Page 8 of The Crown the Fae Forgot
Shiel had saidthat the worst of it was over, but while that might have been true for his injuries, I doubted the same applied to me. I had a feeling the worst was still yet to come.
Just because the weight of every fae’s eye was no longer tugging on my shoulders, it didn’t mean I had the luxury of letting down my guard. That was why, when the very next morning brought with it the sound of Finch’s voice on the other side of the door, there was only one emotion aroused in me with the news he carried.
Suspicion.
“Aurra,” called Finch, when his first attempts at waking me were ignored, “even if you don’t want to seeme,there’s someone else here for you.”
I rolled over onto my stomach with a groan, the pillow I’d pulled over my face no longer enough of a barrier to protect me from this world. I hadn’t been ignoring Finch in particular, I’d been ignoringeverything.As soon as the healers had left last night, we’d checked once more on Shiel to find him sleeping peacefully for the first time since he’d been injured by Icarus’ guard.
Something about the sight of him safe—or at least as close to safe as he could be—triggered an exhaustion in me that had me stumbling into the next closest room and passing out myself. I was almost surprised when I heard Finch’s voice the first time, not because I’d slept so late into the day, but because he hadn’t somehow wormed his way into my bed with me in the middle of the night. I’d thought that without Shiel to stop him, he would have at least tried.
The fact that he hadn’t was one of the reasons I felt so much suspicion as I finally crept over to crack open the door, only to not find Finch’s face looking back, but a stranger’s.
She bowed the moment she spotted me. “Aurra? I’m Vestele. My Lady sent me to serve you during your time here.”
Behind her, Finch mouthed a quicksorrybefore slipping back into the room where Zev’s snores still practically shook the doors.
This Vestele must have seen me about to try and send her away, because she stepped forward slightly, her foot edging towards the door, as if to keep me from slamming it in her face.
“Our Lady wanted to make sure you were taken care of. From what I’ve heard, I understand why you might have trouble trusting a fae. But I can run a bath for you, clean your clothes, give you a tour around the Court, and much more.” She bobbed her brown head again in a quick bow. The entire time she’d spoken to me, she hadn’t looked me in the eye.
It was a far cry from the servant Icarus had assigned to me, the memory of the way the demon had stared at me as if she…or it…could see into my very soul still making me have to fight off a deep-seeded shudder.
I glanced towards the door Finch had slipped behind, silently swearing at him for leaving me to deal with this newest…complication…on my own.
“Uh,” I stammered, “I don’t think I need any of that.”
Though, even as I said it, I glanced over my shoulder at the empty metal tub in the corner. Without a demon’s magic to fill it, and no spicket anywhere in sight, that particular offer of Vestele’s was already nearly tempting me enough to let down my guard.
If only for as long as it took to fill that tub with steaming water.
“Anything you need, I am here to assist,” Vestele said, her eyes looking at me a little too knowingly when they finally met mine.
I released a sigh. “Right now I’d really like to catch up on some more sleep.”
“I’ll return tomorrow then,” she said, before bowing once more. I wrapped the blanket I’d thrown over my shoulders a little tighter so I could follow her out, then watched alone from the doorway as she left, her footsteps taking her back towards the castle on the far end of the court.
Finch was waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs when I finally stepped back inside.
It was Zev who caught me off guard, however.
“Looks like the Lady of the Southern Court is very interested in you, Princess,” he said, coming up from behind my shoulder with a plate of freshly washed fruits. I should have noticed the silence that had fallen in the absence of his snores. “I’m sure I goes without saying that you’ll need to be very careful of anything you say around her.”
“It does,” I snapped back, unable to hide the bite in my voice.
Instead of growing angry, however, it only made that all-too-familiar smile pull at the outer corner of Finch’s mouth. “Glad to see the Wildness didn’t break you.”
It was in that moment, looking back at him and Zev, that I realized he was right.
I should have been broken. There was no reason for me to be standing before them. I should have been holed up in my room, as broken in spirit as Shiel was in body.
But, instead, I was here. For whatever reason, I was still standing. I was still fighting.
I glanced back over my shoulder towards the door where Vestele had just left. I’d shown no fear in the face of Icarus, the lord of that wicked court he called the Wildness, so why would I cower from any other fae…let alone one assigned to wait on me? Vestele might have been sent here to spy on me, on all of us, but that didn’t matter.
I was used to the fae trying to trick me, trying to use me.
But…I was fae too.
