“Well, what do we do?”
“I don’t know. I need to think. Let’s see if there are rooms at the inn.”
The inn doubled as some sort of restaurant or pub. Beyond the small foyer with a spiral staircase and an empty desk, an intricately carved entranceway led to a room warmly lit by hearth and candles, full of fairies, singing and stomping.
Ay di day
We’ll gather up our swords
Ay di day
We’ll gather up the hoards
Ay di day
We’ll take to the roads
Down with the rebel king!
Violet looked up at him, her eyes glittering with excitement.
A bird flew from the rafters and off into the pub. Ifra watched it land on a girl’s shoulder, and she glanced back at the foyer and mouthed “Oh!”
She walked in, stuffing a rag in the waistband of her apron. “Are you in need of a room? They say there’s a storm coming.”
“Yes. Please, if you have any.”
“We have a couple left on the second floor. Over the pub. I’m not sure you’ll get a wink of sleep at a time like this, but…” She shrugged.
“That’s fine.”
Violet suddenly burst out, “Are you really going to take to the roads and march on the king?”
The girl’s cheeks flushed. “Oh… no, no, they’re not serious.”
“I’m Violet-”
Ifra covered her mouth. “Let’s see our room first and then maybe we can come have a drink.”
The girl gave them an odd look for a moment, and then unlocked a drawer and gave him a ring with a key on it. “It’s the last one down the hall, on the right. Five silvers. Show them your key downstairs and your dinner is on the house.”
“Thank you.” Ifra hustled Violet upstairs, hissing in a whisper, “Why were you going to tell them who you are?”
“Why does it matter? They’re my future subjects, and they hate the king!” She rolled back and forth on her toes. The music was pounding through the floorboards. “You told me about the Green Hoods and all that, but I never realized what it would really be like-people singing about the king! I bet if I walked into that pub right now and said I was a Tanharrow, they’d start singing for me. Maybe they’d go with us.” She gasped. “Maybe we could show up with an army!”
“Maybe that’s a horrid idea,” said Ifra. “What do you think Belin will do to me if we show up with an army?” He unlocked the door. The room was spare but clean, with two quilts on the bed and a rag rug on the floor.
“That bed is far too small,” Violet said. “Don’t they have any rooms with a larger bed?”
“I’ll sleep on the floor.”
“But then I’ll be cold.” She glared up at him suddenly. “Are you ever going to kiss me again?”
Ifra stared at her a moment, and she stared right back, her brown eyes firm and even indignant.
“Are you serious?” he said. “My master is now King Belin. You aren’t queen yet. He could change his mind about needing a Tanharrow on the throne. He could ask me to kill you. He could ask me to attack the Green Hoods, and I might take out an awful lot of them before they kill me. We have advantages, chances to win this, but we must be careful because there is a lot at stake. We have to consider what we’re doing. We can’t just charge into some town, tell everyone who you are, and get up an army.”
“But…”
“And you know what else? I am sick and tired of you being so ungrateful for everything that’s put before you. You complain about every meal and every bed you’re ever given, even when the people offering hardly have anything themselves. I am sorry-more sorry than I can ever express-about what happened with Erris and Celestina, and I know this is not an easy situation for you, but being a good queen isn’t about having everything handed to you on a silver platter. A good master wants his servants to be happy, and a good ruler wants the same for her subjects. There is give-and-take for the good of everyone.”
Violet sat down hard on the bed and started crying. Ifra stayed near the door. He probably shouldn’t talk to her like that. She likely would be queen, and his only hope of freedom, but, well, all the rules his tutor had drummed into his head clearly hadn’t been drummed hard enough.
“It’s not that I’m not grateful,” Violet snapped. “I just-” She broke off. More crying.
He was finding it increasingly uncomfortable to just stand there. “I’m going downstairs for some dinner. Join me when you feel better.”
The singing in the pub had ceased for the moment, but the talk was loud. Ifra found a table with two chairs and showed his key in return for a plate of roasted corn, sauerkraut and apples, squash soup with small red-speckled beans, and a cup of hard cider. The food smelled good enough to get his appetite going even as he fretted over Violet.
He really shouldn’t talk to her like that.
But, no, she needed to hear it. The Green Hoods deserved a good queen, and if he had destroyed Erris, the least he could do was put some sense into the last remaining Tanharrow.
I’m in way over my head.
He was halfway through the plate when Violet appeared in the doorway. She’d been wearing the same childish dress-gray with black velvet trim-for days. She kept her hair down now, not in bows, but she still looked like a lost child searching for her mother, although Ifra guessed the girl serving him was only a year or two older. Violet caught sight of him and edged over, slipping into the empty chair.
“I’m sorry, Ifra,” she said.
“It’s all right.”
“I never… realized… I don’t know.”
He spread his hands. “Join me for dinner.”
That put the ghost of a smile on her lips. “I will.”
The serving girl brought a plate of food right out to her. The room was even busier now-all the chairs were gone, the bar was full, and some people who had come in after their friends were just standing at tables, holding drinks and talking. Individual conversations were impossible to catch, but the names of Luka and Belin were on everyone’s lips.
“We need to make a plan,” Ifra said. “And we need to make it carefully. We know what we want. To find Erris, if we can. To put you on the throne. To get the fairies behind you. To get Belin out of the picture. But what does Belin want?”
Violet leaned in closer. She still had that spark of excitement in her eyes-probably a part of her still felt like she was in a story. “Well, it sounds like people aren’t too happy with him. He wants me so people won’t be as upset, but… he must also want to keep me from going anywhere or talking to anyone important.”
“Yes. And he’ll know that if you’re on the throne, you can give me orders.”
“Can I give orders that contradict his orders?”
“Sometimes jinn are bound to families, and if that happens, the person usually names a successor, like the eldest son, who takes precedence in giving commands. Luka named Belin as his successor to the throne, so I assume he’ll take precedence. But I really won’t know unless you gave me contradicting orders, because the commands will tug at me.” He frowned. “Try not to do it. I don’t want to get pulled in two different directions.”
“I’m going to try my best to seem like a stupid little girl who just wants dresses and cake. I’m good at that.”
“I bet.”
She gave him a withering look. “I suppose I will order you around anyway, in stupid ways. Like, ‘bring me my slippers!’ Make him think I don’t see you as anything but a slave. We don’t want him to know there’s anything between us.”
Was there something between them? Ifra couldn’t stop looking at her, even when she was acting spoiled. Maybe even especially then. Not that she ought to just get away with it. “Maybe there won’t be, after all of that,” he said.