Page 22 of A Court Bright and Broken

“Father will haveyouslaughtered for dog food if you do,” she said. “It’s all humans at that market.”

“I didn’t go seeking a fight,” I explained. “As Pharis said, I only went to sketch. But there was a girl…”

Caution made me pause as I debated how much to say about her. I trusted my brother and sister completely, but Mareth wasright. Any sort of real connection with humans was forbidden to us.

I hadn’t been lying to Raewyn—the palacewasfull of human servants—but they were strictly off limits to our kind when it came to romantic entanglements. I needed to be careful not to say anything that would suggest my interest in Raewyn was anything more than gratitude for her intervention in the attack.

Which of course was all it was. Anything more would be impossible.

“What girl? A human?” Mareth asked, wide-eyed.

“Yes. I saw a gang of thieves following her, intending to rob her, and I offered to escort her. She refused, but they apparently didn’t appreciate my interference and ambushed me later.”

“How many of them were there?” Mareth asked.

“Please tell me it was at least twenty,” Pharis drawled. “Or I shall lose all respect for you.”

“There were four,” I admitted. “But as I said, they attacked from behind, and one of them had a club, which he applied rather vigorously to my skull.”

Pharis began fake-coughing, inserting the word, “pussycat” into the racket.

“Oh Stells. How terrifying.” Mareth covered her nose and mouth with her hands.

When she lowered them, her expression was twisted in distress.

“How did you manage to make it all the way home with so many broken bones? And the healer said your eyes were nearly swollen shut by the time he got to you. I’m surprised you could see the road.”

“The girl I mentioned… she helped me walk to the gates,” I said. “It was she who frightened the thieves away before they killed me. She threw fish oil onto them and waved a torch at them.”

“Definitelytell the tree story,” Pharis advised. “Not that one.”

He clutched his hands to his chest and made a comical face. “Savedby a brown trout.”

“What a brave girl,” Mareth said, clearly impressed. “And so kind.Thoseare the qualities youshouldbe looking for in your companions. Your taste in women is almost as bad as Pharis’.”

“What does it matter?” I asked. “I won’t be allowed to choose my own bride anyway.”

Pharis piped up, his tone droll. “Nonsense. You’ll have your pick of thefairest ladies of the landat the Assemblage.”

“So will you,” I pointed out.

My brother let out a bitter laugh. “Oh yes. I’msolooking forward to going through the scrap heap of your rejects.”

“There will be plenty of fine ladies to go around,” Mareth consoled him. “Odds are you wouldn’t want the same one anyway. You two are as different as day and night.”

She was right. Unlike me, my younger brother was powerful. He was also far better looking in my opinion, though women threw themselves at me because of our birth order.

“Yes. Stellon is important, and I’m expendable,” Pharis joked.

But the corners of his eyes were pulled tight in the way they often did when he was enduring Father’s frequent insults. I didn’t like hearing him insulthimself.

None of us were immune to it, but we couldn’t let ourselves start believing it. My brother and sister and I had begun referring to ourselves in childhood as the Three Pillars because we all lived under the heavy weight of our powerful sire’s thumb.

If it hadn’t been for the two of them, I would likely have gone mad long ago.

“Count yourself lucky,” I said to Pharis. “I’d much rather have your life with all its freedoms and not so much responsibility.”

“Ah the life of a second son—endless fun,” he quipped. “What shall I do today? Skip through a field of poppies? Or have an orgy?”

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