Page 21 of The Prince or the Bard?
I won’t let it be true.
Fiadh is going to live a long life, and fill the castle with as many babies as she likes. She and the high king will be happy together, raising their family and changing the face of the high court just by being them. I won’t accept any other outcome than that.
“Do try to be more creative,” I tease her. “After all, whoever could forget a wild púca queen, her hooves dancing all throughout the castle halls, scandalizing the nobles with a flick of her tail? That will land you a place in everyone’s memory.”
Thank the sea goddess, my humor lands, and Queen Fiadh cracks a smile. A huff of laughter pries its way through her tears. “You, cousin Loaise, are wild enough for us both,” she says, still smiling. “It’s your unseelie side—it’s so strong in you. Promise me you won’t ever lose it.”
“They make it hard, in that castle,” I admit. “I think I’ve lost a bit of it already.”
“Don’t be silly. You’ve merely grown.”
I swallow. This isn’t supposed to be about me, and yet my throat feels thick now. “Don’t ever do anything like that again,” I admonish her, trying to hide the trembling in my voice. “You’re going to be around for a long, long time.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“We’re púcaí. We’re a heartier breed than most.”
Fiadh smiles, leaning her head against my shoulder. “Thank you, Laoise. For saving me. For being you. For coming to serve me at all. I knew I needed someone I could trust.”
I huff. “We’re family.”
“We are.” There’s a soft squeak as her mouth breaks open into a smile. “Even if I do outrank you significantly.”
I shove her away, gripping the blanket firmly enough that it slips off her shoulders. In an act of pure theater, she flops over, bare feet kicking into the air.
I respond by wrapping the blanket around myself as tightly as I can, my chin tipped toward the sky as I harrumph.
Dear Fiadh, may you never be too weak to be playful.It’s in a púca’s nature to be curious about life and to be free. To be everything that goes against the rules of castle decorum.
“Use that rank to change things, will you?” I say, offering her a small corner of the blanket. “That castle is stifling.”
“It truly is.”
Using the blanket for leverage, she draws herself up from the place she’s dramatically fallen to. Then she reaches an arm around me, giving my shoulder a squeeze.
Here we are. Just two púcaí against everything.
And for once, that doesn’t sound so bad.
Chapter Twelve
By the week’s end,Lady Taliana is in high dudgeon, berating her poor servants for every which thing. I’m truly sorry for them. They deserve better than her.
And I think Prince Ruairí finally sees it, too, for I find him on the marginal walk by the cliffs, gaping at the cottage that his lady love has rented.
I can hear her shouting from where I walk. Which means he can, too. Quite well.
At least he says nothing of me avoiding him since that night; I’ve been dreading the inevitable talk. The “I’ve never seen a fae in her unseelie form” talk. In my home court, it’s as natural as breathing, changing into our other form. It’s a part of us.
Something in me has always feared that these High Fae, who act as though they’ve never met a low fae in their lives, will call half my nature ugly. But wearen’tugly. My unseelie form is my greatest strength, my greatest truth.
It is what the fae should consider most beautiful of all. But High Fae are strange creatures, I’ve come to see. They rarely can see past themselves.
Our unseelie forms are what all fae used to be, before they took on human-like forms, and before the High Fae made themselves mighty and the gods forced them into their unbreakable vows. Or so the stories say. Since then, the High Fae have come to think of anyone who isn’t like them as very low indeed.
The part about the unbreakable vows is true, however. Which means that if the topic comes up—if Prince Ruairí turns around and sees a wild water horse in me instead of a fae woman—he won’t be able to lie and pretend otherwise.
"I thought it was her," he says when I very gingerly approach, not taking his eyes off the whitewashed door.
