Braithe frowned down at the hamlet nestled among the trees. Smoke coiled from cottage chimneys; a scattered constellation of lit windows pushed back against the eternal dusk. Children’s shouts and dogs’ barks echoed off of the hills. People milled around in the town square. Braithe spied an inn—the sign depicted some kind of insect—which meant the town would welcome a traveler. And yet, the cart remained where it was. She slid her eyes over the homes, the slivers of gardens she could see, the busy square, and then she could no longer put off looking at the mansion across the valley. Even in this twilight, the building managed to overshadow the town. Ah.
“What do you think, Caë? Are we going to pay a fey a visit?” She glanced over at her traveling companion, but the diminutive girl was wholly cocooned in her quilt. The shape grunted at Braithe, and the woman sighed. “Sure, mother. Let’s, mother,” she murmured. Caërra grunted again, but Braithe shook the reins and drowned out any more wordless protests under the sound of jingling tack and creaking cart as their horse led them down into the valley.
Braithe ignored the manor guards’ stares. She felt her hair—gone brassy after so many days of solid traveling—hanging around her ears; half an hour on Caërra’s hair hadn’t done anything about the rats’ nests. The estate was larger than it seemed from afar, and their cart and horse were almost half a mile away. These were terraced grounds, without anything taller than a shrub anywhere around. The silver fence at the base of the estate was tall and pointed; the only exit was, again, half a mile away, and another guard had shut the gate there behind them.
She kept a hold of Caërra by the collar of her dress. The girl’s had her eyes fixed on a garden on a lower terrace. Several children played there; Caërra’s gaze refused to waver, even when the tall doors finally opened. Braithe smiled at a woman who stared back up at her.
“Hello! I’m Braithe Miller. This is Caërra.” The maid glanced down at the girl—or, her back. “We would like to speak to Mamun, avatar and master of the tokay gecko. Please,” Braithe added.
“I am Sonata.” Braithe endured the woman’s silent scrutiny from top to toes. Her shoulders fell when Sonata the maid, or housekeeper, closed the door. Braithe blinked her eyes a few times. She tried to pick Caërra up, but the girl went dead weight in her arms; Braithe put her back down. Together, they looked out over the gardens and lawns. That was a long walk of defeat. Maybe by the end of it, she’d have another lead in mind. Maybe—
“You’re not getting in,” said one of the guards. “Time to leave. Go home. You have a home to go to?” He gestured at the path with his silver-tipped spear. Braithe drew herself up.
“I don’t know you are, friend, but my husband—” Caërra growled and mumbled something at the same time as the door opened again behind them. Sonata had someone with her. The new girl—in a similar maid’s dress, but more flattering and a bit better made—sported dark skin and hair in a striking shade of black. Sonata’s lips were lemon-pursed.
“The lord is—expecting you. Please come in,” she said. She moved to the side, and Braithe pulled Caërra after her over the threshold. The housekeeper held up a hand. “But his study is no place for a child. If you allow Lyric to escort you to the study, I can take her to play with the other children.” Sonata gestured back toward the terrace garden, but Braithe was already shaking her head.
“No, sorry. Caë stays with me.” The girl whined, and pulled away hard enough to choke herself. She tugged at Braithe’s hand on her collar.
“Please. M’m.” Braithe’s fingers slipped. She gaped after her daughter as the girl bolted for the terrace. Sonata rested a hand on Braithe’s shoulder and shot her a neutral smile, and then she followed Caërra. Braithe turned back to the girl—Lyric—who grimaced a smile at her.
“Please come to the study,” she said. Braithe followed the small woman through the marble-floored foyer. Lyric glanced over her shoulder at Braithe every few steps. “Please do not disagree with the lord,” she said. “Please do not anger the lord. Please do not insult him. Please to be respectful.”
“Timid, you mean,” Braithe said as she followed Lyric down plushly carpeted halls. Lyric managed to shrug and cringe at once. She led Braithe into an empty study paneled in unfamiliar wood. Some sourceless, incessant sound Braithe couldn’t place pierced through her head.
“What is that—”
“Please,” said Lyric. Braithe turned to find the girl holding a tray holding two bowls out to her. “Would you like cherries, or sweatbread?” Braithe fixated on the cherries, but her nose was full of the scent of fried meat. She ignored her stomach and her watering mouth, though the cherries were a safer choice than the meat. Only slightly safer, in the heart of the home of a fey.
