Chapter 2: Uninvited
1754 Words
"So she's human. Big deal." I said it without thinking. "It's not like it's some dirty secret. Why can't anyone talk about it?"
Helen looked like she'd swallowed a fly. She made sure the maids had all left before dropping her voice. "My lady, Miss Selena's father earned great honors in the War of the Shattered Moon. The Lord promised to turn her himself, to make her a true vampire. But it's been three years, and the turning ceremony has never taken place..."
She didn't finish, but I got the point: Selena is still human, and nothing wounds her pride worse than that. The whole Court knows it, and nobody dares mention it. Nobody but me and my big mouth.
Fine. Another Night Court survival rule for the collection: watch where your eyes wander, and keep your mouth shut.
Between the muffins and everything else, Selena's birthday was well and truly ruined. The peace treaty means Liam can't simply dissolve our marriage. Sending me away would amount to declaring war on the Silver Moon Pack. But he had to avenge Selena somehow.
So I was confined to my room.
Confinement in the Night Court is not the kind where you're stuck inside but at least you've got your phone and your shows. This miserable place has no phones, no wifi, no electronics of any kind, not so much as a trashy novel to read.
And it wasn't just confinement. He had Marcus haul over the vampire court etiquette manual, with orders that I copy it out five times. No leaving the room until I finished.
The contents were the real killer. Three and a half pages just on which foot to lead with when entering a room, plus strict protocols for how to bow to vampires of every conceivable rank. I copied until midnight on the first day and barely finished round one. My fingers were solid blisters from gripping the pen, and I fell asleep face down on the desk.
Every day after that was stamped from the same mold. Wake, copy. Copy until exhausted, sleep. Wake up, copy some more. Kayla brought my meals in, gave me one look each day, and signed two words: "Hang in there."
I wanted to strangle her.
On the third day, while I was buried in round three, Helen came in with the tea, wearing an odd expression.
"My lady, something's happened."
I didn't look up. "Mm."
She set the tea down, fingers trembling. "The blood servant from the castle cellars, the one called Lydia... she was turned last night."
I blinked at her. "Turned? You mean she's a vampire now?"
"Yes. On the Lord's own order."
The pen went still in my hand. Turning a human requires the Lord's personal authorization. In the Night Court, news doesn't come bigger than that. Selena had waited three years and never gotten it. A cellar blood servant just cut the line ahead of her.
"Does Selena know?"
Helen nodded, grimacing. "She's been crying since the news reached her. Hasn't left her room. Her people say she smashed everything on her vanity. Didn't leave a single mirror standing."
I shot up from my chair, headed for the door.
Helen scrambled to grab me. "My lady, have you lost your mind?!"
"What? She's upset. I can't go check on her?"
"If you go now, she'll think you're there to gloat! The muffin disaster barely just passed. Showing up at her door at a time like this would be pouring oil on the fire!"
I honestly don't get it. All I saw was somebody holed up alone smashing her own things, which is pitiful, so I wanted to look in on her. In the werewolf world, when someone's hurting, you go sit with them. Bring a jug of liquor, or pick a fight with them. Either works. Since when does kindness need this much choreography?
"But I didn't do anything wrong."
"In the Court, whether you did wrong doesn't matter. What people believe you did is everything." Helen pronounced each word like she was carving it in stone.
I sighed and sat back down.
In this wretched place, being decent is so much harder than being wicked.
I picked my pen back up and opened that damned etiquette manual.
I was nearly done with round three when Marcus showed up again.
He stood in the doorway, face blank as a wall. "The Lord requests that my lady visit Miss Selena and help settle her spirits."
I didn't even put down my pen, just looked up at him. "Say that again?"
"The Lord's wish is..."
"I heard you." I slapped the pen down on the desk. "He locks me up copying books because of Selena, and now he wants me to go soothe her? When did I become her nanny?"
Marcus didn't take the bait. He turned and left.
I rounded on Helen. "A few hours ago I wanted to go and you called me insane. Now he's sending me?"
Helen opened her mouth. Nothing came out.
"Fine. I'll go." I tossed the pen aside and stood, rolling the stiffness out of my neck. "Let's find out whether I'm being sent to comfort her or to be her punching bag."
