Page 34 of Of Monsters Of Kings

Toil, Hex, and Sigil had done a number on me, even after Toil drew that heart in the dust. I wish he hadn’t done that, then stolen from me after.

I stopped before my mother’s grave. “King See might think I’m to blame, Mother.”

I lay on my back next to the black hellebores covering her grave. The pavers were warm from the day’s heat, but that heat didn’t permeate much further than the concealing dress I wore. “It’s a strange business.”

“You’re outside again, fair maiden.”

Toil was back. I didn’t move. “You took things.”

“Only that which belongs to our king.”

I closed my eyes. Bother. “And who is your king?”

“How is it that a monster wouldn’t know?” Sigil mused from my left.

“I am only recently this way.”

“You are something to behold,” he replied.

My cheeks warmed, and I didn’t answer. I wasn’t sure that was a compliment—how could it be?

Hex’s voice was very close. “Look here. She blushes black. Wondrous.”

I covered my face.

“Lady, do you not wish for us to look upon you?”

“I don’t.” I felt like a creature in a cage, and King See’s mention of exquisite was hard to remember in the face of so much gaping and gawking.

Hex, Sigil, and Toil whispered for a time, then fell quiet.

I peered through my fingers at the nearly dark night. “Who is your king then?”

“King Bring, lady. Will you not tell us your name?”

They’d given me a name. This time, I knew well enough not to mistake their sire’s name for Kingbring, and I did like that the name rhymed. Maybe I’d return the favor. “My name is Patch.”

“Patch, a fitting name.”

Sadness flooded me at the reminder, and I rolled toward my mother’s grave, toying with a hellebore.

Hex asked, “Are these your stunning blooms, Lady Patch?”

“I think so, but I don’t know.”

“She needs help,” Toil announced. “She does not know about herself.”

“How could that be?” Sigil asked.

No one had an answer, including me.

I pushed to sitting. “I wouldn’t mind some help to know myself, but I fear knowing too much at once.” On a whim, I said, “I only had a three-week slumber.”

“Only three weeks,” Toil and Sigil gasped together.

“Did you sleep too?” I asked.

“But of course, lady,” Hex said seriously. “We entered the womb one hundred years before the dawn of the new age.”

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