eyes so drawn to the lady this courtworshipped that we could have started a war without them noticing.
The inside of the manor seemed colder without the lady’s presence. Or, perhaps rather than her warmth, it was simply the contrast between the heat and color of the festival and this new cold, lifeless building where the air was cool and the walls dulled the screams and cries of the crowd outside. The moment we plunged into the cool, dry, dim lighting, I felt something inside me seize up.
The hallway was made of white stone, the vaulted ceiling arching overhead so that shadows shifted between the chandeliers hanging between each section of the hall, the limestone beams running the length of the hall making it look like we were stepping into the long, white throat of some enormous creature.
And in a way, we were.
In a way, we’d always been here. We’d made a long journey to this moment, just to finally be swallowed whole.
From the moment I’d arrived in this court, I knew this was my fate.
I knew I was destined to unlock the power deep within me, to lift the glamour that had held me in its grip since before my mind began to even form memory. I’d wrestled with this truth since before I knew for certain that itwastruth.
