Page 61 of Her Shadow so Dark and Lovely
There are footsteps across the stones, the sound of the door reopening and then closing again.
A chair is dragged over with a screech, and someone drags me up and sets me in it, draping the bed sheet over me. Beryl appears in my line of sight. I get a good look at the markings on her coat, and I realise she is not just a Lightkeeper, but part of the Dawn King’s inner circle. One of his dreaded Lightwardens. They had protected me once— until they hadn’t. I don’t expect any mercy from this one.
Beryl’s mouth makes the shape of a smile. It does nothing to soften her face and does everything to make her resemble the creature from the dark room in the labyrinth. She kneels in front of the chair and takes my hand, looking at it with mock regret.
“Now,” she says. “I’m going to give you back control of your limbs, and you’re going to wash and dress. The Dawn King wishes to see you, and I’ll not allow you to go dressed in little more than a bedsheet.”
I take a moment to get enough control of my tongue to reply. “I’d rather go naked,” I say. It comes out a little mumbled.
Beryl grimaces. “You seem to be under the impression that I was asking for your preference. I was not, so let me make myself clear,” she says. “You were a scribe, were you not?”
I don’t much like her use of past tense. I am still a scribe. I belong to the Library. Not to these dusty archaic halls.
“I imagine your hands are rather important to you, then.”
Fear grips my chest.No.Beryl takes my little finger with one hand. I have no control over my body and no means to resist what is about to happen, but I still try to pull my hand away.
Perhaps it is a blessing that the sedation remains in effect, because it means it doesn’t hurt quite so much when she snaps my little finger up and back. I let out a strangled cry, my eyes watering. Beryl smiles up at me, still holding my hand. This time the smile is sincere, and it is clear there is nothing she would likebetter than to break every one of my fingers. I tremble, the pain and shock of it sinking through me.
“Do I make myself clear?” Beryl asks.
The thought of not being able to paint, or write, or sink my fingers into Sila’s thighs is enough to convince me that this is not a fight worth fighting.
“Yes,” I manage. It’s barely more than a whisper.
“Good,” says Beryl as she rises. “Jareth, set the finger, but don’t heal it. I expect our visitor could use the reminder of what she has to lose if she decides to misbehave again.” She leans in over the chair and lowers her voice. “Your sister may have the Dawn King’s protection for now, but how long will that last, I wonder? Be a good girl now, hm?” Beryl pats my cheek sharply, and the weightless feeling in my limbs bleeds away.
My slow, foggy thoughts clear, and then the man, Jareth, is grabbing my broken finger, and I can hardly think at all.
I’m left alone after that, with nothing but the throbbing pain in my finger and my bed sheet for comfort. At least it still carries Sila’s perfume. I bury my head in it and breathe it in. Sila will come for me, only now I hope she won’t. I’m not sure she can stand against the Dawn King, but for me, I know she will try.
The curse stirs in my chest. It feels feeble, and a little dazed, like it’s in sympathy with everything that has happened since the Lightkeepers broke into Sila’s rooms. Under everything, the dark coal-black mark on my chest is burning. Time is running out for both of us.
There is a knock at the door, which seems absurd, and then the door opens and the quiet of the chamber is being turned upside down. It’s as if I had never left the Keep, the chaos that floods in exactly as I remember it. A woman marches in, followed by two men carrying a bath. Another woman carriesa fashionable dress, two more carry cases of accessories and shoes, and another man has a case that suggests he’s going to try and do something to my hair and face. Overseeing them all is Inetta. My sister’s handmaiden, and a force of nature who does not ever back down from a challenge.
She takes one look at me and proclaims, “No, this won't do at all.” She claps her palms together. “Stand.”
I do, the sheet huddled around my shoulders. I remember this part of life here— this ritual of dressing. An army of people, all existing only to dress courtiers up like dolls for their roles in the Dawn King’s circus of a court. Orielle had always thrived in this place. I had withered.
“No, don’t hang onto the sheet like that.” Inetta swats at my hands, and I wince, dropping the sheet to the ground. She grabs my hand roughly, but not unkindly. “Beryl,” she hisses. “The nerve of her to think she can lay a hand on a Dawnchild.”
I shrink back from the title and the way it settles sickly in my stomach. It has been a decade or more since anyone has called me such a thing. Since I had thought of myself as such. I’d been naïve to think I could be free of it.
Inetta holds my hand gently between hers, and the pain eases. “There now. Let’s see to all these other scrapes of yours.” She does not heal the broken finger completely. It still aches, but perhaps the damage won't be so lasting now. I do not begrudge her the caution in the slightest. Inetta is a clever woman, and she hasn’t survived with my sister all these years in the Court without knowing how to play its games.
Inetta heals as many of the cuts and bruises as she can— and there are more than I thought— and while she works, the rest of the envoy prepare the next stage of torment. A water mage fills the bath, a fire mage heats it. The hairdresser sets himself up at an empty table, and the remaining attendants lay out some of the finest clothing I have ever seen. It’s all colourful silks andflorals, ribbons and pearls, and they are lovely beautiful things, but I prefer my sturdy woollens and my dependable leather boots. As I stare at the beautiful costume laid out for me, I wish I was stronger, that I didn’t have to go along with this. Not again.
“Right,” says Inetta. “Into the bath.”
I allow myself to be ushered across the room and submerged under the water. Inetta and another woman take no time in starting to scrub me.
“Really, I’m sure I can?—”
“Nonsense, Lola, you are in the Suntide Court now. You do as you are bid,” says Inetta, rubbing soap into my hair.
I grit my teeth. Of all the indignities I have suffered today, this is the worst. Being called by my childhood nickname somehow digs in like a thorn. As if it wasn’t enough to be dragged from my lover's bed, have my finger broken, and be called a Dawnchild by the same people who had happily called me a foundling and my mother a whore. Now I must also sit and be called Lola, and do as I am told, like a dutiful child.
Because on top of everything else, these are not the people who truly mean me harm. Inetta is as close to an ally as I will ever get in this place. I should just be grateful that, for now, I’m still alive.
