Page 20 of Royals
“Shhhh!” Ellie hisses, looking around her, but Alex is talking to Miles, and the rest of the Royal Wreckers are heading back to the parlor, laughing, punching each other, basically a walking advertisement for bad decisions.
“I thought Flora was the only one who was a mess,” I add, still whispering. “Is she here?”
Turning back to me, she smooths her hair with her hands, probably drawing power from its mystical shininess. “We’ll see her once her school term is over,” Ellie says, “and as for Seb and his friends, I know they can get a little out of hand, but—”
“Out of hand?” I whisper back. “Ellie, that was full-scale insane. There was nearly a duel! Seb, like, tried to steal some dude’s house! And you’re worried aboutourfamily being embarrassing?”
“No one is worried our family will embarrass me, first of all,” she says, and I scoff.
“Okay, sure.”
Ignoring that, she goes on. “And those are Seb’s friends, not Alex’s.”
“Are you sure about that?” I ask.
I glance over to see Alex thumping Miles’s shoulder in that way boys do, and Miles shoots a quick look at me before heading off in the same direction as the other Wreckers. Only Ellie,Alex, Sherbet, and I are left in the main foyer, and while I want to ask Ellie more about Seb, Alex is already walking toward her, one hand out.
“Drink, darling?” he asks, like we’re in aMasterpiece Theatreshow about murder in the 1930s or something.
Ellie sighs and places her hand in his. “Yes, please,” she says, and off they go, violins probably swelling on the soundtracks inside their heads.
As I watch them go, I wonder: Isthiswhy Ellie kept things so separate? Was it less to keep us from embarrassing her new fancy-pants family and more to make sure we never knew hownotperfect her new life was?
That’s... interesting to think about.
Sherbet moves closer to me, hands in his pockets. “Shall I show you up to your room?” he asks, and I nod. I wouldn’t mind holing up somewhere private for a little bit.
“Follow me,” Sherbet says, jerking his head toward the main staircase.
As we walk along, our footsteps muffled by the thick carpet on the steps, I glance around again at all the stuff. Paintings fill up all the wall space, and little tables covered in clocks and porcelain eggs and miniature portraits are scattered everywhere.
“How would you know if anything went missing?” I ask, and Sherbet turns, looking at me and then around again as though he’s just now noticing that his house is full ofthings.
“Huh,” he says, gripping the banister with a long-fingered hand. “I’m not sure wewouldknow, really.” He laughs then, some of his dark hair flopping over his forehead. “Most houses like this are stuffed to the gills,” he says, continuing up the stairs.
“I guess owning a place for like a thousand years will do that,” I reply, and he laughs again, stepping onto the landing.
“Yes, that, but also, families like ours would always make sure to have extra trinkets lying about in case anything caught the monarch’s eye when they visited.”
I stop just behind him, looking at an end table littered with all sorts of bits and bobs: a magnifying glass with a jeweled handle, a thumb-sized naughty shepherdess figurine, a leather-bound journal so old the spine is flaking. “What do you mean?” I ask, and he looks back at me, eyebrows raised.
“Oh, just that if the king or queen were visiting your house, they might see something they wanted, and they’d take it. So it behooved hosts to fill their house with extra knickknacks or objets d’art, so they could give away something less valuable or sentimental.”
I try to imagine someone visiting my house and just... taking whatever they wanted.
“But what if you didn’t want them to have it? What if they didn’t fall for the extra junk and wanted, like, a book your dead grandmother gave you?”
Sherbet shrugs. “Then you gave it to them,” he says. “They’re royal.”
Like that explains everything. And heck, for these types of people, maybe it does. Seb did just try to commandeer someone’s farm, after all.
“I hope you enjoy your stay here, Daisy,” Sherbet goes on. “I know today was a bit mad, but tomorrow is the race, and that should be a good deal calmer.”
Oh, right. The race, aka An Reis, a fancy, Ascot-like thingwe’ll be attending that’sprobablyin that folder Glynnis prepared for me. I know nothing about horses or races, but how hard can it be?
We make our way farther down the hall until Sherbet stops at a door and opens it with a flourish, giving a little bow. “If anything is not to your satisfaction, please let me know,” he says, and then he’s off down the hall, back toward the stairs and, I’m sure, more drinks.
The room is smaller than I’d expected, but maybe that’s just because the bed is so massive, it takes up most of the space. It’s covered in a floral bedspread, and there’s a tiny canopy that I like, but other than that, it mostly feels... weird. Other than my bag—resting on an ancient-looking luggage rack at the foot of the bed—it’s all deeply unfamiliar and even a little unwelcoming. The walls are stone, and while there are two windows looking out toward the stream that cuts across the property, the glass is so warped and distorted that it makes it seem like I’m looking outside through water.
