Page 19 of Seduction of a Psychopomp
He chewed on his own lip while lost in thought for a moment before answering with his own conundrum. “I could travel back to Faery alone to try to find you some, so that you wouldn’t have to use the Gate again and travel so far to an outpost, but I don’t want to leave you alone for that long.” I didn’t mention that he had left me alone for a long stretch today, but I supposed he had been nearby so perhaps that was different. But then I remembered that he’d told me time passed differently within the realms and we wouldn’t have any way of predicting how much time had passed. No, I definitely didn’t want him going back into Faery. He shook his head as if agreeing with my thoughts. “I will make sure you get some.”
The next morning, he knocked on the frame of my open door while holding a small ceramic jar. I’d woken early to find the other side of the bed undisturbed again, had eaten some leftover pastry-things from the night before, and then set to work immediately on my wings. Better to do what I could while I had the energy, I figured. I’d needed to hold on to the table as I snapped my wings out several times, beating them as hard as I could to shake out any rumples and close up most of the openings in my feathers. And then I’d set to work on the most stubborn feathers with a stiff comb, smoothing out each one until it laid just right. I looked up to find him watching me work and gave him a self-conscious smile.
“You’ll have to make sure this is the right kind of powder,” he said. The familiar pink began to tinge his cheek bones.
“Oh, where did you manage to find some so quickly?” I asked in surprise.
He approached the small desk I was sitting at near the bedroom window. It had a matching wooden chair that didn’t get in the way of my wings, and the old mercury glass mirror it held made me think it had seen more use as a vanity than a writing surface.
“I sent a spectral to Blunthorn last night and he had Helda bring some for me when she came to cook this morning.”
I blinked at him in surprise. “Spectrals” were what we called the little spectral messengers that carried missives to another person for us in exchange for being allowed to absorb the magic that we placed inside of special stone chips for them. I was surprised to hear that they existed here, as I’d always thought they needed fae magic. I was also surprised that Victor was close enough to this Mister Blunthorn to send him a messenger. You needed aliteral pieceof that person for the spectrals to be able to find them, so if you don’t know someone well enough to carry an old baby tooth or a lock of their hair, the spectral wouldn’t be able to find them.
“Oh, please give them my thanks,” I told him, taking the jar from him. I opened it to find what looked like a simple lady’s setting powder inside, along with a powder puff, which would work perfectly for my needs. I told him that and thanked him, wondering what his Blunthorn man had thought of myVeardur’srequest for lady’s setting powder and smiling at the mental image. “This was very sweet of you,” I said, setting it down so I could finish with my combing.
“Always tell me what you need,” he said quietly as he watched me preen with evident curiosity. “Is there something I can do to help? That seems like a lot of work.” His voice was rumbly and deep, and his offer gave me a spark of pleasure.
I shrugged awkwardly and hid the embarrassment coloring my cheeks behind the wing I was tending to. “It isn’t usually this much work,” I explained, feeling bashful. “Day to day it only takes as much maintenance as someone’s hair might. This has gotten particularly bad from me lying on them, so it’s going to take a bit more work, like long hair would if it became badly tangled. But if you want to,” I handed him another comb, “it would be helpful to do the back feathers where I can’t reach.”
“And what am I doing?” he asked, all business, as he took the comb and stepped behind me.
The prickling feeling at the back of my neck showed how aware I was of him being at my back, even though he hadn’t touched me yet. I had to clear my throat before I could answer him. “Feathers have tiny hooks in the filaments called barbules, they help the feather to stay closed up and smooth. You can use the tines of the comb to rake them straight and close up the splits wherever you find them, like this,” I explained, showing him a feather that had split and how to fix it.
He was so gentle I couldn’t imagine how effective he was being, but I appreciated the effort. I smiled again at his tenderness, remembering all too well my whining protests at how rough my mother could be with my feathers when I was a little child. Or how we’d squawk at our friends when one tweaked a feather wrong.
“Does it tickle?” he asked when I chuckled at the memory, pulling his comb away.
“No,” I told him, and he returned to combing. “Parents do this for little ones before they’re able to, and then when we’re children we tend to sit around and groom each other’s feathers like this. It’s a social activity, I guess. I don’t know if girls here sit around and braid each other’s hair.” I glanced back at him, but he was too focused on combing to notice. “If they do, it’s a similar thing. But little kids aren’t the gentlest, and squabbles always started when someone wasn’t careful enough with another person’s wings. I was just remembering some of those childhood fights.”
