Freya looked between us, her thin eyebrows pulling together.
“A pleasure as always, Lady Aveen.” Robert slipped a finger beneath his cravat, loosening the knot at his neck. It would be unladylike to grab the ends and pull until it choked him. Wouldn’t it?
It would.
I hid my hands behind my back in case they got any ideas of their own.
How had I ever been attracted to someone so awful? Sure, he was handsome, with trimmed blond hair and a strong jaw, but beneath it all, he was vapid and hollow. “I’d love to chat, but I’m afraid I’m in a bit of a hurry. It’s my sister’s birthday next week, and I still need to pick up a few bits for her. You remember Keelynn, don’t you, Freya?”
Robert stiffened, and his Adam’s apple bobbed when he swallowed. The sheen of perspiration at his hairline was more thrilling than a second helping of dessert.
No-good, lousy, two-timing wretch.
“How could I forget darling Keelynn?” she sniffed, her painted lips turning down in a frown.
I’d caught my sister kissing Freya’s brother at the Samhain festival a few years earlier.
Keelynn was so desperate to find love that she sought it out at every opportunity.
I knew there was no point.
Love was used to trick women into giving themselves away. In my social circles, it rarely factored into a marriage transaction. The most I could hope for was finding someone likable and kind, and most importantly—at least according to my father—a man who could manage the estate without gambling it away.
That was my fate. The curse of being a nobleman’s first-born daughter.
I swore after the first time I saw Keelynn cry over a boy that I would do everything in my power to ensure that she married the man she loved. I hadn’t accounted for the fact that the man would be a philandering wastrel.
“Is she still off chasing faeries,” Freya asked with a grating giggle, “or has she finally grown up?”
It was one thing to look down her upturned nose at me but another thing entirely to speak ill of my sister. “Perhaps that’s something you should ask your escort.”
Freya whipped toward Robert, eyes narrowing into slits. Robert’s mouth opened and closed like one of the gaping salmon displayed on the fish stall.
“Enjoy your day, Freya. Goodbye, Robert.” I offered a false smile and danced around a young woman pushing a pram along the uneven cobblestones.
Salesmen called from their stalls displaying pottery, fruit and veg, and handmade jewellery. The spools of ribbon were pretty, but ribbons as a birthday present ceased being acceptable after Keelynn had turned ten. The bolts of fabric would make for a fine dress, but even Meranda couldn’t hope to finish something from scratch on such a tight deadline.
The bunches of daffodils tied with twine at Farmer Warren’s stall used to be my favorite flowers. Now they seemed too cheerful.
Beside the daffodils, the bundles of dirt-crusted bulbs, which would bloom into stunning dahlia and echinacea come summer, called my name.
Gardening took patience and cooperation from the elements that remained outside human control. And people loved control.I’d put my faith in the earth over a person any day. At least I knew its betrayal wasn’t personal.
Farmer Warren nodded when I passed, and I told him I’d be back tomorrow for some bulbs.
A few ladies milled around the “fortune teller’s” booth. I wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t as if the old crone was a real witch practicing real magic. That sort of thing had been illegal in Airren for centuries.
Still, the soldiers who kept a close watch on the town let the harmless old woman sit at her booth and exchange her false second sight for coin.
An act of charity.
The woman dressed the part perfectly, with long, snowy hair unbound, a bronze circlet across her forehead, and two milky eyes searching the sky for lies to tell her “clients.”
As if she knew I was thinking of her, the woman’s eyes landed on me from across the square. She had enough people paying her today, unlike the dark figure begging on the cathedral steps behind her. Most of the creature’s grotesque features remained hidden beneath a threadbare brown robe. Everything except gnarled hands covered in red hair, holding a tin cup.
A grogoch.
Since he’d arrived three months ago, I’d seen him spat on, kicked, and jeered. Told to go back to where he belonged—to Tearmann—but he never did. Even if he wanted to leave, how could he get all the way to the creatures’ haven on the west coast with no funds?