The Wicked King (The Folk of the Air #2)(21)

“The last room Cardan occupied caught fire,” I call back to the Bomb. “Let me rephrase. It caught fire because he lit it on fire.”

She laughs. “It would take him days to burn all this.”

I look back at the books and am not so sure. They are dry enough to burst into flames just by my looking at them too long. With a sigh, I stack them and move on to the cushions, to pulling back the rugs. Underneath, I find only dust.

I dump out all the drawers onto the massive table-size desk: the metal nibs of quill pens, stones carved with faces, three signet rings, a long tooth of a creature I cannot identify, and three vials with the liquid inside dried black and solid.

In another drawer, I find jewels. A collar of black jet, a beaded bracelet with a clasp, heavy golden rings.

In the last I find quartz crystals, cut into smooth, polished globes and spears. When I lift one to the light, something moves inside it.

“Bomb?” I call, my voice a little high.

She comes into the room, carrying a jeweled coat so heavily encrusted that I am surprised anyone was willing to stand in it. “What’s wrong?”

“Have you ever seen anything like this before?” I hold up a crystal ball.

She peers into it. “Look, there’s Dain.”

I take it back and look inside. A young Prince Dain sits on the back of a horse, holding a bow in one hand and apples in the other. Elowyn sits on a pony to one side of him, and Rhyia to the other. He throws three apples in the air, and all of them draw their bows and shoot.

“Did that happen?” I ask.

“Probably,” she says. “Someone must have enchanted these orbs for Eldred.”

I think of Grimsen’s legendary swords, of the golden acorn that disgorged Liriope’s last words, of Mother Marrow’s cloth that could turn even the sharpest blade, and all the mad magic that High Kings are given. These were common enough to be stuffed away into a drawer.

I pull out each one to see what’s inside. I see Balekin as a newborn child, the thorns already growing out of his skin. He squalls in the arms of a mortal midwife, her gaze glazed with glamour.

“Look into this one,” the Bomb says with a strange expression.

It’s Cardan as a very small child. He is dressed in a shirt that’s too large for him. It hangs down like a gown. He is barefoot, his feet and shirt streaked with mud, but he wears dangling hoops in his ears, as though an adult gave him their earrings. A horned faerie woman stands nearby, and when he runs to her, she grabs his wrists before he can put his dirty hands on her skirts.

She says something stern and shoves him away. When he falls, she barely notices, too busy being drawn into conversation with other courtiers. I expect Cardan to cry, but he doesn’t. Instead, he stomps off to where a boy a little bit older than him is climbing a tree. The boy says something, and Cardan runs at him. Cardan’s small, grubby hand forms a fist, and a moment later, the older boy is on the ground. At the sound of the scuffle, the faerie woman turns and laughs, clearly delighted by his escapade.

When Cardan looks back at her, he’s smiling too.

I shove the crystal back into the drawer. Who would cherish this? It’s horrible.

And yet, it’s not dangerous. There’s no reason to do anything with it but leave it where it was. The Bomb and I continue through the room together. Once we’re satisfied it’s safe, we head through a door carved with an owl, back into the king’s bedchamber.

A massive half-tester bed rests in the center, curtained in green, with the symbol of the Greenbriar line stitched in gleaming gold. Thick spider-silk blankets are smoothed out over a mattress that smells as though it has been stuffed with flowers.

“Come on,” says the Bomb, flopping down on the bed and rolling over so that she is looking up at the ceiling. “Let’s make sure it’s safe for our new High King, just in case.”

I suck in a surprised breath, but follow. My weight on the mattress makes it dip, and the heady scent of roses overwhelms my senses.

Spreading out on the King of Elfhame’s coverlets, breathing in the air that perfumed his nights, has an almost hypnotic quality. The Bomb pillows her head in her arms as though it’s no big thing, but I remember High King Eldred’s hand on my head and the slight jolt of nerves and pride I felt each time he acknowledged me. Lying on his bed feels like wiping my dirty peasant feet on the throne.

And yet, how could I not?

“Our king is a lucky duck,” the Bomb says. “I’d like a bed like this, big enough to have a guest or two.”

“Oh yeah?” I ask, teasing her as I would have once teased my sisters. “Anyone in particular?”

She looks away, embarrassed, which makes me pay attention. I push myself up on one elbow. “Wait! Is it someone I know?”

For a moment, she doesn’t answer, which is long enough.

“It is! The Ghost?”

“Jude!” she says. “No.”

I frown at her. “The Roach?”

The Bomb sits up, long fingers pulling the coverlet to her. Since she cannot lie, she only sighs. “You don’t understand.”

The Bomb is beautiful, delicate features and warm brown skin, wild white hair and luminous eyes. I think of her as possessing some combination of charm and skill that means she could have anyone she wanted.

The Roach’s black tongue and his twisted nose and the tuft of fur-like hair at the top of his scalp add up to his being impressive and terrifying, but even according to the aesthetics of Faerieland, even in a place where inhuman beauty is celebrated along with almost opulent ugliness, I am not sure even he would guess that the Bomb longs for him.