“Agree to disagree.”
She waved that away. “She’s always been protective of you. I thought it was because she felt bad about your pain. Sounds like there was more to it. Someone must have asked her to protect you. Had to be your father, right?”
“I don’t know who else it could be.” I had no other family, and this wasn’t a storybook. Fairies weren’t planning my rescue.
“How do you feel about the Aetheric business?”
“Physically, I feel better than I have since the practitioner. It’s like she cleaned away what he did, the scar he left behind. As for the doorway, I don’t think I did much. She formed the connection. I just let it happen.”
She nodded.
“Are you going to tell him?”
No need to explain who “him” was. “That I let an Anima open a doorway to another realm in the middle of his palace? Of course not.” Seeing ghosts was one thing. Even if opening a doorway wasn’t enough to make me a practitioner, which Luna seemed to think, it might still draw the Emperor Eternal’s attention. Of course, he’d have to catch me first.
We were silent for a moment while she stared at the only sausage we’d left on the plate, apparently debating whether to indulge in another one. “I do know that someone imprisoning a damned god isn’t the shit we need right now.”
“Maybe you should skip the blasphemy given the general state of things.”
“Maybe they should skip being arseholes.”
The sausage was looking good to me, too, so I cut it in two, stabbed one half for her, and passed it over. “Do you think she’ll ever tell me all of it?”
Wren sighed, uncrossed her legs, and folded her arms on the table. “I don’t know. And I don’t know if she knows all of it.”
“Tell me what you didn’t tell the prince last night,” I said. “What are the rumors about the Aetheric practitioner?”
She chewed. “Mostly angry ghosts doing bad deeds.”
“There are always rumors about that,” I said. “And it’s usually humans doing the damage.”
“Always. I did hear something about a woodworker who went for a job in the foothills but hasn’t come back. There’s been no sign of her.”
“Maybe she took her chance to go to the City of Flowers?” Pay was rumored to be higher in the capital, where there was more wealth to go around.
Wren lifted a shoulder. “They say she was always busy. Had orders from around the stronghold. It might amount to nothing, but I’ll let you know if I hear anything.”
I sighed. “I don’t like sitting around all day, especially not while you’re out there working and earning coin. This place is ruining me.”
“It’s been three days.”
“Three days with a soft bed and square meals and warm clothes and no attacks on my person. Servants and guards and fancy celebrations.” I lifted a foot. “And look at these damned boots.”
She nodded. “They’re good boots. You need to take the clothes with you when you leave.”
“So I can ruin them with mud and shit? No, thanks. It will be back to holey tunics. I won’t be trying to impress a prince then.”
Her brows lifted. “You’re trying to impress him?”
“I’m trying to not get kicked out of the castle for being slovenly.”
“Lys’Careth or not, I don’t think he’d do that. But there is something to be said for looking the part. And you’re playing the part of…”
“Palace guest?”
“Something like that.”
The faster I stopped the Aetheric practitioner, the faster the stronghold would be safe—and I could return to my old life. The longer I stayed here, the harder that return would be.
