“It was my fault,” Rhys added. “I put the—”
“I don’t care what you were doing! Do you have any idea how inappropriate this behavior is?” Her eyes narrowed on Rhys, and he shrank back even more. “Rhys, you know this was completely unacceptable.” She rubbed her temples as if this were giving her another headache, and Finn looked at her with concern. “I don’t even want to deal with you. Get ready for school, and stay out of my sight!”
“Yes, ma’am.” Rhys nodded. “Sorry.”
“As for you—” Elora pointed a finger at me but couldn’t find the words to finish. She just looked so disappointed and disgusted with me. “I don’t care how you were raised before you came here. You still know what kind of behavior is ladylike and what isn’t.”
“I wasn’t—” I began, but she held up her hand to silence me.
“But to be honest, Finn, you disappoint me the most.” She had stopped yelling, and when she looked at Finn, she just sounded tired. He lowered his eyes in shame, and she shook her head. “I can’t believe you allowed this to happen. You know you need to keep your eyes on her at all times.”
“I know. I won’t let it happen again.” Finn bowed apologetically to her.
“You most certainly won’t. Now fix this mess by educating her in the ways of the Trylle. In the meantime, I do not want to see any of you for the rest of the day.” She held her hands up, like she was done with the lot of us, and then shook her head and left the room.
“I am so sorry,” Rhys apologized emphatically. His cheeks were red with shame, and somehow that only made him cuter.
Not that I was really paying attention to how he looked just then. My stomach was twisted in knots, and I was thankful that I hadn’t started to cry. I didn’t even fully understand what I’d done. I knew sleeping in a boy’s room wasn’t ideal, but they were acting like it was a capital offense.
“You need to get ready for school,” Finn snapped, glaring at Rhys. Then he pointed to the hall and turned to me. “You. Out. Now.”
I gave him a wide berth on my way out the door. Normally I loved being close to him, but not today. My heart pounded erratically, but not for any pleasurable reason. Finn tried to keep his face expressionless, but tension and anger radiated from his body. I slunk across the hall to my room, and Finn barked something at Rhys about behaving himself.
“Where are you going?” Finn demanded when I opened my bedroom door. He had just emerged from Rhys’s room and slammed the door behind him, making me jump.
“To my room?” I pointed at my room and looked confused.
“No. You need to come to my room with me,” Finn said.
“What? Why?” I asked.
A very small part of me felt excited about the prospect of going to his room with him. That sounded like the start of a fantasy I might have. But the way he was looking at me now, I was afraid he might kill me once we were in private.
“I need to get ready for the day, and I can’t very well let you out of my sight.” He wore pajama pants and a T-shirt, and his dark hair wasn’t as sleek as it normally was.
I nodded and hurried after him. He walked fast and pissed off, and I fell about a step or two behind.
“I really am sorry, you know,” I said. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep there. We were just watching movies, and it got late. If I had known it would be like this, I would’ve made sure I was in my room.”
“You should’ve known, Wendy!” Finn exclaimed, exasperated. “You should know that your actions have consequences and the things you do matter!”
“I am sorry!” I repeated. “Yesterday was so boring and I just wanted to do something.”
Finn whirled on me suddenly, startling me so I took a step backward. My back hit the wall, but he stepped closer to me. He rested an arm against the wall on the side of me, his face only a few inches from mine. His dark eyes were blazing, but somehow his voice remained calm and even.
“You know how it looks when a girl spends the night alone with a boy. I know you understand that. But it is so much worse when a Princess spends the night alone with a m?nsklig. It could put everything in jeopardy.”
“I-I don’t know what that means,” I fumbled. “None of you will tell me.”
Finn continued to glare at me for another painful minute, then sighed and took a step back. As he stood there, rubbing his eyes, I swallowed back tears and caught my breath.
When he looked back at me, his eyes had softened a bit, but he didn’t say anything. He just walked to his room and, uncertainly, I followed him.
His room was smaller than mine, but a much more comfortable size. Even though the blinds were shut, I could tell one of his walls was made entirely of glass. Dark blankets covered his bed, and books overflowed from several bookshelves. In one corner he had a small desk with a laptop on it.