“No, thank you,” she said, and turned away to keep exploring. Lyric set aside the tray on a chilled table. She took up a gourd-shaped instrument and settled into a seat in a corner. The instrument couldn’t drown out the noise. Braithe shifted her weight on the too-thick carpet and examined the room for the culprit of the sound. One wall was glass, and the view looked down at the lawns. Braithe paused in her search. Caërra might have been one of those small figures at play in the garden. Braithe smiled.
“It’s a heartwarming sight, isn’t it?” Braithe turned to set eyes on the speaker. Behind him, the curtains she’d assumed were another wall still billowed with his passing. The two of them sized each other up: her brassy blond to his tousled sky blue; her sunburnt brown to his mottled orange; her stains and wrinkles to his silks. Mamun’s clothing wasn't the local style: a dark tunic knotted at the shoulder and a pair of loose pants. The lord smirked at her; he moved to stand beside her at the window. They watched the children playing. Braithe did not react to his nearness. Mamun occasionally wet his eyes with a cloth. After some time, he spoke:
“I did not recognize the name when Sonata informed me a mortal requested an audience. When Lyric described you, well. No longer using your liege’s name, consort Fulbright? Made peace with his abandonment?” Braithe gritted her teeth. She made herself smile into the lord’s unblinking face.
“My husband would come back to us if he could, Mamun. I thought I was being polite to use my maiden name. Otherwise, you might think I was bringing up the past on purpose, and refuse to see me.” Braithe turned back to the window. Was that Caërra, after all? It was hard to tell in the dusk. “This grudge is tiresome, lizard,” Braithe said. Mamun stepped away from her to stand behind his desk. “I saw the sign down in the square,” she added. “It’s a cockroach. What’s the inn called?” Mamun played with a dagger-shaped letter opener.
“The Roach's Cock.” He sighed. “Relations between fey are too complex for you, consort. There are machinations that are impossible for you to understand. The eras pass, you fade, and we, the immortal, remain. To question me is to question everything about us. It took years for me to return and restore order here after your liege extinguished my form.” Braithe clenched her hands around her arms so she couldn’t clench them into fists. She reeled on the gecko, who stared back at her unblinkingly.
“You tried to eat him!” she said. “He was defending himself. You picked the wrong cockroach; would he be right to carry on like you, if you’d won? It’s a fey-eat-fey world out there,” she said over him. “Besides. What’s three or four years coming back from India, to your immortal eras?” Mamun moved to slam down the knife; instead, he stilled himself and took a deep breath. He set down the letter opener, and then left the desk. The lord moved back to the curtains. He parted them with a golden rope, and the noise—never gone—grew more intense.
The cause was clearly the crickets in a glass case, but their song was unfamiliar to Braithe’s ears. Beside the case stood a silver cage as big as Mamun. Geckos laid in repose on the ledges inside, or stared unblinking at the room. Their gormless expressions were far at odds with Mamun’s intent face. Braithe noticed the handle on the inside of the cage as Mamun opened the door. He opened the glass case, too, and snatched up crickets with predatory quickness.
“He killed me, consort Fulbright. The favors I had to pay, the coin I had to promise... a house without a lord cannot stand,” Mamun said. He fed the crickets to the geckos, who ate them with eager snaps. With each one, the music went sour for just a note. Braithe glanced at Lyric; the girl stared at nothing, but she flinched with every eaten cricket. Now Braithe noticed the pointed ears and darker striping on the fey woman’s brown skin. Doubtless, these were the only crickets of this breed on the estate—in this country, probably. Where was Lyric from? India? China? Braithe glared at Mamun as he ate one of the crickets.
“So you have a good reason to kidnap him,” Braithe said. “Vengeance, or whatever. Lots of places you could keep somebody here, especially a roach-sized person.” Mamun sighed. He closed both cages and drew the curtains. Before he turned back to her, he dampend his eyes again.
“Consort Fulbright, if I sought to harm your liege, I would do so monetarily, so that—when he makes a reappearance—he will find less waiting for him than he already had, less than I came back to find waiting for me.” The gecko straightened up and walked back toward the desk. “That said, he doesn’t have claim to much, does he? I’m hardly going to go into mortal trading because of him, however much you might be worth to someone.” Braithe felt the gooseflesh spreading over her cradled arms while she stared at the gecko fey. She took a step away from the window.
“I don’t understand. Is somebody asking? For me?” Mamun smirked.
