Stuart’s serene, happy-go-lucky countenance immediately returned. “It be important ye be having the right fit. I’ll no be having anyone saying that I’ve gone and lost me touch.”
In short order, I found myself in my underwear. I didn’t have time to process any sort of embarrassment before Stuart slipped the silky gown over my head. I reflexively held up my hands for the armholes. My gaze trailed the threads of silver skittering down from my waist. It was breathtaking, but had I only been looking at Stuart’s face, I would have sworn it was a hot mess.
“Humph,” was all he said as he fastened up the back of my gown. “Humph.” Stuart stalked around me like a wolf hunting his prey. He waved a hand over a shoulder seam, and I watched in fascination as it shrunk a couple of millimeters. He kept at it, each place he waved over tightening or smoothing as he desired.
“Ye’ve not had a proper meal this whole week, I’d wager.” Stuart’s voice dripped disapproval as the waist shrank a smidge.
I shrugged.
“Don’t move,” he ordered. I stayed there for a good forty-five minutes as Stuart fussed with my dress, fluffing it out in some places, making miniscule adjustments in others. The differences seemed so slight as to be inconsequential, but one glance at Stuart—tongue sticking out to the side as he bent low to inspect a seam—and I knew better than to say anything.
Stuart finally stopped scrutinizing the dress and pulled his gaze up to mine. “Ready!” he said proudly, holding his hands out to me. I took one of them as I stepped down from the box he had brought for a makeshift pillar. The cloth seemed so delicate that I tried to make my movements as small as possible so I wouldn’t rip it.
He grinned at me before abruptly turning stern again. “And remember—”
“Nothing but a few crackers and some water,” I repeated verbatim.
He beamed, patting my head like a star pupil.
I turned my back toward him so he could unfasten the gown.
“Nay, lass, you be wearing that from now until the investiture.”
“But that’s over an hour away! I’m gonna spill something, or…” I faltered under Stuart’s glare.
“Water and crackers,” I mumbled.
His expression immediately cleared, and he hummed to himself as he packed up his things.
“I’ll be seeing ye at the investiture!” he called from the front door, waving his fingers at me in goodbye. I lifted my hand and found myself waving my fingers right back at him as he shut the door.
Deena walked over and circled me. “Mm, mm, mm…Now that’s a dress.”
She looked over at Louie, who’d pocketed his earplugs as soon as the pixies left.
“Can I get me one of these?”
“You the heir?”
“I’m the heir’s caseworker.”
“No.”
“Well, I need something to wear. It’s not like I dressed for a coronation when I hightailed it down here thinking Kella was going all crazy."
“You’re not going.”
“What do you mean I’m not going? What am I supposed to do? Sit here on my hands?”
“If you could sit on your mouth, that’d be better.”
“You ain’t making sense. Sit on my mouth. Huh.” Deena folded her arms and glared.
Louie remained unfazed.
“So what am I supposed to be doing then?”
“Going home,” he said.
“Well, that’s not happening anytime soon.”
Louie gave her a long look. “It will.” He said it so matter-of-factly it gave me chills.
Another doorbell ring.
“About time,” Louie grumbled, pushing up from the sofa again.
When he opened the door, a lady with a large basket-woven purse peered through.
“This her?” she said, looking at me.
“No,” Louie said. “The other one.”
The lady redirected her gaze to Deena. “Ah. Well, that makes more sense.” She stepped closer to Deena, examining her. “Hmm. So resistant to Maeve’s magic, is she?”
“Maeve doesn’t have much left, so it’s not a big surprise.”
“No, I suppose not,” she said, peering into Deena’s eyes. Deena shifted from one foot to the other, but she stood her ground.
“Come, human, sit on the sofa. That’ll feel better.”
Deena glanced at Louie, who was shooting her his most intimidating do-it-now-or-I’m-gonna-make-you look.
Deena exhaled loudly. “Fine. But exactly what are you going to do?”
“Adjust your memories.”
“Adjust my…oh heck no. You’re not getting anywhere close to my memories. You better—”
But then Deena’s mouth snapped shut—like it didn’t have a choice.
The lady had swung a golden pendant in front of Deena, and Deena was staring at it as if it was the most interesting thing she had ever seen.
“Are you hypnotizing her?” I asked. For some reason, I didn’t expect fae to use anything so mundane—so human—as hypnotizing.
“Of course not,” the lady snapped. “Although,” she said after a second, “I suppose that is what it appears to be. This here” —she jutted her chin toward the swinging pendant— “is a magicked item. I do not currently enjoy the full range of my power, so I am limited in scope and need to rely on items such as these during the interregnum.”
“Interregnum?”
“The time between queens,” she snapped again. Obviously, she didn’t like explaining herself.
“So,” I said, apprehension pressing down on my chest. “What does it do?”
“It allows my mind to connect to hers, extract memories that are…unnecessary… and plant suggestions that will reconnect her memories into a cohesive whole.”
“But she’ll remember me, right? I mean, you’ll take away the bits about the fae, but she’ll know that I’m her foster kid…right?”
“Quiet,” she hissed. “This is a delicate process and you are becoming a distraction.”
“Okay,” I said. After a few minutes, I couldn’t resist adding, “But you’ll let her remember me, right?”
Only the twitch of her jaw let me know that she heard me—and that she wasn’t happy about it. Every other muscle in her face was taut, zeroed in on Deena. She sat there in the same rigid position, pendant hanging from her hand, for what couldn’t have been longer than twenty minutes. The entire time, I wanted to ask her more about what she was doing, but whenever I opened my mouth, Louie would shake his head.
“That should do it,” she said,
