bracelet.
“When we were married,” she’d said shyly, “I couldn’t afford to give you anything but that thin little chain. This is more manly, don’t you think?”
The next day she’d seen the pearl, and he’d bought it for her.
“We must have someone bespell the clasps, just as the Good Brother did at our wedding,” she’d said when he fastened the silver chain round her slender neck. “Mayhap Cayden would do it for us this time.”
“That would be nice,” he’d replied in as neutral a voice as he could manage, privately vowing that Cayden was absolutely the last person he would ask to perform the service, and not just because Cayden was the very last person who would want to.
As he waited in the kitchen of Wistly Hall for water to boil in the kettle, he thought over Cade’s revelation of a few days ago. No Elsewhens. No dreams. No turns where he glimpsed a tantalizing hint of a possible future. Mieka had become so used to this odd Fae-bequeathed magic of Cade’s that knowing it was gone set him off balance. And that was ludicrous, because he hadn’t even noticed. How could he—how could any of them—have been so utterly unaware of what Cade had done? They were taking each other for granted. All the talent and skill and inspiration and sheer delight in playing that was Touchstone had become routine. Rafe had had the right of it, and no mistake. Not just their performances but their friendship had gone stale, too.
He ought to have known that something peculiar had happened to the Elsewhens. It said shameful things about him that he had not noticed. He could argue to himself all he liked that after that horrible night when Cade had seen Briuly and Alaen find The Rights of the Fae, talking about any Elsewhen was the very last thing he ought to do. He supposed it had become habit, this not talking; for the rest of that Royal Circuit, and on into the winter, and then through the spring, and then—good Gods, it really had been almost two years. Was it the compassion and consideration of a friend that had kept him silent, or the total self-absorption of an essentially selfish man?
The difference in the magic Cade used for the withies ought to have been a clue. But how could Mieka have explained it?
“It just doesn’t feel like
you
anymore”
? Cade would have mocked his vagueness, denying that anything was different at all.
And then there was the
clever and mad
that Blye had prescribed years ago. Cade didn’t laugh the way he’d used to at Mieka’s jokes. Those first years had been such marvelous fun—oh, they all snarked and sniped at each other, to be sure, and pranked each other unmercifully—and here he winced, recalling what had happened when he finally got back at Rafe for the vanishing-clothes trick at the Lilyleaf baths.
Almost a year after the incident, everyone else seemed to have given up trying to scheme any retaliation. Mieka was simply biding his time, working out the best method of revenge. At last, one morning while Rafe was sleeping off a colossal drunk, which Mieka had occasioned through the simple expedient of paying for two rounds out of every three, the luxuriant black beard of which the fettler was so proud had undergone a radical transformation. Armed with a pair of nail scissors, which he reasoned was the only instrument delicate enough for such precise work, Mieka trimmed Rafe’s beard as if it were a decorative hedge.
Rafe woke to find that both cheeks now sported stripes, his chin had been snipped almost clean, and his mustache had all but vanished except for two little tufts at the corners of his mouth.
There were no roars of outrage. There was no physical retaliation, nor even a threat of it; not a word about taking Mieka apart and putting him back together sideways. All Rafe did was examine himself very closely in a looking glass, arch his brows at Mieka—who stood there with Cade and Jeska, all of them holding their breath—and ask to borrow a razor so he
“When we were married,” she’d said shyly, “I couldn’t afford to give you anything but that thin little chain. This is more manly, don’t you think?”
The next day she’d seen the pearl, and he’d bought it for her.
“We must have someone bespell the clasps, just as the Good Brother did at our wedding,” she’d said when he fastened the silver chain round her slender neck. “Mayhap Cayden would do it for us this time.”
“That would be nice,” he’d replied in as neutral a voice as he could manage, privately vowing that Cayden was absolutely the last person he would ask to perform the service, and not just because Cayden was the very last person who would want to.
As he waited in the kitchen of Wistly Hall for water to boil in the kettle, he thought over Cade’s revelation of a few days ago. No Elsewhens. No dreams. No turns where he glimpsed a tantalizing hint of a possible future. Mieka had become so used to this odd Fae-bequeathed magic of Cade’s that knowing it was gone set him off balance. And that was ludicrous, because he hadn’t even noticed. How could he—how could any of them—have been so utterly unaware of what Cade had done? They were taking each other for granted. All the talent and skill and inspiration and sheer delight in playing that was Touchstone had become routine. Rafe had had the right of it, and no mistake. Not just their performances but their friendship had gone stale, too.
He ought to have known that something peculiar had happened to the Elsewhens. It said shameful things about him that he had not noticed. He could argue to himself all he liked that after that horrible night when Cade had seen Briuly and Alaen find The Rights of the Fae, talking about any Elsewhen was the very last thing he ought to do. He supposed it had become habit, this not talking; for the rest of that Royal Circuit, and on into the winter, and then through the spring, and then—good Gods, it really had been almost two years. Was it the compassion and consideration of a friend that had kept him silent, or the total self-absorption of an essentially selfish man?
The difference in the magic Cade used for the withies ought to have been a clue. But how could Mieka have explained it?
“It just doesn’t feel like
you
anymore”
? Cade would have mocked his vagueness, denying that anything was different at all.
And then there was the
clever and mad
that Blye had prescribed years ago. Cade didn’t laugh the way he’d used to at Mieka’s jokes. Those first years had been such marvelous fun—oh, they all snarked and sniped at each other, to be sure, and pranked each other unmercifully—and here he winced, recalling what had happened when he finally got back at Rafe for the vanishing-clothes trick at the Lilyleaf baths.
Almost a year after the incident, everyone else seemed to have given up trying to scheme any retaliation. Mieka was simply biding his time, working out the best method of revenge. At last, one morning while Rafe was sleeping off a colossal drunk, which Mieka had occasioned through the simple expedient of paying for two rounds out of every three, the luxuriant black beard of which the fettler was so proud had undergone a radical transformation. Armed with a pair of nail scissors, which he reasoned was the only instrument delicate enough for such precise work, Mieka trimmed Rafe’s beard as if it were a decorative hedge.
Rafe woke to find that both cheeks now sported stripes, his chin had been snipped almost clean, and his mustache had all but vanished except for two little tufts at the corners of his mouth.
There were no roars of outrage. There was no physical retaliation, nor even a threat of it; not a word about taking Mieka apart and putting him back together sideways. All Rafe did was examine himself very closely in a looking glass, arch his brows at Mieka—who stood there with Cade and Jeska, all of them holding their breath—and ask to borrow a razor so he
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