Page 12 of Prince of Flowers
“And I am Doctor Euclidea Fang.” She folded her hands on top of her desk, resting them over a stack of papers. “Again, how may I help you gentlemen?”
Her tone was more polite, bordering on kind, which was something that I rarely experienced with Euclidea Fang. I could tell that she was putting on airs for the sake of our visitor.
“To keep a long story short, I was minding my own business, drifting in the layers of the cosmos between your realm and the Verdance.” Sylvain jabbed an accusing finger toward me. “And then this uncouth individual over here decided to pluck me out of the wilds, no doubt because he found my charms and my countenance so very irresistible.”
Betrayal. I knew it. Where was all that sweetness from before? I crossed my arms and groaned.
“Now how in the world would that even be possible when I couldn’t see you? I could sense you on the wind, but that was it.”
One of Dr. Fang’s eyebrows raised far above the frame of her blocky glasses. “Lochlann, is this true? Did you really summon this gentleman with your magic?”
I hugged my grimoire close to my chest, tapping my finger on its cover, making a repetitive and reassuring sound.
“Hear me out, Doc. I used the Pact of the Unknown. I know, I know. It wasn’t ideal. But I felt this powerful presence on the wind, and I just had to give it a shot. You know I’ve been trying to contract a greater eidolon for ages now. Doves are nice and all, but how could I pass up an opportunity like this?”
Sylvain bit his lower lip. He crossed his legs and linked his fingers behind his head, leaning back against the armchair.
“A powerful presence, eh? Is that really the only reason you summoned me, Lochlann?”
I clenched my teeth. Gods, I hated how he’d learned my true name. The good news? All that we understood of the fae suggested that the myth about them abusing the knowledge of someone’s name was just that — a myth. It didn’t truly give the fair folk any kind of power over humans, or even each other. Hopefully.
The bad news? Just knowing that he had something new to taunt with me had my hackles rising. I wasn’t a fan of the name Lochlann. Who was? It felt so formal and made my skin crawl without fail, each time a Wispwood faculty member or admin staffer invoked it. It didn’t help that I associated its use with Father and his lectures. What a tough man Baylor Wilde was. Long gone, but the memory of his sternness never forgotten.
So I went with Locke, like lock, but with a silent E at the end. Because why not? It sounded cool, sophisticated, mysterious, all the things that I aspired to. All the things I wasn’t.
Dr. Fang bent across her desk, smiling sweetly at Sylvain, a truly rare and borderline terrifying sight. “May I offer you a drink of water, Sylvain? I’m afraid that’s all I have on hand at the moment.”
“I’m quite all right,” Sylvain said. “But thank you for the offer.”
Again I remembered how Sylvain had seemed so curious about the waters of the Wispwell, and again I wondered why he was so interested if he hadn’t been so thirsty.
“Lovely,” Euclidea said. “No water, then. In that case, could I trouble you with giving Lochlann and myself here a little bit of privacy? I’d like to speak to him about some matters regarding the academy. Student and professor things. Very boring, I assure you.”
She tilted her head, her smile going even brighter, almost reaching her eyes. I felt my heart stop. Gods, none of the other students would ever believe me. Sylvain looked between us like he suspected something was up, but he shrugged and relented.
“Very well, then. Where should I wait?”
Euclidea got up from her desk and guided him toward the other end of her office, which opened up into a balcony filled with even more plants. Dr. Fang had the privilege of a beautiful corner office with high windows and plenty of natural light.
I moistened my lips as Sylvain stretched his muscles out on the balcony, his body unfurling, a cat basking in the sunlight. He selected a seat between two ferns and placed his hands behind his head, but not before snapping his fingers.
Sylvain’s shirt disintegrated into a trail of leaves, every scale on his armor blowing away with the wind. I watched, mouth agape. He wasn’t joking. He really did have the ability to manipulate plant matter, and in a way that I’d never seen before.
I rose from my chair, still gawking at Sylvain, allowing myself to do so because he had his back to me. I pointed toward the balcony and hissed under my breath as Euclidea returned to her desk.
“Doctor Fang, did you see that? Did you see what he did with his tunic?”
She sat back down, nudged her glasses, and once again folded her hands on top of a stack of papers.
“I saw, and I understand. Gods above and below, Lochlann Wilde. What have you done this time? You’ve contracted one of the fae, of all things.”
The defiance bubbled in the pit of my stomach, something inside me resisting. Maybe it was how her tone reminded me so much of Father. My spine straightened and my shoulders squared. I lifted my chin and answered.
“A fae prince, actually.”
Wow. When had I defaulted to actually defending him? Even saying that last bit out loud felt off, boasting about it as if I knew the first thing about fae royalty. Perhaps I just so desperately wanted to impress this upon Dr. Fang, me, finally achieving something in the field of summoning worth bragging about.
Dr. Fang leaned back, clapped her hand on her forehead, and groaned. “Honestly, Lochlann. You dragged a fae prince all the way back from the Verdance. We know so little of them.” She cast her finger toward the balcony windows. “Look at him out there.”
