Page 106 of Crowned By the Fae King

Pelleas eased off on the shadow-glamor, leaning back in his chair and spearing his own pastry with the tip of a knife. "Not entirely," he said, seeming to relax. "While I am an artist, and do much of my own designing, I have several people on staff who assist with tracking fashions, building base designs, acquiring new cloth and gems for me to study, and other such things."

Cass gave me a physical heads-up before mentally speaking again, tracing a heart next to his hairline as if he was scratching an itch. Pelleas is the last of the four Raven Princes, he sent me, his expression going grave for a moment. He lost his older brothers days apart. Raelix fell in battle, and his corpse was so mutilated that he almost couldn't be identified. Sundamar— Cass had to take a careful breath, looking down as the servers brought out the first course, a creamy soup with tiny daisies floating in it. Sundamar ate his eldest brother Elion. Literally. He's moon-called, and his second form is enormous, and monstrous.

An image flickered into my mind as I mechanically polished off my appetizer and took my first sip of the soup. A beast even larger than Faerqen, something like a cross between a wolf and a dragon, with snow and ice all around him and a pair of winglike limbs on his back. I swallowed carefully, barely hearing Yllana and Pelleas discussing the designs of the latest fashion, and how to reproduce certain glamor-looks in actual cloth.

The fourth is Ayre? I asked silently, though I remembered Dani saying something to that effect. The manticore King—the one who made you.

The same, Cass sent back, sounding sad. Both Ayre and Pelleas lost all their brothers in that war in the span of a week, with little hope of reconciliation. Not as long as Tathalin lives.

The Raven King?

Cass gave me a slight nod, then turned his polite attention to Kettekh and offered the required comment to the conversation. I kept eating my soup, trying to maintain a placid face as the conversation of the table washed over me. Pelleas seemed to actually be enjoying talking with Yllana, and I managed to ask a question about his cloth-of-gold embroidery that sent him and Yllana down an entire tangent as to the specific qualities of cloth-of-gold and golden thread.

We made it through the first and second courses without incident, but during the third course, Tarra casually called Cass her "hulking brother," which made Cass flinch and my teeth clench.

The skies in the tapestries darkened towards storms. I hoped no one noticed.

Tech breathed a disbelieving laugh. "Ravens never can seem to resist tweaking the tails of gryphons," he said, smirking at her. "Luckily, those birds are clever enough to escape the inevitable snap of the jaws."

Tarra kept looking at him with the same eager, vapid expression, clearly not getting the joke, or that she was the butt of it.

Pelleas leaned over, his violet hair tumbling across his shoulder. "Tarra darling," he purred. "You're supposed to laugh when handsome men make jokes while flirting with you."

"Oh? Oh!" Tarra laughed, a bright, shining sound that had to be practiced. "Oh, Kettekh, you cutie. Do you want to be my kitty? I might even let you bite me."

I very nearly choked on my wine, managing to keep my laughter to a sharp snort. Pelleas smirked at Tech and turned back to Yllana, who wore the blandest expression I'd ever seen.

I waited until Cass had his drink at his lips to send, She's really not very smart, is she?

Cass actually did choke on his wine. Tarra frowned at him in the squinty way people do when they're not sure if someone is laughing at them or not, and Pelleas cast me a sidelong glance that suggested he knew I was at fault, and found that both deeply amusing and dangerously interesting.

"Are you quite alright, Xarcassah?" his mother asked, looking at him with a reasonable approximation of motherly concern.

Cass gave me a dire look as he used a napkin to wipe off his face. "I'm fine, Mother."

"Are you certain?" she persisted, frowning at him. "Your bodily control used to be so much better."

A sudden spike of terror jolted through me. Cass went very still, every one of his physical responses locking down. I felt the blastwave of that reflexive action flare through the palace, animals cowering and every flame and candle in the Clement Palace snuffing out. In the back of my mind, a little boy begged, "don't, don't, Mama, don't, I'll try harder to be good, I can be good—"

"I didn't hurt anyone, Mother," Cass said quietly, breathing with care. "I haven't hurt anyone like that in a long time."

Her upper lip tightened. "I thought I taught you better than that."

Rage grabbed my heart in its fist.

I set my utensils down on my plate with deliberate care, hitting the porcelain just hard enough that the sharp sound would yank everyone's eyes towards me.

She was my mother-in-soul, the matriarch of Cass' family, and I decided that I didn't give a shit. Elders like Bà deserved respect, but this woman? She'd surrendered all rights to my respectfulness or submission the moment she'd left those opals bound to her son's hands.

"It's funny how easily people slip into old habits, isn't it?" I said in a pleasant voice, as if I was discussing the weather instead of considering whether I wanted to stab her with the cutlery. "Maybe you should try to remember, princess, that your rank comes from His Splendor, and not the other way around." I leaned forward; she leaned away from me. "My soulmate's behavior isn't yours to dictate. Don't forget it."

Her chin lifted and nostrils flared. "What do you know of it?" she asked in a tight voice, her lips pinching. "A mayfly mortal like you. He can cause an eternity of suffering. How can you even hope to imagine it?"

Cass voiced a snarl, his wings mantling.

The lights didn't dim. Nothing broke. The palace didn't have to show his anger, because he was doing it.

God, I was so fucking proud of him.

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