19. Amber

Chapter nineteen

Amber

T ime had never moved so slowly. The days before the festival were sluggish, long hours stretching into endless days.

I had to pretend to be something I wasn’t and hide most of my feelings, no matter who I was around. Even Eldrin. I didn’t want to end up as another skull on Vanir’s throne.

Damn, was that how he got all those skulls? Bad breakups?

And then there was that awful dance, that testament to elven flexibility. I had practiced the dance many times until my arms ached and my feet went numb, Eldrin watching me with a small grin. With his eyes on me I came alive, exposed in the best way. And at the end of each session he would give me a compliment, step just a little closer than he should, and then back away, leaving me untouched in the cool fall air. Empty .

Sometimes I would go with Siliana and watch him train, and I saw again and again how he was able to deftly remove my attacker that night. He was able to duck a blow, take his opponent’s arm, and throw him to the ground in the time it took me to blink. With unnatural grace he caught daggers flung at him in midair, and threw them back at another target, hitting it right in the center. His bare skin shone in the sun, a sheen of sweat covering him while he maneuvered his opponent. And yes, I couldn’t but imagine myself in the opponent’s place. I’d be wrapped around him, his glistening skin pressed against mine, his arms delving around and enveloping me. He could move me so that I was bent before him, my skirts hiked up, my legs—

“Staring at him won’t make him come any closer,” Siliana had muttered from her place at my side at the training ring. “This was a horrible idea.”

“No,” I had said, “this was excellent.”

And when the matches were done and Eldrin strode towards us, it took all of my restraint not to embrace him.

“You did well,” I said.

“Just well?” he asked with a smirk.

“‘Well’ is plenty enough for all of us,” Siliana said, rolling her eyes.

I smiled at Siliana. I had to ignore the way Eldrin locked eyes with me, as if he was thinking the exact same illicit things .

Tomorrow it would all change. It had to change—I couldn’t remain this desperate to touch him for much longer, to have him whisper his desires in my ear. To pin me underneath him, and feel his hard length against me. The dance had to accomplish what we wanted. Would it work? Siliana had instructed me as best she could, and by this point I could shake the maple leaves like I had been doing it my whole life. I wasn’t as tall and graceful as the elves, but I knew how to make a leaf vibrate.

More practice wouldn’t help me. It was time to rest before the day that would decide everything. Ha—as if I could relax. So much depended on tomorrow. If I tripped and fell, if I shook the branch the wrong way, that would ruin everything.

“Where are we going?” I asked Eldrin as we strolled through the city. Elves darted through the streets, which were decorated with hanging boughs and garlands made of vines and vibrant leaves, somehow making the place even more devoted to autumn than it had been before. Piles of textured gourds, brilliant yellow corn, red apples, and deer heads with flopping tongues sticking out of the sides of their mouths waited on the street for their custodian to swoop down and arrange them amongst the opulence. Apparently, decapitated animals were mandatory for this festival. Hopefully decapitated humans were not.

“Dinner,” Eldrin said. “I thought it would be good for you to be seen in the city, so that when you make your request, more people will be familiar with you. Their support could push Vanir to grant it.”

“Shouldn’t we have done that…earlier?”

“No,” Eldrin said, voice certain. “I want them to be familiar, but too much would…” He shook his head. “There are too many who might mean you harm. I didn’t want to give them any opportunity.”

Ah, that. The assassin almost no one mentioned to me again, despite that being the most traumatic event of my life. Even more than the spider. I was starting to get the impression that random assassination attempts were just a fact of life at this court. Hopefully, that wouldn’t be the case once I was done with the binding and not engaged to the king. If I got lucky, they would leave me alone. The unhappy elves might decide that I wasn’t worth killing. Might.

Eldrin guided me through the streets of Great Glen, where the gentle wooden curves meshed with constant reminders of death, until we came to a dark brown wooden structure with a weather-beaten sign hanging over the door. Lit by a lantern encased in orange glass and curved iron, the sign was written in a language I couldn’t read. Apparently no one could. Not anymore. But the owners kept the sign anyway, a symbol of how they hoped to return home. I couldn’t imagine losing everything about my native language except my name—that would be like missing a piece of myself that I would forever be searching for .

