She was trying hard to cheer me up. I recognized that, even as part of me balked at her needing to. She had spent the day trying to gather information and discovering just how messed-up Silences really was; she had barely slept. She deserved better than to have me clinging to her arm like some fainting heroine in a bad gothic romance . . . but I didn’t let go, and when she started for the bathroom, I let her lead the way without fighting. It was easier.
I needed a little easy.
The bathroom was large enough to contain an old-fashioned copper bathtub, complete with clawed feet that dug into the tiled floor like they were declaring war on the plumbing. There was plumbing, which was a bit of a relief: I’d been half afraid we were going to need to fetch buckets or boil our own water. Instead, May turned on the taps, beginning to fill the tub with steaming water.
“I brought bubble bath, on the assumption that you were going to need to scrub blood off yourself at some point; I guess this is a similar situation,” she said, indicating a bunch of bottles arranged on the sill of the room’s single window. The glass was cloudy with particulates, but judging by the green on the other side, it looked out on a garden of some sort. We were on the second floor. Make that “it looked out on the trees growing in the garden.”
May grabbed two bottles, uncapped them with her thumbs, and sniffed their contents before announcing, “You’re going to be the most perfumed princess at the party,” and dumping a healthy amount of both liquids into the bath. The water promptly foamed up, smelling of peppermint and rosemary.
I blinked at May. Then, slowly, understanding dawned, and I smiled. She wanted to remove the temptation. With two strong herbs scenting the air, there would be virtually no chance of my smelling the traces of goblin fruit still clinging to my skin.
She smiled back, even as she was tipping another vial of Walther’s countercharm into the water. Just in case. “Get in the bath. I need to have you dressed again and ready to go before Tybalt gets back.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I stood, stepping out of my shoes, and peeled off my underpants before allowing May to help me into the bathtub. I would have felt weird about that, but the tub was twice as high as the one we had at home, and had clearly been designed for someone with attendants to use. She took her hand away as soon as I was in the water, and leaned over to turn off the taps.
“There,” she said. “Now clean yourself up, and tell me what happened.”
“I’m not sure you really want me to,” I said, sinking down so that the bubbles were up to my chin. Then, and only then, I began to speak.
There wasn’t much to tell, but it took a surprisingly long time to tell it all, especially since May kept asking me to back up and repeat things that she considered important—some of which were seriously odd. She focused less on the goblin fruit juice than she did on the spices in the quiche, for example, and on the seating arrangement of the room.
When I finished, she looked at me, lips pressed into a hard line, and shook her head. “That’s messed up. The etiquette of the room is all off. He’s playing at classy, and falling way short.”
“I don’t know about that, but I know it’s messed up. You didn’t see . . . is the chef a pureblood at least?” Anything to let me believe, however temporarily, that Rhys wasn’t making his changeling servants crush the goblin fruit themselves.
May’s expression killed that hope before it could fully form. “I didn’t see anyone in the kitchen but changelings. If they’re that fond of goblin fruit here, they probably lose one or two a year to addiction. Why should they worry about it? They can always make more.” She made no effort to conceal the bitterness in her tone, and I appreciated that. It was easier to feel like my own bitterness was justified when I wasn’t the only one.
“The trouble with thinking of living beings as a replaceable commodity is that one day, they may think the same of you,” said Tybalt, in the mild tone he always used when he was angry but trying not to aim it inappropriately. I turned my head to find him standing in the bathroom doorway. His expression softened as he looked at me. “Are you . . . well, my little fish?”
“I’m sitting in a tub full of water without having a panic attack about it, so I think I’m doing basically okay,” I said. “Where are Walther and Quentin?”
“Walking back with diplomatic slowness,” said Tybalt. “Both of them knew you would need to clean yourself, and I think neither wished to offer offense by walking in when you were unprepared.”
“I’ll go let them know everything’s fine,” said May, pushing herself away from the bathtub and heading for the door. She patted Tybalt on the shoulder as she passed him, causing him to raise an eyebrow. Laughing, she made her exit, and closed the door as she went.
“I may never understand that woman,” said Tybalt, walking toward the tub where I sat. “Then again, I may never understand any woman.”
“Not even me?” I asked.
“Especially not you,” he said, leaning forward to kiss my forehead. I tilted my chin back, and he kissed me again, this time on the lips. It was a glancing thing, but it made me feel better. “If I understood you in more than the most basic of principles, it would be a violation of the laws of nature, and the cosmos would be quickly thrown into disarray. What is that smell?”
“Bubble bath, two kinds,” I said. “May was making sure I couldn’t smell anything else.”
“Ah. She is a wise one, your incomprehensible Fetch.” Tybalt took a step back, leaning against the nearest wall and watching me. “You realize this has all been orchestrated, do you not? Even down to our places at the table.”
“Yeah, I picked up on that.” I grabbed a sponge from the side of the bathtub, beginning to scrub off the last of the sticky film from the goblin fruit. “I can’t tell whether it was a test or a carefully designed humiliation, and I’m not completely sure it matters. The end result was the same.”
“Ah, but you see, it does matter,” said Tybalt. He sat down on the rim of the bathtub, picked up another sponge, and began washing my back. “They only had one chance to do what they did today. You cannot forever be having things spilled upon you, or it becomes intentional offense. The glass was aimed at your clothing, to test your poise and self-control, but not at your face. Why not? That approach has worked in the past.”
“Yeah, but with you right there, and Walther in the room, I wouldn’t have had the chance to really hurt myself,” I said. “We know blood stabilizes me, and I know you want me to be safe more than you want to not be bleeding. I would have stabbed you in the arm and used your blood to stay on an even keel until Walther could hit me with some alchemy.” He’d done it before. I had every faith he could do it again.
“So they knew they could not reacquaint you with your old addiction—not in any way that would serve them—and with the false Queen having experienced your magic firsthand, they must also have been aware of the risk that you would simply become stronger in an effort to overcome the fruit.”
I twisted to blink at him. “Say what?”
Tybalt leaned over and tapped the point of my left ear. “A person would have to be blind of both the eye and nose to have missed the changes you’ve undergone these past several years, October. You have traded away slivers of your humanity for many things, all of them worthy, and I’d be lying if I claimed I was not glad. I prefer you among the living, and the more fae you become, the longer you’ll stay alive. But that is no matter. Every trade you make increases your power. You think they want that? The idea was never to addict you. It was to shame you, and to remind you that this place is not yours, it is theirs. Their blood is purer than yours, and things which can destroy you cannot hurt them.”