Two Wicked Courts

Chapter 4

My hyper-awareness dulled as the days began to blur together. In the beginning, I had jumped at every sound and touch and continuously looked for chances to escape. The twins rarely left us alone, and even when they did, servants were usually roaming the halls and guards patrolled at regular intervals. The only window in our room was open, but the drop was too far for us to survive and only led to one of the palace's many gardens. Alana, however suggestible to the twins, was not to me. She refused to move if I even tried to leave the room without the twins.

The situation, already hopeless before, didn't improve. I realized it was much easier to go along with it, as Alana did, especially when it became apparent that the amount of real food and water we received was based on my behavior.

The twins' daily lives and amount of responsibilities was laughable. They paraded us in our colorful, revealing costumes all over the palace, had regular gatherings in a favorite garden in the afternoons with a few select Fae that always seemed to differ, and their evenings climaxed with music, dancing, and copious amounts of wine until they eventually dragged us back to the room we awoke in. Sometimes they would leave us to retire to their own bedroom, which I realized was the adjoining chamber opposite the bathroom, and other nights they would fall asleep with us in the many cushions strewn across the floor.

I didn't know what was worse; how they plied us with their faery wine until we danced and did whatever else they told us even without glamour, the possessive way Leander touched me as I danced and the vague recollection of his hot mouth on my skin, or how I would wake up at dawn to find myself curled against him in various states of undress like he was my lover.

The realization as I came to myself in the low, periwinkle light and the utter repulsion and anger at myself for letting my guard down, even in my sleep, to him.

I often vomited in the mornings and retreated to the corner by the window to fall into a light, restless sleep until the rest of them woke for the day. I was always too exhausted and hollow to direct my rage anywhere other than inward.

The first wave of glamour in the mornings came with relief, to sink into blissful compliance for a period of time until it wore off, which had started to come earlier and earlier. It had started in the afternoon, then late mornings, and after just an hour or so after the first command. It was like a fog, making me feel not all present in my own body, least of all conscious of my actions. It made what I was doing, what I had to do, easier.

Eventually, Leander stopped using his glamour on me, seeming to prefer my conversation so long as I obeyed his commands and was as pliable as a doll.

I stood at the window, unable to sleep, and watched the sun rise over the sea in the distance. The palace was so vast, its walls and towers elaborate and high, that it covered most of the view, save for a sliver of water and the open sky. The sun painted the remainder of last evening's storm clouds pink and golden and coaxed the sea from its gray to a warmer, lighter blue.

We had always heard stories of the ocean from merchants and I had fantasized about one day dipping my toes in the saltwater, but it had never happened. Now I was in another world entirely, with the ocean in sight, yet locked behind walls.

Captives. Prisoners. Favored, a term the Fae used when nobility took mortals and bonded with them. Other Fae couldn't touch us, under some law the twins' ancestors had laid down. The Fae women at court looked at us with envy and curiosity, although I had no idea why they would be envious of people often perceived as pets. Perhaps it was the attention. I almost pitied them.

Prickling on the back of my neck urged me to turn back to the room, but it came too late. Leander brushed my loose hair away from my shoulder and kissed my skin lightly. His fingers remained knotted in my hair. The prickling turned to buzzing, crawling insects. I remained still.