Fated Crown by Eva Chase
Chapter Twenty
Talia
I’d have thought that being in pain would make it easier to produce tears. As the healer warned me might happen, the wound on my thigh still throbs deep in the muscle when I’m moving around much. But even with that pulsing ache spreading through my flesh, I can’t start weeping for the curse victim in front of me like flicking a switch.
I look at her, taking in the frail lines of her aged body turned even more brittle in the curse’s grip, and think of the children and grandchildren she might be hoping to see grow older, that the curse would steal from her. Of my own grandparents who passed on, never knowing I was still alive, while I was trapped here in the fae realm. It takes a few minutes for the familiar burn to form.
Our audience, gathered in the glow of the Heart’s rhythmic light, is nothing but patient. They might even like it when the spectacle takes a little longer, giving time for their anticipation to grow so their relief when I deliver the cure can be that much greater. When I turn away from the cursed woman, with Corwin’s hand on my shoulder in case I need steadying, enough breaths draw in to form a collective gasp.
The fae who came to watch the healing are even more reverent than usual today. It might have something to do with the fact that after seeing how my limp was worsening as I moved around the castle, Corwin insisted on carrying me out to the Heart. There’s no outward sign of my wound, but he had a few members of his coterie pass on word that people would need to be more patient with me for a little while. When he approached this group with me in his arms, we were met with a lot of widened eyes and murmurs of concern and appreciation.
I guess that makes sense. It’s an even bigger generosity to put my time and energy toward healing the fae when I’m not fully healed myself. Still, the awed silence of the crowd feels even stranger than the eager murmurs I’ve gotten before.
It’s a bigger audience than usual too. As before, the curse victim arrived with a large retinue of her flock-folk. But several others have drifted over from both Heart’s Cadence and at least a couple of the other arch-lords’ domains—and from across the border as well. One of Sylas’s staff in the joint castle must have passed on word in the summer realm that I was being called to do a curing, because a dozen or so Seelie slipped through the haze around the Heart around the same time Corwin and I got here.
They’ve hung back from the Unseelie crowd, watching curiously from a respectful distance. Apparently yesterday’s encounter with the Murk has drawn even more interest from the summer fae than I realized.
I focus harder on the sadness I stirred up, and my tears finally spill over. After a moment, I swipe them away and turn back toward the aged fae woman. When I reach for her cheek, her stiffened face manages to twitch to form a hint of a smile.
I might worry about how demanding my role will become as the curse intensifies, but moments like this are why I can’t imagine backing down from it. No matter what fae like Aerik or Laoni think of me, every single one I’ve healed has been grateful beyond words.
None of them deserve to die, especially not in the curse’s cruel way.
This time, when the woman straightens up and shows that the frigid chill has released her, the crowd around us keeps a careful distance from me, respectful of my injury. Many of them still call out words of thanks and of their hopes that my wound heals well and soon. As I nod and smile to them in return, my gaze slips past them to the distant form of Laoni’s iridium castle.
After all the chaos last night, Whitt and I never got a chance to reach out to Donovan about a visit to see how his human servants are faring. And I still have so many questions to expand on what I learned about Laoni’s past and family.
I don’t have any immediate business to attend to after this, if there’s something you want to talk about,Corwin says through our bond, raising his hand in farewell to the now-dispersing crowd. I know he’s careful not to dig too deeply into thoughts I’m not purposefully sending his way, but he can’t help picking up on my mood.
There is, actually,I say, but before we can head back to the border castle, one of his staff comes hurrying over from the palace at Heart’s Cadence.
“My lord,” the man says when he reaches us, with a low bow. “And lady,” he adds hastily before focusing back on Corwin. “A messenger has come calling—she said she needs to pass on some news to you as soon as you’re able to hear it.”
Corwin frowns, apprehension trickling from him into me to join my own. I’ll come with you, I say before he can suggest I go back to the border castle on my own. I’d rather hear whatever it is myself—and maybe it’ll be something that involves me.
He nods and reaches for me to lift me up. I still feel a bit awkward being carried like an invalid, but my leg is hurting enough just from standing on my own for the last ten minutes that I’m not going to complain about it. The man from the palace doesn’t appear to think it’s odd.
“Did the messenger give any indication of what matter she wants to speak to me about?” Corwin asks him as he strides toward the palace. The melody the wind makes passing around the diamond spires shivers over us. “Or which domain she was sent from?”
The attendant shakes his head. “She said nothing other than what I’ve already conveyed. I assumed it was a message that required discretion.”
“That’s fine. I wouldn’t want you to press in a situation like that. Thank you for summoning me.”
At the entrance hall, the fae man heads off to whatever other duties he has to attend to. Corwin keeps carrying me all the way to the room next to the terrace where visitors from farther abroad tend to land. The attendant had said the messenger would be waiting for us there, but when we reach the sitting room with its scattered armchairs and tables, there’s no one else there.
Frowning, Corwin sets me down and scans the space. I sink onto the nearest chair, puzzled myself.
After a moment, he walks over to the doors leading to the sparkling terrace and plucks a bit of pale bark that’s been fixed to the wall there. “It appears she left a note.” He studies it, and I catch the gist through our bond before he speaks again. “She apologizes and says she wanted to confirm one detail of the message, but that she should return within the hour.”
“I guess that’s not too long,” I say. It seems a little strange that she’d have left like that, but I’d rather she delivered an accurate message than one she knew might not be factual. “We were going to talk anyway.”
“Yes.” Corwin tugs another chair closer and sits down next to me, reaching to take my hand. He runs his thumb gently over my knuckles. “How have you been feeling, my soul? You’re sure your injury is on the mend?”
