“I said,” he remarked, “nothing seems long to a fair one.”
I looked up to find him staring at me in perplexed fascination with the smile still frozen on his face. There was his flaw: the color of his eyes, a peculiar shade of amethyst, striking against his golden-brown complexion, which put me in mind of late-afternoon sunlight dappling fallen leaves. His eyes instantly bothered me for a reason other than their unusual hue, but try as I might I couldn’t put my finger on why.
“Forgive me. I’m a portrait artist, and I have a habit of looking at people and forgetting about everything else while I’m doing it. I did hear what you said. I just don’t have an answer.”
The fair one’s gaze flicked down to my satchel. When he returned his attention to me his smile had faded. “Of course. I imagine our lives are beyond human comprehension, for the most part.”
“Do you know why the thane came out of the forest into Whimsy, sir?” I asked, because I got the sense he was waiting for some sort of validation regarding his mysteriousness, and I wanted to keep the conversation both short and practical. Fairy beasts were rarely glimpsed here, and its presence was beyond troubling.
“This I cannot say. Perhaps the Wild Hunt flushed it out, perhaps it merely felt like wandering. There have been more of them about lately, and they’re causing an awful mess.”
“Lately” could mean anything to a fair one, my parents’ deaths included. “Yes, dead humans do tend to be messy.”
His eyebrows shifted minutely, creating a furrow in the middle, and his gaze sharpened to scrutiny. He knew he’d upset me somehow, but in typical fair folk fashion wasn’t able to divine why. He was no more able to understand the sorrow of a human’s death than a fox might mourn the killing of a mouse.
One thing I knew for certain: I didn’t want to linger long enough for him to decide that his confusion offended him and the cause of it deserved revenge in the form of a nasty enchantment.
I ducked my head and curtsied again. “Whimsy’s people are grateful for your protection. I’ll never forget what you’ve done for me today. Good day, sir.”
I waited until he’d bowed again before I turned back toward the path.
“Wait,” he said.
I froze.
Behind me, the sound of wheat shifting. “I said something wrong. I apologize.”
Slowly I looked over my shoulder to find him watching me, looking oddly uncertain. I had no idea what to make of it. Fair folk were known to extend apologies on occasion—they valued good manners highly—but most of the time they followed a double standard according to which they expected humans to be the polite ones, while doing everything in their power to avoid acknowledging their own misbehavior. I was flabbergasted.
So I said the only thing that came to mind: “I accept your apology.”
“Oh, good.” His half-smile reappeared, and in an instant he went from looking uncertain to looking quite pleased with himself. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then, Isobel.”
I’d already started walking by the time his words sank in and I realized what they meant. I whirled around again, but the fair one, who could be none other than the autumn prince, was gone: wheat swayed around the empty path, and the only sign of life in the entire field was a single raven winging away toward the forest, with a red sheen on its feathers where they caught the fading light.
Three
I STILL had no idea when the prince might arrive, and with my aunt in town making a house call, the responsibility of emptying our kitchen of goat children fell to me. Easier said than done.
“He called our names weird!” May shrieked, while March sobbed silently next to the stove. Never had I loathed the baker’s boy more, though truth be told he was quite nice, and he did have a point.
I squatted down and took them both by the shoulders. “Well, when Aunt Emma and I named you,” I said reasonably, “you were goats. You were already familiar with March and May by then, and we weren’t certain whether the enchantment would last, so we decided not to make changes.”
March gave a strangled sob. I needed a different tactic. “Listen, I have an important question. What are your favorite things?”
“Scaring people,” said May, after a moment of thought.
March opened her mouth and pointed into it.
Oh, god. “Those things are weird, aren’t they?”
May eyed me warily. “Maybe . . .”
“Yes, they’re definitely weird,” I said in a firm voice. “So weird isn’t really bad, is it? It’s good, like scaring people or eating salamanders. Harold was paying you a compliment.”
“Hmmm,” May said. She didn’t look convinced. But at least March had stopped crying, so for my sanity’s sake I declared this round a partial victory.
“Now, come on. The two of you need to play outside until our guest leaves. Remember, don’t go past the edge of the wheat field.” As I pushed them toward the door a slimy coil of unease stirred in my stomach. If another fairy beast emerged from the forest . . .
Such events were extraordinarily rare, and I couldn’t forget how easily the prince had dispatched the monster yesterday. Surely we were safe with him visiting. But the uneasiness wouldn’t pass, and I added: “If you hear the grasshoppers go quiet, come back to the house right away.”
May peered up at me with her eyebrows bunched in suspicion. “Why?”
“Because I said so.”
“Why can’t we just play in the house?”
I propelled them down the stoop while our rickety kitchen door banged shut behind us. I noted with relief that it looked perfectly normal outside. The chickens muttered to themselves as they stalked across the yard, the trees rippled in a lively breeze, and shadows raced over the rolling hills. Yet May kept staring at me. I realized my stomach was still clenched tight as a fist and it must show on my face.
“You already know the reason,” I said briskly, stomping down my guilt.
Honestly, there were multiple reasons. May had knocked over my easels on more than one occasion. March exhibited an insatiable appetite for Prussian blue. But most of all, fair folk didn’t like having them around. My theory was that the twins embarrassed them, being visible proof of one of their mistakes, and unintentionally powerful proof to boot. I knew for a fact they couldn’t be ensorcelled: March and May were their true names. If the fair folk could use that knowledge against them, they would have done so by now.
March gave a delighted bleat and went capering over to the woodpile, but May didn’t look away. “Don’t worry, we won’t get hurt,” she said finally, soberly, and patted my knee. Then she tore off after her sister.
My eyes stung. Busily, I straightened my skirts and shoved a few stray hairs behind my ears. I didn’t want them to see I was affected, and I didn’t want to admit it to myself, either. When I focused on keeping everything in order, I didn’t have to think about what had happened to my parents, or why the event still gripped me with panic twelve years later when I hadn’t even been there, seen or heard a single part of it. Yet obviously, I didn’t hide my fear well enough. Even May could see it.
A raven’s hoarse croak sounded from the tree shading the yard.