A Wild and Unremarkable Thing

Chapter 2

2

WOLFE

The new library at the Royal Summer Villa in Sandhorne is small. Wolfegang pinches his lapels between two fingers and pretends not to notice the size.

“You hate it,” Zoe says, and behind them both, the Crown Prince Fares snorts.

It’s not like the prince to stifle a laugh. Wolfe knows why he does it: the young duchess will lose her temper, and fast, if he mocks her, crown and throne and godsblood be damned.

She’ll pitch a fit, and there are altogether too many vases and statuettes in this little room for her to throw. The crown prince doesn’t want a bruise, or a swollen eye, not when there will be so many feasts and festivals to celebrate the Emerging soon, and so many courtiers to impress – as if his crown is not impressive enough.

Zoe glares at the prince. She doesn’t know her place, has never known it, but she’s a favorite niece of the queen. No one dares to tie her tongue, not when the queen claps at her sass.

No one says Zoe should act more like a lady, so she acts like herself instead. And she’s rotten.

She knows the prince favors her too, and won’t send her to the stocks, so she is bold, and throws magnificent fits at the most trivial provocations.

It’s a sight to behold – her bulging eyes and quick, pernicious tongue, and all the staff that scurries away before she can whack them inadvertently with one of her flailing arms, or break something invaluable, spraying the floor with crystal or porcelain.

A scene fit for the stage. Sometimes, Wolfe and Fares retell it for days afterward. But Wolfe isn’t in the mood to rile his friend. Not today, when he feels so aimless and out of sorts.

It may be too late. Already, Zoe’s face is flushing red.

“It’s quaint,” he says, and Zoe’s cobalt eyes go dark. “It’s…cozy,” he amends. “And there’s a fireplace.” He does like that, although it’s the size of a pastry oven. He could hardly fit a book inside it if he wanted to, much less a flake of kindling.

He doesn’t mention that. Setting the hearth alight might be more trouble than it’s worth in Sandhorne, anyhow. The weather here is always warm. But if he says so, Zoe will snipe at him for sure.

He might like the fireplace better in the Alps of Arly, where the royal family keeps a cottage. He’s gone there every winter since he was nine, since the king officially recognized him as a favorite – a playmate for the prince, though he is untitled and low of birth, the orphaned son of Zoe’s late handmaiden, Elise.

“A perfect retreat,” Wolfe says sweetly.

Zoe purses her lips. She knows when he’s lying. But she must know that the library is small. Maybe it seems smaller because so many of the shelves are bare.

“Where…where are all the books?” Wolfe ventures, and now, Fares cannot help himself – he laughs out loud, booming peals of laughter that are twice and thrice as rude, each new belt echoing against the walls.

Zoe juts out her sharply angled chin. “Well, there’s space for them,” she says. “You’ll have to fill the shelves yourself.”

“Fill the shelves himself?” Fares says, and doubles over, strapping his arms across his abdomen. “What kind of gift-giver are you? You’ve given him half a present!” And now he laughs so hard, he cries. Tears stream down his cheeks, and Zoe turns her burning, blue eyes on him.

“There are some books already!” she says. “What do you call those?” She motions to a shelf arched over the fireplace, where half a dozen leather-bound books are perched between two marble bookends.

“He’ll read those in a day,” the prince says. “Don’t you know him at all, cousin?”

“Well maybe he shouldn’t read so fast.” And she pouts. “I’ve never met someone who liked to read so much. I hate to read.”

“You hate to read?” Wolfe says. He’s wandered stealthily away from the two of them and is perusing the titles stored over the fireplace. “How can you hate to read?”

“I’ve never read a book I liked,” Zoe says, “not one.”

“Now that’s a lie,” Wolfe says, but he’s teasing. He’s well-acquainted, too well, with Zoe’s forked-tongue honesty.

He plucks out a thin volume and fans through the crisp, yellow pages. “Didn’t you say you liked The Eighteen Seas when we saw it in Arly?”

Zoe’s face lights up. “You know it’s my favorite play!” she chirps. “Better than any book, that’s for sure.”

“It was a book first!” Wolfe says. He slaps shut The Eighteen Seas of Scim and waves it at her. Fares throws back his ginger head and howls.

Zoe balls up her fists and stamps her foot, as if she’s five years old and not twenty.

“Well happy birthday, anyway,” she says to Wolfe, and he smiles at her.

“It’s lovely, Zo,” he says. He perches his hands on his hips and makes a show of gazing about the room – which takes no time at all. It’s half the size of his palace chambers, and might even be smaller than the guest room he keeps when he vacations to the Villa with Zoe. “Now I’ll have a little project each summer, making selections.” He reinserts The Eighteen Seas of Scim while Fares wipes his eyes.

“Good on you, Zoe,” Fares says.

“You may both call me duchess,” she snaps, “until I’ve forgiven you.”

She falls into one of the plush, leather armchairs arranged in a semicircle in front of the cold fireplace and cushions her chin in her palm. Her bottom lip protrudes. “I suppose we should visit the nearest bookshop, then, and clean them out,” she says.