“I am not in a position to say. I would be careful, if I were you,” he told her. Braithe shook her head.
“I—I got to go. I need to go. We have to go,” Braithe said. She glanced at the young woman still resolutely playing in the corner, and then she turned to leave. She felt the gecko’s dry eyes on her until she shut the door.
“What do you think, Caë? Are we going to pay a fey a visit?” She glanced over at her traveling companion, but the diminutive girl was wholly cocooned in her quilt. The shape grunted at Braithe, and the woman sighed. “Sure, mother. Let’s, mother,” she murmured. Caërra grunted again, but Braithe shook the reins and drowned out any more wordless protests under the sound of jingling tack and creaking cart as their horse led them down into the valley.
Braithe ignored the manor guards’ stares. She felt her hair—gone brassy after so many days of solid traveling—hanging around her ears; half an hour on Caërra’s hair hadn’t done anything about the rats’ nests. The estate was larger than it seemed from afar, and their cart and horse were almost half a mile away. These were terraced grounds, without anything taller than a shrub anywhere around. The silver fence at the base of the estate was tall and pointed; the only exit was, again, half a mile away, and another guard had shut the gate there behind them.
She kept a hold of Caërra by the collar of her dress. The girl’s had her eyes fixed on a garden on a lower terrace. Several children played there; Caërra’s gaze refused to waver, even when the tall doors finally opened. Braithe smiled at a woman who stared back up at her.
“Hello! I’m Braithe Miller. This is Caërra.” The maid glanced down at the girl—or, her back. “We would like to speak to Mamun, avatar and master of the tokay gecko. Please,” Braithe added.
“I am Sonata.” Braithe endured the woman’s silent scrutiny from top to toes. Her shoulders fell when Sonata the maid, or housekeeper, closed the door. Braithe blinked her eyes a few times. She tried to pick Caërra up, but the girl went dead weight in her arms; Braithe put her back down. Together, they looked out over the gardens and lawns. That was a long walk of defeat. Maybe by the end of it, she’d have another lead in mind. Maybe—
“You’re not getting in,” said one of the guards. “Time to leave. Go home. You have a home to go to?” He gestured at the path with his silver-tipped spear. Braithe drew herself up.
“I don’t know you are, friend, but my husband—” Caërra growled and mumbled something at the same time as the door opened again behind them. Sonata had someone with her. The new girl—in a similar maid’s dress, but more flattering and a bit better made—sported dark skin and hair in a striking shade of black. Sonata’s lips were lemon-pursed.
“The lord is—expecting you. Please come in,” she said. She moved to the side, and Braithe pulled Caërra after her over the threshold. The housekeeper held up a hand. “But his study is no place for a child. If you allow Lyric to escort you to the study, I can take her to play with the other children.” Sonata gestured back toward the terrace garden, but Braithe was already shaking her head.
“No, sorry. Caë stays with me.” The girl whined, and pulled away hard enough to choke herself. She tugged at Braithe’s hand on her collar.
“Please. M’m.” Braithe’s fingers slipped. She gaped after her daughter as the girl bolted for the terrace. Sonata rested a hand on Braithe’s shoulder and shot her a neutral smile, and then she followed Caërra. Braithe turned back to the girl—Lyric—who grimaced a smile at her.
“Please come to the study,” she said. Braithe followed the small woman through the marble-floored foyer. Lyric glanced over her shoulder at Braithe every few steps. “Please do not disagree with the lord,” she said. “Please do not anger the lord. Please do not insult him. Please to be respectful.”
“Timid, you mean,” Braithe said as she followed Lyric down plushly carpeted halls. Lyric managed to shrug and cringe at once. She led Braithe into an empty study paneled in unfamiliar wood. Some sourceless, incessant sound Braithe couldn’t place pierced through her head.
“What is that—”
“Please,” said Lyric. Braithe turned to find the girl holding a tray holding two bowls out to her. “Would you like cherries, or sweatbread?” Braithe fixated on the cherries, but her nose was full of the scent of fried meat. She ignored her stomach and her watering mouth, though the cherries were a safer choice than the meat. Only slightly safer, in the heart of the home of a fey.
“No, thank you,” she said, and turned away to keep exploring. Lyric set aside the tray on a chilled table. She took up a gourd-shaped instrument and settled into a seat in a corner. The instrument couldn’t drown out the noise. Braithe shifted her weight on the too-thick carpet and examined the room for the culprit of the sound. One wall was glass, and the view looked down at the lawns. Braithe paused in her search. Caërra might have been one of those small figures at play in the garden. Braithe smiled.
