Page 38 of A Legacy of Poison and Lies

Holt returned with a tray of steaming food and took the seat beside her so that he too could keep a close eye on the room, Zylah presumed.

A handful of the drunk’s companions helped him off the floor, laughing with the barman and downing another round of drinks, but something about it seemed off. Zylah’s fingers grazed the dagger in her bracer as she kept a close eye on the group.

“I didn’t handle things very well with Mae,” Holt said, passing her a plate of meat and potatoes.

“It looked like you had everything under control to me.” The way he’d spoken to Mae, the way he’d bound her with his vines. The way every faerie in the court had stopped at his words. He knew exactly what he was doing.

Holt frowned as he poured water from a pitcher and handed Zylah a cup. “I want you with me next time. At the next court.”

“With you?”

“In any of the meetings. Some are friends, like Mae. Some aren’t. But I’d like you to be present for all of them.”

Zylah arched a brow as she stabbed her fork into a potato. “Friends like Mae?”

“Just friends.” He held her gaze as he said it, and Zylah didn’t question him. “The next court is still a few days’ ride from here.”

“My knowledge of the courts is still limited.” She’d read all the books in Raif’s library, but none covered the faerie courts or their locations, or what was left of them. They were mostly story books, save for a few, and now she thought of it, it seemed a strange collection given Raif’s character. No history books, nothing of the world. Perhaps he coveted an escape from the realities of Virian more than she’d realised. She pushed her potato around her plate, swallowing down the lump that had formed in her throat.

Holt leaned back against the bench, his attention solely on her, his plate of food untouched. “There was a time when the courts overlapped with human lands, when they were vast sprawling territories. Those that remain now are small. Not quite as small as Mae’s but closed off from humans. Sheltered. Protected.”

Trapped.

Mae’s court had been trapped, whether they admitted it or not. Even just a few days had been stifling.

Zylah took a bite of her food, and at last, Holt seemed content to start on his meal.

Of all the books she’d read, none explained the workings of the downfall of the Fae, only that humans had driven them all to thisshelteredlife they now lived. Not that that privilege extended to all of them. She’d taught herself about the human lands in her time away from Virian. The history she should have learnt as a child in Dalstead, the history her father and brother should have told her, but instead, they chose to follow Arnir’s rules.

Stupidity meant compliant citizens; knowledge meant questions. Gatherings. But why had her father and brother hidden those things from her, too? “It seems strange that humans could overthrow the Fae,” she said at last between mouthfuls of food.

A group entered the tavern, a priestess and her acolytes, easily identifiable by their fine cloaks. Zylah knew Holt tracked their movements just as she did.

“Not all faeries have powers like yours,” he said. “They have strength, yes, speed that humans don’t possess, but they have families too, weaknesses to be exploited. For every faerie that walks these lands, ten humans walk alongside them. It’s why most conceal themselves now. Safer to go unnoticed, to remain in hiding, rather than face being used by the humans, or worse.”

Zylah glanced around the room. She’d already surveyed the space, the patrons, where the doors and windows were. None of the occupants seemed as if they were Fae wearing deceits. It was just a room full of ordinary humans, none of them so unusual that they would turn a head. With the exception of the priestess, perhaps. “How many courts remain?”

Holt ran a thumb around the rim of his cup. “The last I knew, there were still twelve courts. All part of the four kingdoms.”

Saphi had told her there were four kingdoms. Holt’s and Raif’s families were from two of those, but the other two… Raif’s library had held a book on Holt’s line, but no others. The books had been mostly human story books, some in languages Zylah couldn’t read, like the twin to the book Okwata had given her. Nothing of the courts and who ruled over them. “Are there any courts that don’t sit within a kingdom?”

A nervous chatter seemed to settle across the tavern. Zylah tried to hear snippets of conversations, but perhaps it was the effect of the day catching up with her because she couldn’t quite focus on their words.

“Good question,” Holt said, following her gaze across the crowd with a frown. “And one that, before the last uprising, could have got you killed.”

“I thought Marcus was the only unfair ruler.”

“The Fae haven’t got things right for many years.” He sighed, one arm tucked under the other as he held his cup. “My parents were good people. But they weren’t always fair. They had to make decisions that ultimately favoured Fae over humans. And it cost them.”

“Cost them what?”

Holt’s frown deepened, and she hated that she knew what his answer would be. “Everything.”

Living in a cage was no life if that was what the other courts were doing. And there was something else he wasn’t saying. Zylah chewed her lip, wondering if he was ever going to trust her enough to tell her whatever it was he was keeping from her. Maybe that was why her father and brother had never told her the truth… maybe they thought she’d cause too much trouble for them, risking Zack’s position with Arnir.

She’d finished every last mouthful of her food, the first full meal she’d eaten in… too long. The drunks at the bar cheered as the lute player started another tune, revellers raising tankards, words slurring, or maybe it was just her exhaustion. The hours on the horse, the food, the Aster attack, it had depleted her, but she didn’t want to sleep, not yet.

“Tell me about Kerthen,” Holt said, as if he’d sensed her restlessness, as if he too wanted to shake away whatever shadow had fallen over him since the attack.

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