“Tomorrow,” Fares says. “Wolfe and I have a birthday tradition to uphold.”

Zoe rolls her eyes. “Tradition,” she scoffs. “You’re going to Barclay’s to get rip-roaring drunk.”

“Tradition, indeed!” the prince says. “Care to join us?” And he winks.

Zoe tries for an affectless visage and fails. She cannot prevent her eyes sparkling.

“Give me an hour to change,” she says, and springs out of her seat.

“An hour!” Fares says. “When has she ever gotten ready so fast? It will take her two at least, or I’ll buy the first round. What do you say, birthday boy?”

“A fool’s bet,” Wolfe says, and he shakes on it.

Lady Barclay’s Tea House does not serve tea. Fares and Zoe and Wolfe are two bottles into something else, seated at their favorite corner booth, slapping playing cards into a center pile and emptying their pockets of coin.

The atmosphere is starkly bright, especially in such low light. Barclay’s is a dark, after-hours establishment.

The walls are papered: black marble and sallow white. The booth is draped in velvet, deeply violet, like the canopy overhead, like the privacy drapes pinned back by Fares, who likes to let patrons admire him.

The room is lit by chandeliers, wicks set at the center of amethyst casings, so the old teahouse is softly alight, settled upon by a lilac glow and cigarette smoke.

There’s a strict dress code at Barclay’s, and the prince is amiable enough to abide by it. The boys wear black trousers, black shirts and black vests.

Fares wears his crown.

Wolfe wears a pair of violet suspenders and violet, suede shoes. Zoe has chosen his outfit.

As for Zoe, she’s never out of a gown. Even her nightclothes bear a long train. This evening, she wears a filmy, chiffon number, with wispy sleeves embroidered by black silk and cuffed at the wrist.

A funny thing, Wolfe thinks, to wear sleeves when her chest is so exposed, but Zoe loves to be contrary.

“Twenty years old,” Fares says, slapping his friend on the knee.

“A month younger than me,” Zoe says, and takes the pot.

“You may be the eldest of us,” Fares says, “but I am the prince.”

He gazes sidelong at the bar, where a red-haired girl is eyeing him over the shoulder of her date. Every lord and lady that happens to pass by their table, close enough to brush elbows (though there is a wide aisle), gets a wink.

“Who will he take to his bed tonight?” Zoe says in a sing-song voice, as if the prince can't hear her, and Wolfe shrugs.

“The redhead, if he wasn’t so drunk,” he says. “But I think it will be the waitress.”

“Why?”

“Because he doesn’t suffer a long walk to the bar to flirt with her.”

“I like a lover who comes to me,” Fares says, grinning, and not in the least bit insulted. He does like watching the redhead, but Wolfe is probably right. He’ll stumble into their carriage with the last willing person he sees, and that will be the waitress, collecting his bill. He won’t care what she looks like by then.

“Twenty,” he says again. “What have you done with your life?”

“What have you done with yours?”

They’re both teasing, but it’s the wrong thing to say. Wolfe knows the prince means nothing by it, but he’s restless. Maybe Zoe’s present was exactly right, for he’s suddenly sick of reading books and having no real adventures. Would he have done something more interesting with his twenty years, if the king had never favored him?

He takes a long plug of ale and drains the bottle. The waitress flutters to the table, her gait too pretty for her bare, vein-sliced legs. Zoe tries not to laugh when Fares compliments her. She’s twice his age.

“And who will you take back to the Villa?” Zoe says.

“None of the girls here are as pretty as you,” Wolfe says smartly, “and you have a room there already.”

Zoe clucks her tongue, and lets him consider her, always happy to be flattered. Wolfe knows that he will never see her n***d. It’s a strange thing even to wonder about, having known her so long. But he’s nearly as drunk as Fares now, so he does it.

His gaze slides over her face, and she all but preens, adoring the attention. She’s severe looking, Wolfe decides, and wonders if it’s because he knows her so well.

But no, all her edges are sharp: her long nose, her chin, her jaw, all like the letter V. There’s no softness in her cheeks.

Her skin is like milk, and her hair is almost white, so he thinks it would be like bedding a ghost, if he f****d her. But he won’t do it, so he doesn’t let it worry him too much. She’s far too dear to him, and too plotting, too vile. The last thing he wants is a viper for a bedmate. He can only imagine how she might tear him apart.

He flatters her anyway. He likes to see her blush. And there’s no harm in doing it. The duchess likes this game. She knows it means nothing.

Nothing.

Nothing in Wolfe’s life means anything. Nothing is worth writing about. Nothing is worthwhile.

Wolfe considers this, and takes another plug. His vision is rippling now, and Zoe is much prettier, much softer, than she was only minutes ago.

Or maybe an hour. Wolfe isn’t quite sure. Time whips by, now he’s slotted. Fast, he knows the whole tapestry of his twenty years: books and tankards and pastries and cards.

He’s sure he will die a dreadful, unimpressive death, sixty years from today, if he does not do something great.

He says so to Zoe and Fares, but they’re drunk. They’ve quite forgotten his melancholy by dawn.