Mirror wraiths. Mirror-ways.
The longer I spent in Feyreign, the more I was humbled by it. What I knew about this world was the size of a pin’s head next to what I didn’t know.
But danger was universal, undeniable. I felt it always in my chest, in the tingle of my fingers. I wasn’t safe here, and I never would have been. The festival, the diplomacy, the pretty dresses—they were all theater. Mongrel or human or fae, the truth of life always resided in the sharpness of your teeth.
A knock on the door. “My lady Eurydice.” Mirek.
“I’m up,” I said, sounding hoarse. Mirek was worse than my own mother. No, not worse. At least my mother hadn’t pricked me with needles and tittered at her own clumsy hands.
I rose and washed myself. When I emerged from the bedchamber, the others were seated at the dining table, breaking their fast around a fresh spread of food. All except Dorian.
The mirror was gone from the floor, as were the shards.
Mirek set down a steaming mug and stood. “Thank the wildmother. We’ve only got a quarter hour, you know.”
I didn’t move. “Where’s Dorian?”
“Struck off early this morning.” Haskel ripped off a piece of bread. “Didn’t say why or where. Never does.”
I wrapped my arms around myself; my robe felt suddenly thin. It was the second time he’d disappeared since becoming myveyre. I hated that I was counting.
“You look worse for wear,” Faun said, and bit into a pink pastry.
“Not every day a fresh-crowned queen faces a mirror wraith,” Haskel said. “Girl probably slept not even one wink.”
Mirek struck off toward the dais and lifted a lacy canary dress. “In the morning, Highmark fae wear yellow. It represents their gratitude for the dawning of another day.”
“You should have no trouble with gratitude this morning,” Faun said while chewing.
Mirek turned toward the wall and snapped his fingers. He said a loud word in Faerish. Seconds later the tapestry moved, and I stepped back as the door behind it opened.
Eleyrie the handmaiden appeared, her chestnut hair loose and wavy around her head. She only had eyes for me. “Yes, my queen?”
“A braided bun,” Mirek said to her. “Make it high.”
Eleyrie gestured for me to take a seat at the small vanity area beside the tailor’s dais.
I sat. My reflection stared back at me, and then Eleyrie’s as she began to work on my hair.
Faun came to stand beside me, a mug between both hands as we met eyes in the mirror.
“About last night.” Her voice was confidential; no doubt Theia had resumed her post outside our guest chambers. “We’ve still no real idea who was behind the wraith,” she said. “Gawain, sure, but someone in this court facilitated the mirror’s magic.”
“And I’m to nibble on danishes with Liora and pretend my bedding isn’t in pieces.”
Faun shrugged one shoulder. “Queens have been trying to off each other for centuries.” She sipped from her mug. “This is what they call your shadow coronation. Not all survive it.”
I’d only survived because of Dorian. Eleyrie caught a snarl in my hair just as my chest tightened, and I flinched.
“Dorian won’t let anything happen to you. Not while he lives.” Faun tapped her thumb on the mug. “Now, which spoon is for stirring your coffee?”
Twenty minutes later, I was coiffed, dressed, and freshly educated on utensils. Faun and I emerged from my chambers to find Theia standing there just as she had been lastnight, her eyes on the blank wall across from her as though she hadn’t had her ear pressed to the door half the night.
What had she heard? What hadn’t she?
When we came out, she bowed her head. “Good morning, my queen,” she said in a breathy voice. “Allow me to escort you to the Dawnmaker’s solar.”
My first real meeting with the Dawnmaker awaited. I knew what I wanted from her: this sol key Dorian and Haskel kept speaking of. The key to the “eternal cell,” where Carys’s dagger waited. But wanting and having were two worlds apart.