“This is very kind,” he says, because the Folk do not like to have their efforts dismissed with mere thanks and take hospitality very seriously.
She grins, and he notes a cracked tooth. She picks up her own cup, which she has freshened, using it to warm her hands. “I see the advice I gave you was useful. Your father has returned. And you have won yourself a prize.”
He nods, feeling as though he’s on unsteady ground. If she’s referring to Wren, it seems dismissive to call her a prize, as though she were an object, but he can’t think what else she could be talking about. Perhaps Mother Marrow has a reason to appear not to care too much for Wren. “Leaving me to seek your guidance again.”
She raises her eyebrows. “On what subject, prince?”
“I saw you in the Ice Citadel,” he says.
She stiffens. “What of it?”
He sighs. “I want to know why Bogdana brought you there. What she hoped you were going to do.”
Silence stretches out for a long moment between them. In it, he hears the boiling of the water and the clack of the nuts as they move in her cabinet.
“Did you know I have a daughter?” she asks finally.
Oak shakes his head, although now that she mentions it, he does remember something about her having a child. Perhaps someone referred to the daughter before, although the context eludes him.
“I tried to trick the High King into marrying her.”
Oh, right. That was the context. Mother Marrow gave Cardan a cape that, when worn, makes him immune to most blows. It’s said to be woven of spider silk and nightmares, and although Oak has no idea how that could be done, he doesn’t doubt the truth of it. “So you have some interest in your line ruling.”
“I have some interest in my kind ruling,” she corrects him. “I would have liked to see my daughter with a crown on her head. She’s very beautiful and quite clever with her fingers. But I will be glad to see any hag daughter on the throne.”
“I don’t intend to be High King,” he informs her.
At that, she smiles, takes a sip of her tea, and says nothing.
“Wren?” he prompts. “The Citadel? Bogdana’s request?”
Her smile widens. “We hags were the first of the Folk, before those of the air alighted and claimed dominion, before those of the Undersea first surfaced from the deep. We, like the trolls and the giants, come from the earth’s bones. And we have the old magic. But we do not rule. Perhaps our power makes other Folk nervous. Little wonder that the storm hag was tempted by Mab’s offer, though in the end the cost was high.”
“And now she bears a grudge against my family,” he says.
Mother Marrow snorts, as though at the delicacy of his phrasing. “So she does.”
“Do you?” he asks.
“Have I not been a loyal subject?” she asks him. “Have I not served the High King and his mortal queen well? Have I not served you, prince, to the best of my poor abilities?”
“I don’t know,” he says. “Have you?”
She stands—acting offended to cover that she does not—and perhaps dares not—answer. “I think it’s time you go. I am sure you are wanted at the palace.”
He sets down his untouched cup of tea and rises from the chair. She’s intimidating, but he’s taller than her and royal. He hopes he seems more formidable than he feels. “If Bogdana has a plan to move against Jude and Cardan, and you’re a part of it, the punishment will not be worth whatever reward you’ve been promised.”
“Is that so? Rumors abound about your loyalties, prince, and the company you keep.”
“I am loyal to the throne,” he says. “And to my sister, the queen.”
“What about the king?” asks Mother Marrow, her eyes like flint.
Oak’s gaze doesn’t waver. “So long as he doesn’t cross Jude, I am his to command.”
She scowls. “What about the girl? What loyalties do you owe her? Would you give her your heart?”
An ominous question, given what he knows of Mellith’s history.
He hesitates, wanting to give a real answer. He is drawn to Wren. He is consumed by thoughts of her. The rough silk of her voice. Her shy smile. Her unflinching gaze. The memory of fine, wispy strands of her hair under his hands, the nearness of her skin, her indrawn breath. Memory of the way she sparred with him across that long table in the Citadel—the familiarity of it, so like many of his own family meals. But the sting of his confession and her rejection is fresh. “I would give her whatever she wanted of me.”
Mother Marrow raises her brows, looking amused. Then her smile dims. “Poor Suren.”
Oak puts a hand to his heart. “I think I’m offended.”
She gives a little laugh. “Not that, foolish boy. It’s that she should have been one of the greatest of hags, an inheritor of her mother’s vast power. A maker of storms in her own right, a creator of magical objects so glorious that the walnut I gave her would be a mere trinket. But instead, her power has been turned inside out. She can only absorb magic, break curses. But the one curse she cannot break is the one on herself. Her magic is warped. Every time she uses it, it hurts her.”
Oak thinks of the story Bogdana told, of a girl whose magic burned like matches, and considers that Bogdana’s own magic doesn’t work in that way. The storm hag was exhausted, perhaps, after she made the ship fly, but not sick. When Cardan brought a whole island from the bottom of the sea, he didn’t faint afterward. “And that’s what Bogdana brought you north to try to fix?”
She hesitates.
“Shall I ask one of the Council to come and inspect what potions and powders you keep in your cabinet?”
She only laughs. “Would you really do such a thing to an old lady such as myself, to whom you already owe a debt? What bad manners that would be!”
He gives her an irritated look, but she’s right. He does owe her a debt. And he is one of the Folk, brought up in Faerie enough to almost believe that bad manners outweigh murder in a list of crimes. Besides, half the Council probably buys from her. “Can you undo Wren’s curse?”
“No,” she says, relenting. “As far as I know, it cannot be undone. When the power of Mellith’s death was used to curse Mab, Mellith’s heart became the locus for that curse. How can you fill something that devours everything you put into it? Perhaps you can answer that. I can’t. Now go back to the palace, prince, and leave Mother Marrow to her ruminations.”
He’s probably late for the banquet already. “If you see Bogdana,” he says, “be sure to give her my regards.”
“Oh,” says Mother Marrow. “You can give her those yourself soon enough.”
By the time he arrives in the brugh, the hall beneath the hill is full of Folk. He is, as he predicted, late.
“Your Highness,” Tiernan says, falling into step behind him.
“I hope you rested,” Oak says, attempting to seem as though he hasn’t just been dumped, as though he hasn’t a care in the world.
“No need.” Tiernan speaks in a clipped fashion, and he’s frowning, but since he’s so often frowning, the prince can’t tell if it indicates more disapproval than usual. “Where were you this afternoon?”
“I took a quick trip to Mandrake Market,” Oak says.
“You might have fetched me,” Tiernan suggests.
“I might have,” Oak agrees amiably. “But I thought you might be the worse for wear after almost drowning—or perhaps otherwise occupied.”
Tiernan’s frown deepens. “I was neither.”
“I hoped you might be otherwise occupied.” Oak glances around the hall. Cardan lounges on his throne on the dais, a goblet hanging off his fingers as though it may spill at any moment. Cardan. Oak has to speak with him, but he can’t do it here, in front of everyone, in front of Folk who may be part of the conspiracy the prince needs to disavow.
Jude stands close to Oriana, who is gesturing with her hands as she speaks. He doesn’t spot any of the other members of his family, although that doesn’t mean they’re not here. It’s quite a crowd.
“Hyacinthe is a traitor thrice over,” Tiernan says. “So you can cease speaking of him.”