Page 2 of A City of Emeralds and Envy
A FEW MONTHS AFTER FAERIE
Autumn is usually my favorite season. But it’s as ifthisparticular autumn knows I could use some clear blue skies, crisp breezes, and brilliant leaves—and it’s being extremely contrary, determined to deny me all those things.
It’s been the wettest autumn on record for a hundred years. Crops rot where they stand in the fields, and my father comes home every night in a worse mood than usual, which is saying something. My mother is unable to thoroughly dry the clothes for her laundering business.
The only good thing about this dreadful autumn is the opening of a new school, which occupies all but the littlest of my seven siblings for most of the day. I told my parents I would return to my post as a maid for Lord Drosselmeyer, if they would let my siblings attend the school at least four days a week—and my parents agreed, since they rely on my wages.
Lord Drosselmeyer provided the location for the school—a refurbished building on his property—and he’s funding most of it himself, with some contributions from his loyal patrons, who follow him in whatever new scheme he concocts.
The first half of the day is spent teaching the children the basics—reading, writing, arithmetic, and history—while the afternoon consists of optional sessions on science, biology, and engineering, occasionally taught by Lord Drosselmeyer himself.
Most mornings I walk five of my siblings to the school before continuing on to Lord Drosselmeyer’s mansion. As I dust, sweep, shovel ash, polish silver, and change linens, I think about what my younger siblings are learning. What I never had the chance to learn.
I read better now, thanks to some of the tricks Caer taught me—but no, I can’t think of him. When I remember his sharp, pretty face, his ridiculously wide smile, and his laugh—when I recall how hard he fought to keep me from sacrificing myself—Ihurt. I hurt so badly I can hardly stand it.
Did Riordan go after him? Find him? Are they both all right? Do they ever think of me?
Not that Icareif the White Rabbit thinks of me… but part of me wishes he would. I want him to realize he made a wretched mistake sending me home. I hope he’s fucking miserable.
Watching the rain run down the windowpanes of one of the front bedrooms, I snap out a sheet with such violence that my fellow maid, Belle, startles and almost knocks over the bell jar she’s dusting. “Gracious, Alice!” She sets the bell jar back over a porcelain rose.
“Sorry.” I smooth the sheet over the bed, tuck it in, and create neat, sharp corners. “I’m leaving once we finish this room so I can walk my brothers and sisters home.” If I’m lucky, one of them might be willing to tell me some of what they learned today.
“You go on,” says Belle. “I can finish up here.”
“You’re a darling.” As I leave the room, I pretend not to notice the curious, pitying look she gives me—the look most people give me now. The story of my supposed kidnapping by highwaymen has spread through the nearby towns, as has the rumor that the highwaymen used me in all sorts of ways. It’s a more acceptable version of the actual truth—that I jumped down a hole into Faerie, where I was held captive and nearly mutilated by a rabbit-eared Fae who wanted my virgin body for magical research. Well… Iwasa virgin, until the same Fae fucked me back to life, pouring his own heart’s-blood into my chest after his Queen ripped my heart out…
Better to stick with the highwaymen story. The only other person who knows the truth is Lord Drosselmeyer, and even then, I only gave him a partial account of what happened to me in Faerie.
Despite the fact that I stole an ancient spellbook, the Tama Olc, Drosselmeyer offered to keep me on as a maid when I returned. I think he felt a little guilty about the whole thing, and also didn’t want to give me a reason to tattle about his magical dealings to the people of the area. If they knew some of the things Drosselmeyer has dabbled in, they would come after him with pitchforks and torches. Foul weather has a tendency to make everyone angry and restless, eager to find a culprit on whom to blame their bad fortune, and Drosselmeyer would serve them well as a scapegoat. Some of the people in town are already eyeing his school with suspicion.
I run down the back stairs of Lord Drosselmeyer’s mansion, nearly colliding with one of the footmen on the landing.
The footman’s arm shoots out, quick as thought, and his palm slams against the wall beside me, barring my way.
“I enjoyed our time together last week.” He grins, lashes lowered over hungry eyes. “Can’t seem to think about anything else. I’ve got a little time now. We could have some more fun, if you like.”
I knew it was a mistake to have sex with this one. The other men I’ve chosen since my return from Faerie were gentler sorts, but this one has a brash, dominant side. I selected him because the rest were fairly disappointing—none of them knew how to use their lips and tongues like the White Rabbit did, and none of their cocks came close to his size and girth, or to the brutal, heartbroken passion with which he fucked me. The human males I’ve been with have tried to be accommodating, but I could tell they were used to getting their pleasure without much care for the woman.
None of them could give me what I need, what I crave, what I miss so hard that my very bones hurt sometimes. Even when I picture Riordan or Caer, during the act, it’s not enough, because it isn’t only their bodies or the pleasure I miss—it’sthem.
I chose this footman because he’s the most attractive in Drosselmeyer’s household, and because I heard him brag about his cock’s size. He wasn’t lying about the length—but size doesn’t matter when a man thinks a woman should orgasm immediately the moment he enters her. He rutted into me jerkily and awkwardly, saying over and over, “That’s it. That’s what you fucking need, a real man’s cock.”
Actually, no—what I need is Fae cock. Fae eyes, Fae lips, Fae claws and teeth and tongues. Glittering smiles and wicked, long-lashed glances. Sleek bodies and lethal grace.
I’m not about to repeat my interlude with this man, since there’s no hope of him being willing to learn.
“Not today.” I move to pass him, but he brings his body closer to mine.
“You’re a tease, you know that? It’s not fucking fair.”
Footsteps on the stairs above make him step back, and I take the opportunity to hurry down to the kitchens. Fearful that he’ll follow me, I pause for only a moment in the mud room to switch my house shoes for my boots and take my cape from its hook. The cape has a huge hood, for which I’m grateful as I step out onto the mud-slick pavers of the back courtyard.
Holding my hood in place against the rain, I hurry along the path that skirts the house and cuts through the dripping garden. I cast a glance toward the great rosebush, one I’m almost sure came from Faerie. There are no roses on it now, but it has pushed out more thorns. Its leaves hang limp and damp. It looks as wretched as everything else.
My boot-soles squelch in mud as I pass through the garden gate into the lane beyond. I trudge along the low hedge toward the schoolhouse. Lord Drosselmeyer never did say what the building was used for prior to the school’s founding. It’s big as a barn, but it doesn’t look like one. Maybe he once stored some of his inventions there.
Rain streams off the edge of my hood, and my woolen cape is slowly becoming drenched. I feel as if I might never be dry again, as if the dampness is a perpetual, moldering presence in my life now. The heavy clouds will never part, and the sodden sky will keep leaking, leaking onto the dark and shivering landscape.