The inside was as worn as the outside and filled with elves of all ages. The walls were carved with the familiar skulls and bones, plastered against a backdrop of etchings of oak trees. The tables were made of fine—if worn—wood, obviously well-used potentially over centuries. Unlike a restaurant in the mortal world, everyone here was oddly…contained. Smooth. There was no carousing or spilling. Every movement was so gentle, as if everyone was a part of some dance. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get used to that, a people who were so contained that even eating dinner was a tableau of grace. I surveyed the crowd, ignoring how elves looked at me with confusion and distrust. I took a deep breath. Their expressions were the point. That was why I was here. For the people. To change some minds.

There were children sitting next to frustrated elders, men and women conversing over their cups, and more men sitting at a table against a wall. One man looked awfully familiar. Oristan.

“Eldrin,” he called out, beckoning to us and shooing his companions away, while simultaneously gesturing for more drinks. They begrudgingly obeyed, moving exactly one table over. “You can’t avoid me forever.”

“No,” Eldrin said, guiding me forward with his hand on my upper back, “but I was hoping for a couple more weeks of peace.”

I grinned. Anyone who could tease Eldrin automatically fascinated me .

“Ah, here is the famous woman,” Oristan said, deftly raising a goblet to me while taking two more from a passing server. “I was wondering when you would deign to join us.”

“We’ve been occupied,” Eldrin said, taking his seat next to me at the table. I clasped my hands on my lap and foisted my back into an unnaturally straight position. No point in standing out more than I already did.

“With what? What could possible be keeping you so busy that you don’t have time to visit your best friend in these whole woods?” Oristan asked in a way that said he already knew. He just wanted to hear someone confirm it.

“I’ve been practicing for the Maple Dance,” I said, taking my wine from Oristan. And then frowned. During these weeks of practice I had made so many names for it that I struggled to recall the right one. “Oak Dance?”

“Ah, the Deathless Leaves Dance,” Oristan said. I was 90% sure that wasn’t what Siliana called it, but I nodded because that sounded just fine to me. “You’re letting her participate?” he asked Eldrin.

“There is no ‘letting’ involved. You’re assuming that His Majesty has need of the inadequate counsel of one such as me,” Eldrin said softly.

“Eldrin, you’re still a prince.” He smirked and pointed at Eldrin with a bony finger. “Amber, if you’re wondering if he’s always like this, the answer is that he’s usually worse.”

I chuckled. “I guessed as much. I wouldn’t expect him any other way.” I wouldn’t want him any other way .

Eldrin whipped his head towards me, the corner of his lip curved up. This didn’t go unnoticed by Oristan, who reclined. “Well, and here I thought I saw enough of miracles for a lifetime,” he said. “Forget the world being torn apart, here is Eldrin, showing happiness.”

“Careful,” Eldrin said, turning his attention back to Oristan.

“For what? Our future queen should know that she is having a positive effect on everyone around her. Life and death feed from the same hand.”

“What?” I asked.

Eldrin answered. “It’s an old saying—it basically means that two misfortunes can make a positive result. Ironically, it came from the veinwart.” Yes, ironic indeed.

“Two wrongs make a right?” I offered. “That’s what humans say sometimes.”

Oristan nodded and sipped his wine. “I like her,” he said once he wiped his mouth. “That’s better than your explanation.”

“And what are the wrongs?” I asked.

“The wrongs are twofold,” Oristan said, counting with his fingers. “One, you were kidnapped. Sorry, Eldrin, but that is what happened.”

Eldrin took a long drink, and I resisted the urge to place a hand on his leg. Instead, I said, “It’s alright, it’s like Beauty and the Beast. Without the Beast. Or the French palace. Or the library. ”

“There was a beastly veinwart and we do have palace libraries,” Oristan chimed in.

“I’m not sure what Beauty and the Beast is,” Eldrin said, “but I don’t believe you are helping my case.”

“You did save my life though,” I said. “You didn’t hold my family hostage until I agreed to take their place.”

“See?” Oristan said, “Eldrin is an admirable man. He doesn’t need to threaten women with their imprisoned family members. He just gets a veinwart to do it for him.” Eldrin sighed and rubbed his eyes.

I barked out a laugh and asked, “So, what is the second wrong?”

