The Summer Solstice

Chapter 13: Rue

🦋Rue🦋

 Father has gathered us in the great room.

I gently touch the wrappings on my burned fingers, the underneath slick with salve. They burn even now, hours after a seething Calum took me directly to our Hob. The tiny Dryad girl had been resting quietly on another cot, but I wonder if she's been reunited with her family by now.

Kale stands at my side. "Don't bother the bandages," he mutters, then shakes his head. "I can't believe you would do such a thing."

I turn towards him innocently while father paces across the room. "You can't believe that I would save a child?"

Kale frowns. "You know that is not what I meant."

"It was reckless," Kieren adds, appearing from the hall, mother close behind him.

I bite my tongue, not daring to say what I wish—that he, the future king—should have done what I so recklessly did. Instead, it seems he had been munching on higgleberry pie from the purple stain to his lips. He'd been eating while his people were wailing, begging for escape.

"No more," the King says, silencing us all.

Mother walks up to him tentatively. Even she knows to approach him with caution during such a time. "Aladis..." she starts.

He waves a thick hand in the air. "Dryad forest will recover, though the lives lost will never be regained."

I can not hold my tongue this time. "How many?"

My father looks at me. I expect anger, and it is indeed there, but something else too. "Nearly five hundred."

My mother puts a hand over her mouth.

The King goes to her, gripping her shoulder as if to support her. It's a rare sign of affection I see between the two of them. "Elma, that is not the worst of it."

"What could be worse?" Kieren asks, looking pale.

"Lord Dillock of the Dryads is gone."

Though it is a King's duty to deliver bad news, my father's expression is broken. Any Faie lost, especially a Sovereign, is a blow.

Already the gears churn in my head, wondering who will replace his spot on the West High Council. His son, Cedar, isn't even old enough for lessons yet.

"Who is to blame for this?" Kale asks, voicing the question we all have.

"Not the Pooka," I say. "Their scent nor antics were present."

Kieren's amber eyes regard me carefully. "How can you be so sure? The ash and burning smoke could have easily masked their smell."

But father comes to my aid. "Rue is correct. We were initially fed false information that the Pooka were at fault. There is much to uncover still, and I have both Colonel Ronan and the investigative Gentry squadron at the scene."

At Ronan's mention, I can't help but feel a twinge of relief. I wonder if Calum knows his brother is safe.

"And who fed us this misinformation?" I ask.

The King cuts me a sharp glance, the lines on his face like canyons. He is old, even by Faie standards, and I briefly remember that I am in no state to question him. His punishment for my recklessness will not be kind.

Nevertheless, he answers. "High General Nader's son."

"Reed?" I manage.

My father nods.