“He’s here regardless, and I pay him a good salary,” she had said. “You could use the help, as you acclimate.”
The valet knocked again; “Your – Your Majesty?”
Kai looked up from where he’d sunk his head into his hands.
“Yes,” he called hoarsely. He cleared his throat. “Yes, thank you, I’m up. Just a moment.”
On his first morning at the palace, the poor boy had come into the room unbidden, expecting to find some soft, preening royal guest who needed assistance to wash and dress their own body. He had quite the fright when a shaggy, stark-naked Merrow King leapt from the bed with a thundering roar of alarm that knocked him on his ass.
They quickly came to the agreement that Kai would dress himself in the mornings. Kai tried to speak gently to him now, and had since shaved his beard and cut his hair; he was well aware that the boy was not the first person he’d startled with his wild appearance.
Kai washed and dressed quickly, and opened the door to the valet. Simon held a heavy breakfast tray balanced on his thin, wobbling arms. Kai took it from him at once and the boy sagged with relief.
“Thank you, Simon. You can leave it at the door for me next time, I’d rather you didn’t injure yourself.”
He’d rather the valet didn’t deliver his meals to him at all and had told him as much – but this was another insistence of Queen Selma’s. Apparently it was her attempt to rebuild Kai’s strength, and so the trays had continued to come each morning, laden with more food than he would eat in a day. Porridge with berries, fresh fruits cut in artful arrangements, herb crusted potatoes, steamed eggs, thick cut bacon, half a dozen pastries, strong black tea and several slabs of hot buttery toast.
Land dwellers ate stodgier foods than the Merrow; potatoes and bread and heavy, hearty meals rather than the light fare of fish and foraged greens his people would graze on throughout the day. It had always been that way, but over time, with the wealth Eisalaan had acquired… it seemed excessive, to say the least.
“Such an extravagant spread,” Kai muttered to himself. And then to Simon: “I won’t finish all of this, would you like some?”
The boy gaped at him. “I shouldn’t, Your Majesty.”
“A pastry, go on.”
Simon reached tentatively for a cinnamon bun. Kai smiled in what he hoped was an encouraging manner, but he must have been quite out of practice, for the valet gulped as though he’d snarled at him and clutched the cinnamon bun tight, sprinkling icing down the front of his tunic.
Kai sighed.
Time to wrap this up and send the poor child on his way before he expired of fright.
“Any messages?”
The twitching boy produced a fistful of letters from the messenger’s pouch slung across his slim torso. The wax seals came in a rainbow of colours for each of the noble houses where the remaining Merrow people had sheltered. Kai sipped and read, hot tea and relief loosening the tight knot in his chest as each response assured him of what he needed to know; they were safe, they were well, they were comfortable. They were adapting. He fished out the letter he’d been most anxious for, the one with the evergreen seal, and tore it open, setting down his cup so he could grasp the parchment with both hands.
Koo,
When can I come to stay at the palace? The Marchioness has a frightful singing voice and a truly evil cat, sent from the Underking himself to torment me. The spiteful little thing has crawled into my bed and rubbed long white hairs all over my sheets. Did you know you could get a splinter from a hair if it’s thick enough? Well, that is a thing I now know.
Send help! Failing that, send books and rum.
All my love,
Ceri
Kai chuckled under his breath. What he wouldn’t give to have Ceri here with him. She could tell him how to act, what to say, how to make it so that these people didn’t find him so strange. She could help him with the day to day, so that he might find what he was looking for and get them home.
But it wasn’t safe. Not yet. The last time he’d become too friendly with the Beiras, he had landed his family, his people, in a prison of eternal ice. These Beira ancestors had been welcoming, but he wasnt going to mistake poise and noble manners for kindness and decency, not again.
Ceri couldn’t come here. Not yet.
“Your Majesty?”
Simon still stood by his side. “Your combat practice. With Princess Adeline, sir. She’ll be waiting for you by now.”
The loosened knot in Kai’s chest pulled itself tight once more. Of course the Princess – Adeline, as he was supposed to call her – was waiting for him. He’d forgotten about their session. No, that wasn’t true, he hadn’t forgotten, he had purposely shoved it from his mind, knowing the thought of it could drive him to distraction. Adeline, with her wicked smirk at odds with her soft brown eyes. He’d been meant to train with the old man, but – Well. That arrangement had fallen through, and here they were.
He cleared his throat.