“Two, the barrier is failing in the first place and some poor mortal is stuck fixing it for us. And then we get the positive result—we get you, my dear.”

I smiled sadly. “I wish others felt that way.”

Oristan flicked his wrist. “Oh, they’ll come around in time. If this court isn’t trying to murder someone or incite anarchy it wouldn’t know what to do with itself. It might actually be forced to govern.” Oristan lowered his voice. “Someone should, at any rate.” Eldrin shot Oristan a glare and the topic was dropped. I had been insulated from most effects of Vanir’s governorship, other than whispered conversations when other elves seemed to forget that I had ears, but it appeared that there was more to it than even what I had heard .

The three of us ate dinner and talked for some time about things that were suitable for eavesdropping, like how I found the Darkening Woods and if I was excited about the festivities. I wasn’t stupid—I’d watched enough historical dramas—so I answered every question like it would be repeated back to Vanir. Because it probably was. From how Eldrin gave small nods once in a while, I think I did decently. There was a time and a place to be my sarcastic self, and it wasn’t during this outing, and I was careful to barely touch the wine. While we ate, several other elves approached our table, were introduced by Oristan in boisterous tones, and then I promptly forgot them. Names and faces were never my strong suit, and everyone here looked very similar—tall and handsome. All in all, it was nice to be welcomed, such as it was.

Once night fell, Eldrin excused us, and we walked back to the palace. Now the city was silent, resting in preparation for the following day. The sky was empty of clouds, and even with the city’s muted lights it was possible to see stars. The brisk wind was quiet, a fall evening that hinted at a promise of frost.

“Are they the same here as they are back home?” I asked. “The stars.”

“No,” Eldrin said. My cheeks burned—of course the sky would not have traveled with them. “Back home, the stars weren’t just white—they could be every color, depending on the weather and the seasons. They were the first sign that something wasn’t right. Before we realized… ”

“The barrier.”

Eldrin nodded. “We had one around our old home, around the entire forest. And when we moved it must have traveled and adjusted, albeit weaker than it was before.”

“You really needed that barrier? I mean, we talked about this before, but was your home really that dangerous?”

“Yes. We were a land at war. Always. Most recently with the rusalki who share our borders, but they aren’t the only ones.”

“Over what? Why do you hate the rusalki?”

“Nothing that matters now,” he said, clenching his jaw. “The short of it is that they took one of us, and refused to give him back.”

“They didn’t eat him?”

“No. We had…reason to think that he was alive. May still be alive. And we didn’t want them taking any more of our people, for whatever reason.”

“I think that’s a fair request.”

“But because of dangers like that,” Eldrin continued, “we needed a barrier, for our allies seemed to shift with the seasons. Even though our enemies from our old world who made it here are presumably weak and distracted, we don’t want to take the chance that they will use this opportunity to destroy us while they can. Not every people’s lands here have their capital and ruler, but ours do. We are uniquely vulnerable. ”

“How did you learn about the others that came here with you?”

“Carefully. Fortunately, humans are very good at broadcasting news in public places.”

That was an understatement.

I understood a little more about why the barrier was such an issue to the elves—it wasn’t just about staying away from mortals—there were immortals who could cause trouble.

“If I can help, let me know,” I said. “I mean, if there are certain groups you’re wondering about or haven’t been able to confirm. I might have heard something.”

“I appreciate it, Amber,” Eldrin said. “And I may accept your offer, once the barrier is settled and we are…free for other things.”

Heat returned to my cheeks, for a very different reason. It was an innocent statement, innocently said, but there was a a secret meaning that was only too clear to me.

By this point we had entered the palace grounds and approached the steps to the hall that led to my room. Soon, we would have to say goodbye, though I suspected Eldrin never went far during the night. The assassin weighed heavy in my memory and I would’ve been very surprised if he let it go far from his.

“Wish me luck,” I said, giving him a grin. “For the leaf shaking.”

“No need,” Eldrin said with a small smile that lit up his face. “You will be perfect.” He leaned forward as if he was going to kiss me and then stopped himself. We were never truly alone.

Only one more day. Only one more day and this would all be behind us.

I was glad Eldrin had such confidence in me, because I definitely didn’t.