We walked in a procession through the corridors. Or rather, they walked and I floated along behind them. While I might normally have been keen to experience the weightlessness of flying, the knowledge that I flew towards an unwanted fate ruined the effect. The Queen marched in front of me, leaving me to face her tiny sister for the journey. My mind spun with the possibilities awaiting me, each more horrible than the next. Would he be dimwitted like the Queen? Deformed like Marc? Enormously fat as his father, the King? He could be all of them together, or more terrible than my wildest imagination.
I made little note of the palace corridors as we passed through them. I couldn’t make out anything clearly, anyway. A tiny ball of light floated in front of every member of our small entourage, though the gloom troubled the trolls not in the slightest. Their metallic eyes pierced the darkness, and I marked how they watched me, finding it impossible to decipher what they were thinking. Did their cold hearts pity me? Were the women glad it was I, and not they, floating towards this forced match? A fresh crop of tears stung the cuts on my cheeks. I tried to wipe them away, but of course, I could not. My body was bound in place as surely as if I’d been tied head to foot with rope.
Ahead of the procession, I heard the tinkling laugh of a girl and the sound of a door slamming against a wall.
“His Majesty, the King!” the two-headed troll guard announced.
Afraid, I squeezed my eyes shut. When I finally found the nerve to open them, I hovered in a room richly decorated with tapestries and thick carpets. At its center stood a table and two high-backed chairs. Above the table floated half a dozen boards littered with tiny figurines. A young woman stood next to a chair, her face lowered and knees bent into a deep curtsy. Little of who sat in the other seat was visible to me, for his back was to us: only the bend of a black-clad elbow, the curve of a pale-skinned hand resting on the arm of the chair.
My head swam and I gasped for air, having unconsciously been holding my breath. The girl rose, and her eyes latched onto me. She was beautiful, for an instant, and then her expression twisted with rage. The game boards fell to the table with a clatter. I jerked my gaze away from hers, fixing it instead on the tiny figures spilled across the carpet.
“You can’t be serious?” she hissed. “Her? This, this thing?”
The Duchesse spoke. “Leave us, Ana?s.”
She didn’t move.
“Now, Ana?s. This is no business of yours.”
The girl remained fixed on the spot, jaw clenched in obvious anger.
“Ana?s.” The King spoke softly, but the girl reacted to the sound of her name as though she’d been slapped, recoiling backward. I watched in amazement as a red, hand-shaped mark rose briefly on her cheek, then faded away. Eyes filled with real terror, the troll girl cowered in front of us.
“Get. Out.”
“Your Majesties. Your Grace,” the girl whispered as she bolted out of the rooms. If the thick carpets managed to muffle the hurried thump of her heeled shoes, they did nothing to hide the slam of the door shutting behind us.
The King cleared his throat. “Tristan, we have the human.”
The Prince said nothing at first, but the boards rose once again into the air, invisible fingers plucking the pieces off the carpet, pausing in consideration, and then returning them to their places on the board. “We’d been at this round for nigh on three months now.”
His voice was quiet, marked with the faint accent all the trolls had, and showed no concern for the female companion his father had just slapped. I shuddered, wishing he would turn around and, at the same time, hoping he wouldn’t.
“I’m certain Ana?s will regret dropping the game,” the King said.
The Prince laughed softly, but he didn’t sound the least bit amused to me. “Unlikely, given that she was losing. She hates to lose.”
The King frowned. “Tristan, I thought you’d want to have a look at the girl before we…” he glanced over at me, “finalized the contract.”
The Prince’s hand flexed, fingers digging ever so slightly into the upholstery. I might not even have noticed if not for the fact my eyes had been fixated on that one glimpse of flesh, trying to judge his proportion and failing mightily.
“Why?” The irritation in his voice cut across the room. “My opinion of this venture has counted for nothing up to this point.”
“Well, it matters now,” the King snapped. “Look at her. Decide.”
The Prince didn’t move. “And if I say no?”
“Then we’ll procure another.”