“Wildmother.” Footsteps, then the door opened to her hair in disarray as she tied a robe. The smell of sex wafted out, the bed mussed but empty. “What?”
I eyed her.
“Likeyounever touch yourself, especially since Eury won’t look twice at you.”
Urgency flooded back in. “Maeronyx tried to poison her.”
“At thewelcometea?” She pushed past me and into the main room, out of view. “You, come. Yes, you can stand. Arm around me, that’s right.”
The two of them reappeared in the doorway, Faun helping Eury walk with an arm draped over her. I helped Faun set her in bed with a groan. Faun passed around the bed and into her chamber, then returned with a leather roll. “Did you drink?”
“No.” I sat on the edge of the bed. “Not a drop.”
Faun unrolled her leather on the nightstand. A neat series of phials appeared. “Noxveil?”
“No time for anything else.”
Faun plucked a phial with pink liquid and paused. “That’s notlike the Black Frost.”
“I know.” It wasn’t Maeronyx’s way at all. Which probably made it a test.
A shadow fell over us. Finch and Haskel and Mirek and Eleyrie crowded the doorway.
“Ser?” Finch said.
“She’ll be fine.” Faun strode to the door, pulled Eleyrie in, and shut it in the others’ faces. “Men,” she said to the handmaiden.
Eleyrie went straight to the washroom, no doubt to prepare a cool cloth.
“So she was testing Eury’s defenses.” Faun sat beside Eury and uncorked the phial. “Recon.”
“Maybe.” I wanted to run my hand over her brow, to ease away the pain on Eury’s face. “But if so, she’d have someone else do it. Why Maeronyx herself?”
Faun didn’t answer. Instead, she opened Eury’s mouth and upturned the phial until she’d drunk down the liquid. She patted her cheek. “You’ll be up and dancing in no time.”
Dancing. The ball. Fuck.
Eury had already survived two attempts on her life, and that was when she wasn’t surrounded by a hundred fae.
“Go for now.” Faun pushed Eury’s hair back from her face. “She needs sleep.”
Eleyrie emerged with a wet cloth and laid it over Eury’s forehead. The two women sat over her, tending, and I had no reason to stay except that I desperately wanted to.
Back in the common space, Haskel and Finch pretended not to have been listening at the door. They backed up to the fountain when I opened the door and shut it behind me.
Haskel twiddled his fingers in the water. “These koi are lovely.”
“Eury’s fine,” I said.
“Oh thank the gods.” Mirek rolled his eyes up toward the stained glass. “You have no idea how long her ballgown took me.”
“Tell me it’s made out of plate armor,” I said, “and I’ll be happy.”
Mirek’s gaze shifted back down; his face contorted. “I’ve never heard anything more ghastly.” He pointed. “Stay there.”
A minute later, he returned with dark clothing on a hanger. “You.” He gestured. “Up on the dais.”
“But—”