And if Gunter and I have learned anything from dissecting the queen’s concoctions, it’s that any negative property of a substance can be counteracted.
My formula is missing one ingredient still—one I’ll have to procure from the queen—but she’ll hand it over readily if I only ask.
Because I made this antidote with her in mind, and she won’t be able to resist it.
I decide to present my discovery over dinner. It’s a nightly occurrence that the queen has forced upon me ever since I was a child, but tonight I don’t mind it. It affords me council with the queen without having to ask. She won’t be expecting the deal I wish to make either, so her answer will depend upon emotion, and for once, the queen’s emotions will work in my favor.
The dinner she has prepared for me is hearty—roasted quail with spiced beets and smashed potatoes on the side. Normally I can’t get enough of Simeon’s cooking and often sneak extras after dinner, but tonight my fork taps against my barely touched plate.
“Farin, dear. You’re fidgeting, child.”
I fight the urge to crane my neck and shake off the name that oozes through my bones. Just a few more days, I remind myself. Then I’ll be rid of that name for good.
And the term child.
And all the unwanted terms and notions of endearment I receive from the queen.
She leans across the table and places the back of her cold hand on my forehead. “You don’t appear feverish,” she says, and I swallow the urge to cringe at her touch.
“Just excited, is all,” I say, grateful when she rescinds her hand.
A pleased smile balances precariously on the queen’s face. She’s not used to me being cordial, let alone enthusiastic around her.
Her white-blond hair falls across her shoulder in a simple braid today. She must not have had any meetings with the court.
That is well enough.
It will have her in an amicable mood.
“Excited for what, darling?”
I clear my throat and straighten in my chair. The queen clearly still sees me as a child, having branded me in that stage permanently in her mind, but I desperately need her to take me seriously.
“I’ve made a discovery, my queen. One that I believe you’ll find quite to your liking.”
The queen shifts in her ornate cedar chair. “You did this for me?” she asks, a gentle surprise in her tone. I suppose she’s gotten used to expecting coolness from me.
I clench my hands on my knees so as not to fidget. She’s clearly touched, which will work in my favor if I can keep up the illusion. “Yes, my queen,” I say, and I’m relieved when the fae curse doesn’t punish me for the half-truth.
I’m doing this for me, foremost. But I suppose it’s enough for the curse that I made the discovery with the queen in mind.
“I’ve found a way to return your son to you.”
The silence that hangs between us is palpable.
I swallow, sweat threatening to bead on my forehead as I wait for a response.
Confusion knits the queen’s pale brow, and for a moment, it’s as if she’s left the room, her presence at the table is so absent.
“You are my son, Farin,” she says with hesitation, but there’s a sliver in her tone, a crack through which a droplet of hope leaks through, and I know then that I have her, that she’s wet clay in my palm.
It’s also confirmation that deep down, she knows I’m not her son. There’s relief in that revelation alone.
I’m going to be free of her soon enough.
Farin’s ashes are kept in a bone carved vase that sits above the mantel of the queen’s workroom.
I learned that’s what occupied the jar the hard way, by reaching for it thinking it was an ingredient just like any of the others the queen kept in crystal vials.
The lashes on the backs of my hand have since healed, but the memory remains, and so does the theory I’ve never quite been able to shake.
The vase itself is simple and kept free of debris on its outer surface. There was something eerie about it that drew me to it that day as a curious child. Even standing in its presence now, watching on as the queen delicately removes it from the mantel, my fingers twitch with excitement. With discovery.
There’s an aura that emanates from the container—rather, its contents. Like Farin’s life-force hasn’t completely moved on. Like he’s settled himself into the crevices between the ashes and gotten comfortable there.
I hope for my sake that he’s ready to come out.
The glow from the firelight warms the smooth bone, as well as the queen’s face.
She almost looks healthy in its gentle glimmer.
I notice something I haven’t witnessed since the first day we met. A mother’s gentle glow softening the sharp edges of her intense beauty.
When she sets the container on the workbench, the vials that line the shelves rattle, despite how delicately she places it upon the smooth surface.
Goosebumps litter my arms, the back of my neck.
Gunter’s warning echoes in the back of my mind—there is no antidote for death, my boy—but it’s only an echo, not the actual substance, and I ignore it.