“It’s a heartwarming sight, isn’t it?” Braithe turned to set eyes on the speaker. Behind him, the curtains she’d assumed were another wall still billowed with his passing. The two of them sized each other up: her brassy blond to his tousled sky blue; her sunburnt brown to his mottled orange; her stains and wrinkles to his silks. Mamun’s clothing wasn't the local style: a dark tunic knotted at the shoulder and a pair of loose pants. The lord smirked at her; he moved to stand beside her at the window. They watched the children playing. Braithe did not react to his nearness. Mamun occasionally wet his eyes with a cloth. After some time, he spoke:
“I did not recognize the name when Sonata informed me a mortal requested an audience. When Lyric described you, well. No longer using your liege’s name, consort Fulbright? Made peace with his abandonment?” Braithe gritted her teeth. She made herself smile into the lord’s unblinking face.
“My husband would come back to us if he could, Mamun. I thought I was being polite to use my maiden name. Otherwise, you might think I was bringing up the past on purpose, and refuse to see me.” Braithe turned back to the window. Was that Caërra, after all? It was hard to tell in the dusk. “This grudge is tiresome, lizard,” Braithe said. Mamun stepped away from her to stand behind his desk. “I saw the sign down in the square,” she added. “It’s a cockroach. What’s the inn called?” Mamun played with a dagger-shaped letter opener.
“The Roach's Cock.” He sighed. “Relations between fey are too complex for you, consort. There are machinations that are impossible for you to understand. The eras pass, you fade, and we, the immortal, remain. To question me is to question everything about us. It took years for me to return and restore order here after your liege extinguished my form.” Braithe clenched her hands around her arms so she couldn’t clench them into fists. She reeled on the gecko, who stared back at her unblinkingly.
“You tried to eat him!” she said. “He was defending himself. You picked the wrong cockroach; would he be right to carry on like you, if you’d won? It’s a fey-eat-fey world out there,” she said over him. “Besides. What’s three or four years coming back from India, to your immortal eras?” Mamun moved to slam down the knife; instead, he stilled himself and took a deep breath. He set down the letter opener, and then left the desk. The lord moved back to the curtains. He parted them with a golden rope, and the noise—never gone—grew more intense.
The cause was clearly the crickets in a glass case, but their song was unfamiliar to Braithe’s ears. Beside the case stood a silver cage as big as Mamun. Geckos laid in repose on the ledges inside, or stared unblinking at the room. Their gormless expressions were far at odds with Mamun’s intent face. Braithe noticed the handle on the inside of the cage as Mamun opened the door. He opened the glass case, too, and snatched up crickets with predatory quickness.
“He killed me, consort Fulbright. The favors I had to pay, the coin I had to promise... a house without a lord cannot stand,” Mamun said. He fed the crickets to the geckos, who ate them with eager snaps. With each one, the music went sour for just a note. Braithe glanced at Lyric; the girl stared at nothing, but she flinched with every eaten cricket. Now Braithe noticed the pointed ears and darker striping on the fey woman’s brown skin. Doubtless, these were the only crickets of this breed on the estate—in this country, probably. Where was Lyric from? India? China? Braithe glared at Mamun as he ate one of the crickets.
“So you have a good reason to kidnap him,” Braithe said. “Vengeance, or whatever. Lots of places you could keep somebody here, especially a roach-sized person.” Mamun sighed. He closed both cages and drew the curtains. Before he turned back to her, he dampend his eyes again.
“Consort Fulbright, if I sought to harm your liege, I would do so monetarily, so that—when he makes a reappearance—he will find less waiting for him than he already had, less than I came back to find waiting for me.” The gecko straightened up and walked back toward the desk. “That said, he doesn’t have claim to much, does he? I’m hardly going to go into mortal trading because of him, however much you might be worth to someone.” Braithe felt the gooseflesh spreading over her cradled arms while she stared at the gecko fey. She took a step away from the window.
“I don’t understand. Is somebody asking? For me?” Mamun smirked.
“I am not in a position to say. I would be careful, if I were you,” he told her. Braithe shook her head.
“I—I got to go. I need to go. We have to go,” Braithe said. She glanced at the young woman still resolutely playing in the corner, and then she turned to leave. She felt the gecko’s dry eyes on her until she shut the door.
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