“Kill it and be done,” one of the guards said. “It’s disgusting.”
“That would be a grave mistake,” Rosier said quickly, and then yelped when he was poked again.
“I told you to shut up,” a different fey ordered.
“But you want me to talk. I’ve told you, she’s almost powerless without me—”
“An even better reason to end your miserable life.”
“No! No, no, no!” Rosier said, making me tense up.
And peer around the corner again. The room they were in was just the space where a couple corridors intersected. It had been dressed up with a few cabinets and the table Rosier’s cage was sitting on, allowing it to serve as both checkpoint and break room. But the fey were the real deal, three of them and bristling with weapons, not that they looked like they expected to use them.
Except for the one who had just pulled a knife.
“And forfeit that amount of coin?” Rosier asked, his eyes on the blade. “She’s powerful, as long as she has me as a focus. You stand to make—”
“Nothing, cur. She doesn’t belong to me!”
“But you could claim her—”
“Not until they chop off that lying bastard’s head! And even then she’ll be the queen’s prize, to do with as she likes!”
“They’re not going to kill him,” another fey said. He was sitting, with his feet on the table, peeling an apple.
“How do you know?” the first one demanded.
Apple Boy looked up sardonically. “Don’t you know who that is?”
“Who?” the second fey asked. “The veslingr?”
“A wretch,” the other agreed, “but not so powerless. That’s Nimue’s grandson.”
“What?” The other two stopped torturing Rosier long enough to stare at him.
He nodded, obviously enjoying the attention. “I was there when they caught him. He was trying to recover some of the magic he spent on the wards by using his slut, when he lost control and dropped his glamourie. I got a good look at his face before they hauled him off.”
“Grandson?” The second fey was still looking confused. “You mean one of the princes—”
Apple Boy laughed.
The first fey looked like he’d just figured something out. And from the disgust on his face, it wasn’t something he liked. “You mean great-grandson.”
The fey at the table nodded. “Now you’ve got it.”
“Got what?” the second fey demanded. “What are you talking about?”
“The polluted one. That half-demon thing Nimue should have killed at birth.”
“Gods,” the second fey said. If he’d been Catholic, he would have crossed himself.
“Why didn’t she?” the first fey demanded. “Anyone else—”
“But she’s not anyone else, is she?” Apple Boy asked, eating a piece of fruit off his knife. “The law is for peasants like you and me. The great ones do as they like.”
The first fey bristled. “I’m no peasant. My grandfather—”
“And who was your grandmother, again?”