Helen caught my arm. "My lady, once you're there, do not bring up Lydia. Sit a while, drink your tea, and leave. One more friend always beats one more enemy."
I started counting on my fingers. "When he wanted me away from Selena, he nearly kicked my door off its hinges. Now he wants me over there smiling and cooing. What does he actually want?"
"The Lord doesn't want you causing trouble, and he doesn't want Miss Selena's father making noise over this." Helen held my gaze. "If you can smooth things over with her, it gets much harder for certain people to use her as a weapon against you."
I stared at the ceiling for a while. Strip away the wrapping and it was simple: Liam needed my face out there, steadying things on his behalf.
Helen's mind runs on twisty little back roads, but I don't have the heart to keep fighting her.
I first came to the Night Court three years ago. There's a lot from those days I don't remember. Helen was the first blood servant assigned to "look after" me. I knew she was there to watch me. The whole Court knew.
But those were brutal days.
Liam treated me like air. Selena's people laid traps everywhere. Even the lowest blood servants dared roll their eyes at me. I was a werewolf trapped in a castle that never saw daylight, with a seal pressing down on me so hard I couldn't even feel my own wolf. I walked around like something hollowed out, no idea who I was, no idea where I was supposed to go.
Then I got sick. Badly. Liam insisted I was faking and forbade anyone from sending for a physician.
It was Helen who snuck out in the middle of the night to get herbs from an old blood servant, Helen and Kayla who kept watch at my bedside and fed me the brew one spoonful at a time. The fever took three days and three nights to break.
I've known ever since. Helen was sent to spy on me, sure, but there's no rot in her heart. In this whole place, aside from Kayla, she's the only one who genuinely doesn't want me dead.
So if she said go, I'd go.
"All right, let's do it." I stood up. "Beats sitting here copying."
"My lady, arriving with empty hands won't do," Helen reminded me. "Best to bring a gift. It shows sincerity."
What counts as a good gift? I made a lap of my room, dug through my things, and settled on a dagger Kayla had sharpened for me, a flask of strong liquor I'd traded off a blood servant, and a bracelet I'd braided myself from leather scraps.
Solid picks, I thought. A dagger for protection, liquor for the bad days, and a bracelet braided with my own two hands. Sincere enough, right?
When Helen saw my haul, her face looked like a wolf that just got its tail stepped on.
"What?" I glanced at her. "No good? The dagger's silver. It's worth real money."
"My lady, Miss Selena is human." Helen took a deep breath. "You hand her a blade, she will assume you've come to kill her."
"...The liquor, then?"
"She doesn't drink."
"The bracelet?"
Helen picked up the leather bracelet, still smudged with dirt from when I'd worked the hide. She studied it for a long moment before managing, "This one is... stylistically... rather wild."
Got it. She thinks it's ugly.
In the end Helen dug a tin of vampire scented balm and a silk shawl out of her own belongings and made me take those. I picked up the balm, gave it a sniff, and nearly sneezed.
"It smells like disinfectant. She's really going to like this?"
"She will." Helen's tone allowed no argument. "Come along, my lady. And remember: less talking, more smiling."
Truth be told, I was curious about Selena. Three years in the Court, and I'd seen her maybe two or three times total, always from across half a ballroom at some banquet. Liam kept us apart like I carried something contagious.
All I knew was that she was lovely, more poised than anyone, and never spoke above a gentle murmur. Some in the Court privately called her "the true lady of the castle." To my face, even.
Sometimes I envied her. Not for any of that. Just for having someone so afraid she might suffer the smallest slight. Me? I got sick and nobody cared.
The corridor to Selena's rooms was long and dark, the candles stretching Helen's shadow and mine into crooked shapes. We passed a window that hadn't been latched properly, and the night wind poured through with a thread of chill in it. Out of nowhere I ached for the northern forest, for those nights when you could look up and simply see the moon, the wind carrying pine needles and wet earth.
I can't remember exactly what that forest looks like anymore. But sometimes, when the wind finds its way in, my chest goes tight and sour and I couldn't tell you why.
Helen stopped at Selena's door and had just raised her hand to knock when a voice came from inside.
We both went still.
It was Liam.
- Writer
