Which is why she made sure they didn’t. Better they think she’s a boy than gawk at the unnatural color.
As Guard Companion to Prince Bellamy, Haven was given some leeway in her attire. Still, she was expected to carry the Boteler standard in her mannerisms and dress.
But she couldn’t climb trees in a gown or nock an arrow with the silly deerskin gloves popular with the courtiers.
She rolled her eyes as a noblewoman with a painted face and a sharp nose frowned at her. Like most mortal women with means, the noblewoman’s hair was braided, powdered, bejeweled, and piled high atop her head.
But it wasn’t her garish hairstyle Haven found implausible. It was the poor woman’s breasts, which were squeezed into two pale, pillowy mounds atop her chest.
Goddess Above, how was she supposed to kill Shadowlings with her breasts squished and a petticoat tangled around her legs?
Haven slipped inside the dust-trap she called a chamber, eyeing the dirty clothes strewn across the unmade bed. She’d spell a goat for a few hours of sleep, but there just wasn’t time.
Sighing, she set to work washing the dust from her boots and face with a cold washrag. Her lady’s maid, Demelza, appeared seemingly out of thin air, as was her habit.
She immediately started clucking over her charge, muttering prayers to the Goddess under her breath.
“No sleep again, m’lady?” Demelza asked, her guttural northern accent grating Haven’s ears and making the question sound more like an accusation.
Demelza was from some Curse-fallen kingdom near the Bane, the name of which Haven could never quite pronounce.
Stout and slightly hunched, Demelza had a sun-weathered face and thin lips prone to frowning. Sandy, gray-shot curls tangled wildly around her head—the only part of Demelza that wasn’t neat.
“There’s no rest for the brave, Demelza,” Haven teased.
“‘Tis demons,” Demelza muttered beneath her breath.
Haven sighed. “They’re called nightmares, Demelza. Don’t you have those where you’re from?”
Although Haven very much doubted Demelza’s nightmares—or anyone else’s, for that matter—were like hers. But her lady’s maid just clucked her tongue.
After cataloguing Haven’s many faults—impossible hair, dirty nails, callused hands—they fought over Haven changing for Runeday.
As usual, she won the battle of wills, keeping the same pants and tunic but capitulating to the Boteler standard, a black dahlia, pinned to her breast.
Demelza’s constant frown deepened into a scowl when Haven fashioned another silk scarf to cover her hair. Haven frowned back at her sour maid, daring her to argue.
At least this scarf was festive and clean, embroidered in a pattern of gold dahlias to match Haven’s pin.
Her knot of hair beneath the scarf, on the other hand, was loose and sloppy, still dusted with twigs and bark and dirt.
But she was in a hurry to find Bell before the ceremony, when the king would steal the prince from her for the day, and the forest offerings would have to stay.
Leaning down—her lady’s maid was nearly a foot shorter than Haven—she kissed Demelza’s craggy cheek and went in search of the prince. Right before Haven ducked out the door, she caught a rare smile creep across Demelza’s face.
Bell’s chamber was two halls down, but he wouldn’t be inside, not at this hour. When her head was usually just hitting the pillow, Bell’s was blinking sleepily at the pages of a book. The musty bouquet of old manuscripts and dust calling him from slumber like the stout whiff of black Penrythian coffee did her a few hours later.
She hurried to find him, the scents of savory meats and pies wafting through the corridors making her belly rumble.
The cooks had worked all night for Bell’s celebration, and the prospect of endless pastries and gluttony without guilt should have lifted her spirits. The food and runegames would last for weeks, filling the pockets and bellies of the villagers.
It was a time for celebration—something the kingdom desperately needed.
Yet, as she slipped through the heavy oak doors leading to the library, the excitement she felt was eclipsed by a growing pit in her stomach, made worse by the lingering taste of the Shade Lord’s blood.
Nothing’s wrong. You’re going to celebrate Bell’s birthday, probably get drunk and fat, and then wake up tomorrow with a headache and the reality that all is fine.
But she couldn’t help feeling she was on the precipice of . . . something. And that even the slightest of winds could blow her—and everything she loved—into the abyss.
The library was a three-story circular room covered floor to ceiling with books, so many it would take her years to count them all. Sunlight from the domed glass ceiling warmed her cheek, her boots treading quietly over the worn Ashari rug covering the wooden floor as she wound through the smattering of desks. Dust whorled in the spears of light trickling from above.
She found Bell on the second story balcony, curled up in a moth-chewed quilt, his dark, tight curls teased atop his head and his face obscured by a giant, leather-bound book. His reedy arms trembled beneath the book’s heft.
Whatever cold shadow had fallen over her this morning lifted at the sight of her best friend. His skin was the same coloring as the smoky quartz walls in the grand ballroom, a stunning mixture of his father’s ivory tones and his mother’s ebony color.
It was as if the Goddess had chosen the best parts of both parents, bestowing him with the king’s wide eyes, the color of the palest-blue topaz, and his mother’s fine nose and lips.
As Haven neared, the runestone seemed to heat up in her pocket, and hesitation made her pause.
Would Bell like his present?
A thousand shiny baubles from all over the kingdom already swelled the throne room, tributes for Prince Bell on his Runeday. The clothiers would present him with fine tunics laced with gold and boots made from calf leather. The merchants would heap his ceremonial runethrone with gold and silver.
And the king, who had already given him a sleek, long-necked stallion with a mane twined in silver, would publicly show off his wealth by gifting his eldest son rare spices and bulbs from across the sea.
For a prince who had everything, a small runestone from his guard companion and best friend was unimpressive. Also completely and utterly inappropriate, considering the penalty for trading runestones was death.
Her lips drew into a smile. Bell would love it.
Lost inside his tome, Bell didn’t notice her until she slipped beside him on the threadbare rug, wiggling her feet under the quilt. She plucked the last two biscuits from the discarded tin plate by his knee and wolfed them down.
“Easy there, Piglet.” Dropping his book, he tugged her into a fierce embrace before pulling back to look her over. “I’m not even going to ask where you were again, and assume, since you just devoured my old biscuits, you’re well.”
Haven clicked her tongue, talking through her mouthful. “Course . . . I am.”
“I saw the mist from my window. It was the Devouring, wasn’t it?”
On my Runeday, his voice implied. She could read him as easily as he read his books.
“I wouldn’t worry about that. It was long overdue, anyway.” She gathered her sketchpad and the tin containing her charcoals, carefully setting them on the floor. “Wait, you actually pulled your nose out of something as riveting as”—she lifted up the book cover—“Histories of the Nine Mortal Houses?”