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Chapter 9: Brook

“Shouldn’t you be at the Dun Steorra Cultural Dance?” Papa asked sharply.

Brook winced and took a deep breath. She should’ve gone invisible before coming down the front stairs, but she’d been hoping to pick up a snack from the bar on her way out. “Shouldn’t you?” she replied.

“Hmm,” was Papa’s only reply.

Brook turned around and headed into the little sitting room. The fireplace was enchanted not to heat the room, but to still burn bright and cozy; another charm protected the fire from the magical breeze blowing in from the windows. Papa sat on his favorite fluffy chair, his feet up, his glass of good wine in one hand, his book in another.

Different book, she noticed. He was tearing through them this summer.

“Off to see that fiancée of yours?” Papa asked.

Brook flopped into the seat across from him, letting her legs sprawl out before her. “Sort of. I don’t know.”

Papa frowned. “You seemed very happy together the other evening. I almost believed it was a real engagement.” A slight smile tugged at the corners of his lips.

“Me too,” Brook muttered.

Papa raised one eyebrow. “Did you, now?”

“She said she doesn’t want my help at the stall anymore. Which I’m sure Mama will like to hear; surprised she didn’t kick up a stink about me marrying a vendor, let alone a baker.”

“From a very good family of engineers,” Papa pointed out.

“Still.”

Papa closed his book and set aside his wine glass. Then began pouring another from the table between them. When he finished, he held it out to her.

Brook leaned forward and accepted, then stared into it blankly.

This had never happened to her before. Especially not after a night like that. Not that she’d ever had a night exactly like that. Not only was Aisling’s tongue a magnificent thing, but that tail, and the little noises she made when she was happy, and the way she moaned into Brook’s hair as she—

“You know your mother and I were not a love marriage,” Papa interrupted her thoughts.

“Yes,” Brook said, vaguely irritated.

He sipped at his wine again. “But your Mama had many would-be suitors, and her father thought me the best of them. She accepted her duty.”

“As did my perfect brother,” she said.

“Yes, but Harald had a list from which to choose, and he met them all that summer at the market. His choice was his own in that sense.”

“Still.”

“I didn’t want to marry a stranger, but with my name and my parents, it wasn’t so much a question of if—it was more when. But after I married your mother, and I came to respect her, even love her—don’t look like that, you know I do.”

Brook had been about to roll her eyes but stopped. She sipped the sweet after-dinner wine instead. It was rich and ripe. It’d be lovely with one of Aisling’s custard cakes.

“After I came to love her, I made her promise me that if we had children, and if they ever fell in love, we would allow them to marry for it. I don’t think she expected it would ever happen—no child of hers would be so frivolous.” His smile was fond, though. Soft. “Alas, her husband was and is.”

“Is this your way of saying that me losing the one person I’ve ever been interested in keeping is also me losing my one chance at marrying for love?”

“No. It’s—”

“Why should I marry at all?” She set down her glass a little too hard, so it sloshed. She bit back an impulse to apologize for it.

“Some elves do better alone. Some do better in a large family group. Others need a life partner or three to provide them with something they can’t find within themselves. To balance them out.”