Page 92 of A Fae in Finance
“Right, and so I shouldn’t do anything,” I said, because I am a florist at heart. “Anyway, are we going to dinner?” I stuffed my feet into my shoes one at a time. One shoe had untied laces, but I couldn’t make myself bend to tie it.
“No,” he said, “we will go outside. You have been in the Court for too long.”
“Outside?” I repeated.
“We will visit a town in Faerie.”
“Oh, good, so you’re with the tourism bureau now,” I said.
“Take your shoes off and clean yourself,” he said. “I won’t be seen with you like this. It reflects poorly on me, and anyone could interpret your appearance as a failure to fulfill my oath and stab me.”
I considered arguing, but what did it matter?
“Fine.” I kicked off my shoes again and stalked toward the cascading waterfall of the shower. I shucked off my sweater as I went, not even glancing back to see if he had left.
The door slammed shut behind me. I divested myself of my remaining garments and stood shivering in the cold air.
Doctor Kitten had come to stand on the narrow ledge of the shower stall, next to the rocky wall that likely held the pipes. He mewled when he saw me hesitate.
Without checking the temperature, I stepped into the water. It hit me with enough force that I almost staggered. But the water felt nice as it sluiced down my body, wiping away days’ worth of grime and dander.
I took up the lavender soap and scrubbed my chest and arms with it, my heart pounding. Why had Sahir walked in so angrily? I lathered my hands up and massaged the suds into my scalp, my nails digging in. He’d pissed me off, storming in like that. But the lethargy reemerged before I’d even rinsed the soap away.
Doctor Kitten, having jumped back a step to avoid splashing water, started bathing himself, too. He sat decadently on the stone floor, one leg outstretched with ballerenic poise, licking his own phantom balls.
I stepped into the drying stream that came through the vent. Within moments, the water droplets beading my skin had been flung up and away into what I could only assume was the ventilation system for the entire Court.
After that I went to the bed, unsurprised to find clothes already laid out for me with magical precision. They were the usual fare: a simple brown shirt, a thicker overshirt in deference to the cold weather, and leggings with a woven belt. Doctor Kitten, doing his civic duty, had somehow beat me to the bed and covered them in cat hair in the past thirty seconds.
I nudged him onto the bedspread and pulled the clothes on. Sahir had laid out my soft boots as well, and thick woolen socks. I considered sticking to my sneakers but couldn’t make myself care enough to defy anyone. Especially not in a gesture as hollow as my choice of footwear.
When I opened the door again, Sahir was sitting on the floor across the hall, typing on his work phone—which I recognized because it matched mine.
“Exciting day at the office?” I asked, sounding simultaneously snide and miserable.
“No.” He stuck his phone in his pocket and stood up. “Quite boring. Several hours of meetings about a new bond issue, and then a very long and distressing discussion about a strategic initiative.”
I stared up at him. “Where are we going?”
“Outside,” he repeated, striding down the hallway—toward the river, not toward the clearing. I trailed after him, a small bubble of frustration rising in my chest and then deflating. It didn’t really matter where I went, did it?
We stepped out of the Court and I shivered in the chill air. The faeries had replicated the seasons. It was a pure, crisp night, and it even smelled like fall: spicy and cold and exciting. It felt like an adventure. I couldn’t stop myself; I looked around forsomething, the way I always had as a child. A magic carpet or a moving castle or a child flying in the sky.
No magic carpet popped up, but Sparkles did, along with another horse for Sahir.
I glanced at him. “Going for a scenic horseback ride is a very odd thing to do on a work night.”
“I have reasons for everything I do.” He wouldn’t look at me, though. Instead, he gestured to Sparkles. I stared at her bare back, trying to pinpoint the moment the saddle appeared.
He hefted me, his thumbs under my armpits. I flopped onto her back, where the saddle was suddenly beneath my legs. I sighed and watched him mount gracefully.
“Let us depart,” he said. The horses, who were much better listeners than me, started along the path.
We’d wended our way along the riverside for almost an hour when Sparkles began to slow. The horses’ hooves clacked on the errant stones in the dirt path, and we wound upward and upward, the river falling away from us, until we’d crested a hill. We veered left, away from the river and the path, and I stared down into the cup of the valley.
It wasn’t a town, at least not by my human standards. It was more like a street, a row of permanent structures set at a juncture in the winding road where it followed the river most closely. On the riverbank, a neat row of piers jutted into the water, set among the marshy shallows with waving cattails and thick reedy grass. Across the dusty dirt track the buildings squatted. They were not beautiful, but elegant in the way of old things, made of rounded stone set with mortar so ancient it had all but crumbled away.
There seemed to be a crowd of people standing at the entrance to an alleyway between two houses.
