The Wicked King (The Folk of the Air #2) - Holly Black Page 0,70
of the pack. Scattered among leaves and underbrush.
Servants bring wine and cakes, and I lick the sweet icing and let the conversation wash over me. The pain in my leg is distracting, but more distracting yet is the memory of the riders laughing, the memory of their closing in beneath the tree. The memory of being wounded and frightened and all alone.
When I wake the day of Taryn’s wedding, it is in the bed of my childhood. It feels like coming up from a deep dream, and, for a moment, it’s not that I don’t know where I am—it’s that I don’t remember who I am. For those few moments, blinking in the late-afternoon sunlight, I am Madoc’s loyal daughter, dreaming of becoming a knight in the Court. Then the last half year comes back to me like the now-familiar taste of poison in my mouth.
Like the sting of the sloppily done stitches.
I push myself up and unwrap the cloth to look at the wound. It’s ugly and swollen, and the needlework is poor. My leg is stiff, too.
Gnarbone, an enormous servant with long ears and a tail, comes into my room with a belated knock. He is carrying a tray with breakfast on it. Quickly, I flip the blankets over my lower body.
He puts the tray on the bed without comment and goes into the bath area. I hear the rush of water and smell crushed herbs. I sit there, braced, until he leaves.
I could tell him I’m hurt. It would be a simple thing. If I asked Gnarbone to send for a military surgeon, he’d do it. He’d tell Oriana and Madoc, of course. But my leg would be stitched up well and I’d be safe from infection.
Even if Madoc had sent the riders, I believe he’d still take care of me. Courtesy, after all. He’d take it to be a concession, though. I’d be admitting that I needed him, that he won. That I’d come home for good.
And yet, in the light of the morning, I am fairly sure it wasn’t Madoc who sent the riders, even if it was the sort of trap he favors. He would have never sent assassins who hung back and who rode off when the numbers were still on their side.
Once Gnarbone goes out, I drink the coffee greedily and make my way to the bath.
It’s milky and fragrant, and only under the water can I allow myself to weep. Only under the water can I admit that I almost died and that I was terrified and that I wish there was someone to whom I could tell all that. I hold my breath until there’s no more breath to hold.
After the bath, I wrap myself in an old robe and make it back to the bed. As I try to decide if it’s worth sending a servant back to the palace to get me another dress or if I should just borrow something of Taryn’s, Oriana comes into the room, holding a silvery piece of cloth.
“The servants tell me you brought no luggage,” she says. “I assume you forgot that your sister’s wedding would require a new gown. Or a gown at all.”
“At least one person is going to be naked,” I say. “You know it’s true. I’ve never been to a single revel in Faerie where everyone had clothes on.”
“Well, if that’s your plan,” she says, turning on her heels. “Then I suppose all you need is a pretty necklace.”
“Wait,” I say. “You’re right. I don’t have a dress, and I need one. Please don’t go.”
When Oriana turns, a hint of a smile is on her face. “How unlike you, to say what you actually mean and have it be something other than hostile.”
I wonder how it is for her to live in Madoc’s house, to be Madoc’s obedient wife and have had a hand in all his schemes being undone. Oriana is capable of more subtlety than I would have given her credit for.
And she has brought me a dress.
That seems like a kindness until she spreads it out on my bed.
“It’s one of mine,” she says. “I believe it will fit.”
The gown is silver and reminds me a little of chain mail. It’s beautiful, with trumpet sleeves slashed along the length of the arm to show skin, but it has a plunging neckline, which would look one way on Oriana and a totally different way on me.
“It’s a little, uh, daring for a wedding, don’t you think?”