Page 57 of Kingdom of the Two Moons

I head straight to the kitchen as Nidaw instructed. A lot of otherwomen are already gathered. They look similar enough to Nidaw, with the same deep-sea-colored skin and bright eyes, that I assume they are sirens too. But it’s the color of their hair I stare at too often. It reminds me of the sea and its corals, ranging from the palest sea foam blue to Tyrian purple.

They ogle me in return as I enter, mainly my telltale round ears and the still barely healed wounds on my wrists. I quickly look down, suddenly ashamed of my difference, and try to smooth my hair over my ears and hide my hands behind my back.

It is a long day that follows. And I learn what it means to be a servant in a fairy palace. First, in the kitchen, I cut vegetables before Nidaw sends me away with a group of women to clean some of the rooms, each one more luxurious and overwhelming than the next. Velvet-covered furniture and heavy rugs made of silvery silk. Shiny, long curtains of cobalt blue damask sway in the breeze and double-winged doors made of black wood mark the entrances. There are scenes carved into the material, so detailed and exquisite the fingers that made them must have been those of very tiny creatures.

I sweep out huge fireplaces and mantelpieces made of another stone I’ve never seen before, brushing past columns and statues of the same gold-veined, fascinating material that seems to change its colors in accordance with the time of day. I realize that what looked like bleached bone last night now ranges from a shy Isabelline in the morning, to a fiery orchil around midday, only to fade into an ashy heliotrope in the afternoon.

The other women keep watching me, mostly vigilantly. It is only later in the afternoon that they eventually seem to forget about me, and start to talk quietly with each other in a tongue I can’t understand. And I finally have some time to orient myself.

I try to memorize the rooms, the layout of the palace, and potential escape routes. I’ve already figured out that the slave and servant quarters are located on the very edge of the building I’m in, a huge complex on its own. But when we are done with one room and I follow the women onward, I lose track again of where we are.

Occasionally, in the hallways I see other fae hurry by. Somehave hooves and horns. When we walk back through one of the patios, I spot two green-skinned, blue-haired men bent over the lush hedges of herbs, translucent pixie wings on their backs catching the light in all the colors of the rainbow.

***

The days are too long, and I can’t help but feel that Nidaw’s giving me particularly exhausting tasks to drain me. When they are over, my back aches worse than after a round of combat training with Kayne or Hunter, and I’m so tired all I can do is wolf down the food someone left in my room—fresh mint tea, a broth, some honey-glazed goose meat, some walnuts, and a piece of chocolate cake with a flower on top, all lovingly arranged—before I slump onto the bed and fall asleep.

It works. To exhaust me, make me so tired I can barely walk straight, giving me no time to think. But when I glance in the mirror in the morning, I’m no longer so pale. I touch my face.A half-fae,Riven said. But my ears are round, and I don’t look at all likethem. I don’t have their perfect skin and waves of colorful hair. I look ordinary with my brown eyes and human skin.

But then, better than I ever have. Still slim, or thin, yes, lean with muscles but no longer on the verge of starvation. Some life has crept into my eyes, a rosy color into my cheeks and lips.

Perhaps because I’m no longer constantly hungry. Maybe because my nightmares have vanished, too, as if by magic. The same as my panic has faded down from a wildfire to simmering embers as if something in the Fortress kept them at bay.

Something that sweeps through the corridors and fills the very heart of the complex as if it is a part of every stone, every wall, the fundament itself. A presence that fills the corridors and brushes up my skin like a caress sometimes. Curious. Gentle.

Something soft like dew and night. A dark twin to the balmy breeze outside.

But I’m too tired even for this thought.

***

On my fourth night, I step out of the shower. The day has been hot, the warm desert air wafting in and out of the palace through its open windows. Even now, so late, it has not lost its heat.

I get out naked, not bothering to use the towel, but rather letting the water and the wind cool my overheated skin. I love it, the hot, arid air, soft as a murmur. I’ve stayed winter-pale from all the time inside, the brief crossings of the patio in the mornings not enough to bring the slightest tan. Though that doesn’t prevent me from marveling at the gleaming, relentless sun every time I look out through one of the palace windows, sometimes over the city, sometimes at a raw stretch of stone and undulating dunes, or the range of blue mountains in the backdrop that are watching over everything like a sentinel.

The nights are equally magical, especially the few hours before the moons rise. I’ve never seen so many stars before. So close. So bright. As if you could stretch out your hand and pluck them from the sky.

I’m too focused on the darkening horizon and the town that shimmers like a puddle of glowing lights underneath to notice that I’m not alone. My instinct alerts me… too late though. My nose catches Riven’s elusive scent a second after I spot his violet eyes.

I shiver from the way he’s looking straight at me, although I’m totally naked.

“That’s not very gentlemanly at all,” I say with all the bravery and harshness I can muster.

“Is it not?”

His form ripples out of the shadows as if he is a part of them. And again I’m struck by how similar he looks to the Dark Lord. But at the same time totally different. I don’t know why it matters so much. I also don’t know why every time I fall asleep, I have the Dark Lord’s blue and gold eyes in my mind. Why the fact that I know he’s somewhere close makes my heartbeat quicken and, absurdly enough, calms me on a deeper level.

I push the thoughts away, grabbing the towel from where it hangs from a rack on the wall and wrapping it around me. Trying hard to ignore another thought as it sluices through me—that I’m a slave now and that Riven probably can do whatever he pleases with me.

As if Riven knows what I’m thinking, he purrs, “My little treat with her lovely cheeks all flushed. Now, aren’t you perfect?”

I scowl at him, knowing that he’s mocking me.

“I see you still choose to ignore the rules for a slave,” he drawls, silky menace lacing into his words as he approaches with this otherworldly grace I would never manage to capture on paper. Not in a thousand years.

Today, he’s wearing a loose shirt that offers glimpses of his body beneath at every move, thanks to the fabric turning partly translucent whenever the light of the single candle burning on my nightstand hits it at a certain angle.

I swallow at the landscape of rigidly sculpted abdominals and rippling muscles, flashing at every step.

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