Page 18 of A Beastly Court

Flora gave me a nudge with her snout, looking sour. “I have a fast metabolism, thank you very much. It’s a full-time job maintaining all this muscle.” The honey badger flexed then, her muscles bulging beneath her black-and-white hide.

“It’s so nice to see you again after all this time, dear,” Daphne said, trotting over so she could lip at my shoulder. I gave the fine-boned Arabian’s slender neck long strokes and itched behind her ears. She nickered happily, tossing her head.

“Stop moving,” the porcupine chastised. “You’re ruining my braid!”

“Your braid?” Daphne asked Shari. “It’s my hair!”

I turned to the quiet crafter and examined the braid she’d been working into the mare’s mane. It was intricate and fastidiously perfect. “Nervous, Shari?”

“W-we don’t get summoned into the castle proper that often. A-and—”

“’Course not,” the beaver snorted, waddling by with a piece of oak balanced on his shoulder. “She and Cernunnos got better things to do than entertain the likes of us. C’mon, you old ’coon,” he told Emmett. “Toss me that sack of nails. That table ain’t gonna mend itself.”

My delight evaporated. “T-table?” Surely he didn’t mean the one in the great hall.

“The king said the bear got loose and did some damage,” Cody said. “So he did the smart thing and called the professionals. I’ll have that table looking shipshape in no time.”

After stuffing some wood putty into his tool belt, the beaver clamped his orange teeth down on the piece of oak and padded off purposefully towards the great hall.

“You’re going in there by yourself?” I demanded, racing after the carpenter. Thistle thorns, he was fast for an old rodent. “Without a guard?”

“Meadow!” Daphne neighed. “Get back here!”

I couldn’t let the beaver go to his death alone. I had to stop him! “But the bear,” I protested.

“Just needs a firm hand is all,” Cody said confidently, his words muffled behind the mouthful of wood.

Reaching the great hall, the beaver spun around, forcing me to jump back so the board didn’t take me out at the shins, and gave the double doors a mighty whack with his tail. As they swung inward, I flattened against the nearest wall. If the bear saw me—

The grizzly rumbled as the beaver waddled in.

“Ack, boy, shaddup,” the crotchety carpenter chastised. “You want to be free of that chain and I want fully opposable thumbs, but we don’t live in a fantasy world, do we?”

I debated whether or not to close the doors—but not lock them, as Alec had done—just in case the bear got loose. But if the bear did get loose, he could knock those doors down just as easily as he’d gouged the table. With them open, at least Cody would be afforded an escape route.

The bear continued to grumble as the beaver worked, but Cody paid him no mind. I used the boisterous sounds of the beaver chewing and gnawing the oak into the correct shape to mask my steps back to the foyer.

My friends met me halfway, each trembling in fright. Except Flora. But her eyes were very, very wide, a thin white halo surrounding their inky irises.

“The bear,” the three gasped. I wasn’t the only one terrified of the bear, though there seemed no rhyme or reason as to who was scared of him and who wasn’t. Mrs. Bilberry and the woodchucks were indifferent to his snarls, but maybe that was because they were exposed to him twice a day. Though, I was too, and I still wanted to wet myself at the sight of him.

“That is the bravest beaver I’ve ever known,” Flora said solemnly.

“Don’t let him hear you say that,” Emmett cautioned. “You’ll just inflate his ego and next he’ll be wanting to be knighted for being a fearless defender of the realm or other such nonsense. Then I’ll never hear the end of it.” He patted the velvet sack he’d slung over his shoulder. “Why, he’d probably insist on getting one of these rubies made into those stag-head pins the Brotherhood wear for his-own-self.”

“Aw,” Flora complained, sniffing the sack, “and here I was hoping you had some snacks from that old egret, Ms. Harris. She’s always hooking you up with the tastiest freshwater clams and little minnows.”

The raccoon shoved the honey badger away, lest her overcurious nose somehow rip through the velvet and soil the jewels.

“Rubies?” Shari asked, frantic. “Cernunnos said nothing about rubies to me. D-did he want me to sew them into one of your dresses?” She snatched up one of my hands in both of her paws, beseeching me. “Of course! The Winter Fete is approaching and he’ll be wanting you to look spectacular. I-I didn’t forget! I swear! I just don’t remember which dress you wanted bedazzled? I’ll do it right away—”

“Easy, Shari,” I said, alarmed at her panic. She was acting like the fae king would have her drawn and quartered and fed to the falcons!

“Now, now, Miss Cable,” Emmett soothed. “He asked for these special. Ain’t got nothing to do with dresses. I suspect it’s to adorn more of his silverwork.”

Then the grandfatherly raccoon gave me a wink. “Maybe he’s making you another piece of finery to go along with those earrings. A bracelet, maybe?” He waggled bushy white eyebrows. “Maybe even a ring?”

“Emmett.” I blushed.