The Cruel Prince (The Folk of t -(The Folk of the Air #1) - Holly Black Page 0,123
overhear me. “I will help you so long as I am not the only one. I say this as much for your sake as for mine.” With that, he stands. “I wish you and the prince well. If you need me, I will do what I can.”
I get up off the stool and bow again. “You are most generous.”
As I leave his camp, my mind whirls. On one hand, I did it. I managed to speak with one of the rulers of Faerie without making a fool of myself. I even kind of persuaded him to go along with my plan. But I still need another monarch, a more influential one, to agree.
There is one place I have been avoiding. The largest camp belongs to Roiben of the Court of Termites. Notoriously bloodthirsty, he won both of his crowns in battle, so he has no reason to object to Balekin’s blood-soaked coup. Still, Roiben seems to feel much the way Annet of the Court of Moths does, that Balekin is of little consequence without a crown.
Maybe he won’t want to see one of Balekin’s messengers, either. And, given the size of his encampment, I can’t even imagine the number of guardians I would have to pass in order to speak with him.
But possibly I could sneak in. After all, with so many of the Folk around, what is one person more or less?
I gather up a bundle of fallen branches, large enough to be a respectable contribution to a fire, and walk toward the Termite Camp with my head down. There are knights posted around the perimeter, but, indeed, they pay me little mind as I walk past.
I feel giddy with the success of my plan. When I was a child, sometimes Madoc would have to stop in the middle of a game of Nine Men’s Morris. The board would remain as it was, waiting for us to resume. All through the day and the night, I would imagine my moves and his countermoves until, when we sat down, we were no longer playing the original game. Most often what I failed to do was accurately anticipate his next moves. I had a great strategy for me, but not for the game I was in.
That’s how I feel now, walking into the camp. I am playing a game opposite Madoc, and while I can spin out plans and schemes, if I can’t accurately guess his, I am sunk.
I drop the kindling beside a fire. A blue-skinned woman with black teeth regards me for a moment and then goes back to her conversation with a goat-footed man. Dusting the bark from my clothes, I walk toward the largest tent. I keep my step light and my stride easy and even. When I find a patch of shadow, I use it to crawl under the edge of the cloth. For a moment, I lie there, half hidden on both sides and completely hidden on neither.
The inside of the main tent is lit with lanterns burning with green alchemical fire, tinting everything a sickly color. In every other way, however, the interior is lush. Carpets are layered, one over another. There are heavy wooden tables, chairs, and a bed piled with furs and brocade coverlets stitched with pomegranates.
But on the table, to my surprise, are paper cartons of food. The green-skinned pixie who was with Roiben at the coronation uses chopsticks to bring noodles to her mouth. He sits beside her, carefully breaking apart a fortune cookie.
“What does it say?” the girl asks. “How about ‘the trip you told your girlfriend would be fun ended in bloodshed, as usual.’ ”
“It says, ‘Your shoes will make you happy today,’ ” he tells her, voice dry, and passes the little slip across the table for her verification.
She glances down at his leather boots. He shrugs, a small smile touching his lips.
Then I’m dragged roughly out from my hiding place. I roll onto my back outside the tent to find a knight standing above me, her sword drawn. There is no one to blame but myself. I should have kept moving, should have found a way to hide myself inside the tent. I should not have stopped to listen to a conversation, no matter how surprising I found it.
“Get up,” the knight says. Dulcamara. Her face shows no recognition of me, however.
I stand, and she marches me into the tent, kicking me in the legs once we get there so I topple onto the rugs. I