“It’s already better than it was last night,” I say, squeezing his fingers. He found me and Whitt before we’d even reached Hearth-by-the-Heart, flying to us in a panic despite my reassurances, and insisted on having his own healer check the wound over before he could relax. Then he sent out a few more guards from Heart’s Cadence to patrol for any signs of the Murk around the Heart on this side of the border. “The healer did say it’d hurt for a while until it’s fully healed.”
“What’s been concerning you, then?”
I look toward the broad windows, though I can’t see Laoni’s castle from here, only the sprawling icy landscape beyond the Heart’s plateau. “I saw a painting of Laoni’s parents when I visited her castle yesterday. Her coterie woman seemed uncomfortable when I asked about them. I wondered if you know what happened to them.”
Corwin leans back in his chair, his gaze going distant with thought. “I was too young to participate in any direct discussions around their passings, but I did hear some talk of it, mostly from my own parents. Her mother died before I was born, when Laoni was still a young child. I gather they went on a trip to visit a domain that included a magical whirlpool among its striking features, and there was an accident in which her mother fell in and was sucked down too quickly for anyone to save her.”
I shudder. “That’s horrible.”
“Yes. I think there was a lot of talk about it among the lords and ladies afterward, especially because her father hated to speak of it himself. But my parents said he’d always been strict and became even more so afterward. I suppose he was afraid any carelessness might result in someone else he cared about meeting a similar fate.”
It’s hard to imagine what “strict” or “even stricter” might look like from winter fae who are already so uptight in general. Maybe that explains a few things about how rigid Laoni is on certain subjects.
“Her father was the arch-lord, then?” I say. “So she didn’t inherit it until he passed on?”
Corwin inclines his head. “I was still a child then, and she was… around the equivalent of the age you are now, in fae terms. That incident I know more of the details of. A lord from a domain near the fringes thought he’d better his flock’s situation by taking over one of the arch-lordships. He picked Laoni’s domain to target. Her father was able to fend off the attack and protect her, but in the process he took a wound that proved fatal. There was nothing the healers could do.”
That’s horrible too. I rub my mouth, not entirely comfortable with the sense of sympathy the story provokes. It doesn’t really matter what awful things Laoni has been through if she’s being awful herself. All of my men have been through traumatizing experiences themselves, and they’ve all kept their senses of fairness and compassion despite it.
Neither account explains why she’d have turned her back on her friendship with Kesral either. “Do you have any idea why she’s so dismissive of humans—and fae with human heritage?” I ask.
“I’m not aware of any particular reason for it. I hadn’t even noticed her being unusually harsh to staff of more dilute blood until the other day.” Corwin grimaces. “But then, that might be my own failing. Before you came into my life, I wasn’t quite as attentive to my colleagues’ treatment of specific sorts of underlings.”
His guilt travels through our connection. I twine my fingers with his. “I think that’s understandable. It’s such an accepted part of fae society.” Which is going to make it even harder to challenge that part.
Before the gloomy thought can fully take hold, one of Corwin’s guards bursts into the room. “My lord,” she says, jerking into a brief bow, “I think you’d better come. The other arch-lords have marched on the new castle—they’re demanding you hear them out.”
“What?” Corwin springs to his feet, his forehead furrowing. “If they want to speak to me, they can come to me here—or meet me in the Hall of the Heart if they prefer that.”
The guard shakes her head. “I—I don’t think that’ll be possible, my lord.”
Corwin strides toward the doorway, and I hurry after him, gritting my teeth against the ache that wakes up within a few steps. When he stops to help me, I urge him onward silently. Better they see me standing and walking on my own two feet, considering what they already think of me.
He insists on scooping me up on the way to the main entrance and only putting me back on my feet there. We walk out side by side and halt just outside the diamond palace.
It isn’t all of the arch-lords—I only see Laoni, Uzziah, and Terisse standing across the plain from us—but it isn’t only them either. I understand now why the guard used the word “marched.” Each arch-lord has a squadron of soldiers poised behind them, forming a semi-circle around the winter side of the border castle.
My gut twists. What the hell is going on?
Corwin strides over to them, slowing his pace just enough for me to keep up with my greater limp. I come to a halt right next to him, holding my head high despite the throbbing in my leg.
“What’s the meaning of this?” he demands of his colleagues. “You look ready to stage an assault.”
Laoni’s eyes flash. “Perhaps we are. Consider yourself lucky that we’re warning you before we take matters completely into our own hands.”
Corwin looks from her to the other two and back again. “What are you talking about?”
Laoni jabs her forefinger in my direction. She pitches her voice loud enough to carry to all the assembled soldiers. “This human woman has been elevated beyond her station for too long already. No matter how ‘blessed’ she may be, it goes against the laws of the Heart for one who is not a lord or lady by inheritance to rule from a castle of his or her own. And ‘Lady’ Talia cannot be considered a lady in the same way as one of our own besides, since she isn’t even fae. This structure stands in total defiance to the proper order of things.”
I stare at her, trying to wrap my head around everything she’s saying. Can she really support all those claims? She didn’t bring any of that up while we were building the castle.
Maybe it took her this long to dig up some obscure law she felt she could twist to her ends. Or maybe she didn’t bother digging until she saw just how avidly her people are starting to respond to me.
Maybe it’s my fault for pushing my luck, forcing her hand to get my visit into her castle.
As I swallow thickly, Corwin sets a firm hand on my shoulder. “The Heart allowed it to be built. I think that’s proof enough that we haven’t—"
“You are hardly the sole judge of what is good for the Heart or for this realm,” Laoni interrupts with a sneer. “We’re giving you until the end of the day tomorrow to bring down your half of this unnatural building and salvage whatever you would of it. If you’ve failed to complete the task by then, our people will destroy it for you.”
