A Queen of Ruin (Deliciously Dark Fairytales 4)

“Yes,” I responded, crossing an ankle over my knee. “The dragons were on guard duty, and they remained, just in case. The faeries stuck to their rooms. I get the feeling Calia is eager to speak to the prince, though. She’s probably feeling the call of home.”

“I know,” she replied, already pulling ingredients to her. She mixed her herbs with the ease of someone that had been doing it all her life. In her case, it was mostly true. Since she was old enough to garden, at least.

As she got to work, she said, “Nyfain seems to think the different groups of visitors each need some elaborate dinner. Which, fine, as a prince with official business, he’s probably right. But it seems like a waste of time.”

“Have you told him that?” I asked.

“No,” she replied.

“And you shouldn’t,” Arleth said. “He’s doing official dinners so they will be prompted to invite him to their courts. Or at least that’s true of Calia. It’s how things are done. He might appear rough and tumble now, ruthless even, but he was schooled in the finer workings of a court, and he’s using that knowledge to make allies. Trust him. He knows what he’s about.”

Finley didn’t respond, looking at me through her lashes. A new emotion wafted my way—anxiety. I knew what she was thinking: He might know what he’s about, but I have no clue how to exist in that world.

I gave her a small smile and an encouraging nod, letting her know she wasn’t alone. And she wasn’t, truly—I’d need to make sure I learned how to sit at a proper dinner table.

I reached down to grab my notepad to jot that on my to-do list.

“I picked some everlass that the demons fought in,” Arleth said, going back to a more comfortable topic for Finley. “The field is struggling with all the damage, but it will rally. I’ve seen fields look worse and come back strong. But I thought you might try using some of the plants that were trampled by the disgusting creatures. Maybe they’ll work harder to eradicate the enemy from my son.”

Finley glanced at me in that way of hers, and I immediately set down my notebook and stood, grabbing a cup and going to the water. She took the cup from me and poured in the ingredients before handing it back.

“There should be a ladle—”

“I got it,” I told her, taking it from the shelf.

“That elixir you made yesterday…” Arleth started, regarding her with a shrewd look. “It heals very quickly.”

“It has to,” I said, pouring in the water and setting it beside Finley to cool. “With all the times she limped into our house, she needed something quick and effective.”

“And easy to make,” Finley added.

“You need to meet and understand other creatures, Finley, so that you can alter your recipes to suit their needs, but then I think you will make this kingdom money with your skills. A lot of money.”

“Do we need it? You’ve given Nyfain your gold, haven’t you?” she replied, working on something else now, picking from various pots and steaming things from around the room.

“Nope, not that one. It’ll be too watery. Over there.” Arleth pointed at a pot that sat on a patch of dirt, cooling. The two were like dancing partners switching off who led and who followed. “What I’ve given him is a mere fraction of what the kingdom once had. We need it, trust me. To see greatness, we’ll need a lot of it.”

“We don’t need greatness all at once,” Finley replied. “We just need to cut the throats of our enemies so we have time to do this right.”

A puff of Finley’s rage had me smiling. Give her an enemy and stand back. She was like Nyfain in that way.

The queen’s eyebrows rose to her hairline, but she didn’t comment.

Finley froze, looking down at the everlass the queen had picked. Her hands came out slowly to grip the edge of the worktable.

“Yes,” she said softly, her gaze going far off.

I got butterflies in my stomach and my heart quickened, something that always happened when Finley slipped into one of these moods. My animal rolled within me in a flurry of excitement, something I didn’t much understand but liked the feeling of.

Arleth opened her mouth to ask what was happening, but I held up a hand to silence her. Finley was having an epiphany. It was something that happened to her from time to time when she was working on a complex cure. An idea would strike her, seemingly out of the blue, that would lead to exponential gains in whatever she was working on.

Some might attribute these leaps to intelligence and an enhanced analytical ability, and my sister was intelligent. But this was more than that. This was magic. Just as Nyfain could sing plants into growing, Finley could sense new ways to cure ailing people. It was a gift from the goddess, I knew it. She was goddess-touched.