It gives me time to ghost through the castle, avoiding both servants and nobles alike as I work out the layout of the palace.
I try the door to Mistmark’s room, but it’s locked. Usually not a problem, but a servant’s footsteps echo through the hallway, and I’m forced to retreat. I don’t want to enter after last night’s fiasco, but it doesn’t hurt to check.
Malechus’s rooms are guarded by heavily armored guards. Belladonna’s chambers sit at the opposite end of the hallway to his, and there’s a redcap squatting outside her door. Definitely not someone I want to meet on a dark night.
I retreat to the garden so nobody starts to wonder about my actions.
“Lady Merisel!” calls one of the archers with a malicious glee. “Come and try your hand at the targets.”
The targets look like they’re drunk. One serving girl with a fox tail falls into another’s arms, giggling and nuzzling at his neck. From the tails on his coat, he looks like the butler, but no butler alive would grab a housemaid’s bottom like that.
My eye locks on those colorful splats of powder staining their clothes. Now I know what it is. It’s rapture, a fae aphrodisiac that the nobles of certain courts sniff. It’s also a little dangerous, because it strips you of your control and makes you desire nothing more than hedonistic pursuits.
Tomorrow that serving girl is going to wake with a giant’s hammer of a headache and possibly the butler in her bed.
“I’m afraid I prefer my targets to be a little less love-drunk and a little more in control of their faculties,” I reply. I hate such mindless cruelty. The servants have little recompense here. They owe their lives to Malechus—and his guests’—favor.
They can’t refuse to play.
And the appearance of the drug strips them of any remaining choices in regards to their bodies.
“Oh, pish,” says the woman. I’m starting to put a name to her face. Rhea, perhaps? She belongs to the Court of Whispers, though I can’t remember whether she’s part of the ruling family there. “Where’s the fun in that? If she wanted to avoid her current situation, then she should have run faster.”
I should give a shrug and laugh before slipping amongst the women. I have a reason to be here. I want to find out exactly what the relationship between Belladonna and Anissa is. Because if Anissa is Malechus’s lover, then I doubt she’d be friends with Belladonna. To all appearances, Belladonna is displeased with her cousin’s efforts to push her into marriage.
But it’s that callous disregard for a servant’s choice that rubs me the wrong way.
I’ve disguised myself as a servant before.
I’ve had lords’ corner me in darkened rooms, their faces twisted with malice and dark desires before I showed them the error of their ways—and the pointy end of a knife.
I’ve had fae ladies play similar games with me, as if I’m a mere amusement and not a woman with my own hopes and dreams.
I’ve been able to avoid such vicious endeavors purely because my role in their worlds has been a ruse and I’ve been able to escape.
The serving girl with the fox tail has no choice. She has no escape from this.
I turn toward Rhea. She wants to play games? Okay. We’ll play. Right now, I have a position of power, even if these women would tear me down if they knew the truth.
“Your bow?” I ask Rhea, who was the same female I saw sliding her hand over Keir’s sleeve.
I can’t help myself.
I take the bow and arrow from her hands.
And then I smile at her. “Indeed, let’s make this a little more challenging. Let’s see if you are faster than the serving girl.”
Every head in the vicinity tracks toward me. The other ladies look delighted. Some whisper behind their hands, and I can see they think me jealous of Keir’s attentions toward Rhea.
“You wouldn’t dare,” she snaps, backing away from me.
“What’s wrong?” I set the arrow to the bow. “Do you prefer to pick and choose your own partners? Would you perhaps desire a prince? Would you try to steal him?”
Jealousy is a lovely little motive to hide behind.
And maybe there’s a little bit of truth in it.
“Run,” I suggest. “Run fast.”
Rhea takes off with a squeal, shoving her way through the horde of silk.
“Doesn’t she make a fine rabbit?” I ask the woman beside me as I draw the bow back. If I hit her, then I’m virtually declaring war on the Court of Whispers. “Let’s make her think I have her measure. Where shall I aim? That tree in front of her?”
“Right in the back,” the woman replies with a malicious smile.
I loose the arrow, and it hits the tree right in front of Rhea. She squeals as she darts to avoid the puff of pretty pink powder that explodes into the air.
I lower the bow. “While I would love to send that smirking little wretch to her knees, I think a warning sufficient for the moment. But perhaps you would care to do the honors?”
With a wink, I pass the bow to my crestfallen partner.
It breaks up the gaggle of predatory women. They’re no longer focusing on the servants, and the servants—with some relief—are slipping away while they’re no longer visible to the gathering.
I laugh with several of the ladies who think my ruse was amusing to watch. They’ll turn on me in an instant. But for now I’ve won entrance into their little group, which was an unexpected advantage.
And as I watch the serving maid, I see the moment where she staggers against the hedge, feeling overcome with rapture.
Slipping out of the group of fae women as refreshments are brought, I pass behind a tree and vanish, reappearing at the girl’s side where I capture her in my arms.
She looks at me in a mixture of glazed shock and hunger. Even the simple act of my hands on her skin have set off the rapture coursing through her