We never really stopped enjoying social grooming—we were a pretty touchy-feely people in general, I guess—but we became more selective about who we allowed to touch our wings as we grew up. It was a sort of bonding activity between close friends or with a lover, and though he couldn’t have known it, Victor’s offer to help me with mine was incredibly forward.
But it was a soothing ritual for most of us, and since the backs of our wings were difficult to reach and not particularly sensitive, friends would often sit for a chat and gossip while we helped each other with the harder to reach areas. We knew not to touch the underwings or specific places where they connected to our backs. But Victor didn’t. When his fingers grazed the sensitive feathers closest to my spine, both of my wings twitched, and as my sharp intake of breath gave me away, I felt him freeze behind me.
He sounded startled when he asked, “Did I do something?”
YES.
“You’re fine!” I reassured him with an awkward laugh, my voice pitched way too high to be believable. I took a shaky, deep breath, trying to ignore the way my body was reacting to his touch when he timidly resumed his feather stroking. But then he reachedunder my wingto steady it as he combed out a particularly stubborn feather and my whole body just lit up. I couldn’t control the full body shiver at the feeling of his hands on me. I had to slap my hand over my mouth when my breath hitched. “Sorry!” I squeaked when he jerked his hand away. “We’re just really sensitive there. It’s not that you’ve done anything wrong.”It just feels way too good.“I just wasn’t expecting it, and—” I cut myself off, because I was babbling and he had stepped back with an alarmed expression.
“Forgive me,” he said, schooling his face into a mask of calm nonchalance. “So sorry.” He carefully placed the comb back in my hand without allowing his skin to touch mine at all. “I believe I have all the feathers smoothed out back here anyway, so I will leave you to finish without my interference. I will tell Blunthorn his delivery will suffice.” He took another step backward before turning and walking from the room, his cheeks stained red and shadows pulling from every dark corner to wrap their inky tendrils around his legs as he left. The visual effect was startling, making his lower legs nearly disappear and then the illusion swirling up his body as he left the room.
I wilted in my chair when he was gone and rested my face in my hands, feeling the flames of embarrassment in my own cheeks at my clumsy reaction and scaring away my own husband with my nervousness babbling. After a few painful moments of wool gathering I finally straightened, glared at myself in the dimly reflective mirror, and set to work dusting the powder over my wings. By the time I reached the difficult places on my back I simply accepted defeat and did the best I could. That was all I’d been able to do for the longest time anyway.
Iwasmystifiedbyhow quickly I began to feel better. Obviously, I had been told that my husband’s magic would heal me, but I hadn’t truly understood it. Not after having been so unwell that I’d been practically bedridden foryears. Most of my life had been spent battling with my own body. Victor’s magic didn’t necessarily make me anystronger, but it did seem to have healed the parts of my body that my immune system had so badly damaged, and that, in turn, allowed me to gain some of my own strength back. I watched every day as Victor changed the bandages on my arm, amazed at how the wound beneath was knitting itself back together so quickly. It was already nearly healed, though now there were “bond marks” as Victor called them, beginning to surface on the skin around it. I still needed naps throughout the day, and I had to be careful not to overexert myself, but compared to the state I’d been in for most of my adult life, it was a huge improvement. Massive.
Distrusting what I was experiencing was a regular struggle—like maybe it wasn’t going to last and the bottom would drop out at any moment, and then I’d be back in that dark hole of magical stasis to keep me from dying. But when I was able to focus on the moment in front of me it was an amazing feeling, both being able to stay awake for longer periods and the pain I carried in my body slowly lessening until it was almost like it had never been there. I hadn’t even realized how badly I’d felt until I began to feel better. I could even change forms for short periods now when I wanted to, which meant my magic was coming back.
Every morning I woke up to find a small flower on the nightstand beside my bed. I didn’t know where he was finding blooms when there was still snow on the ground, but I enjoyed the little purple and pink blossoms immensely. The moment my eyes opened, I would look to the little cup of water on my bedside table to see what he’d brought me that day.
Still, the blankets beside me were never disturbed, and it left me feeling a little hurt and unwanted that he chose to sleep somewhere else at night. Even though we were married, I reminded myself often that we were still virtual strangers. Or maybe marriedVeardurdidn’t sleep together at night? I was too embarrassed and afraid of rejection to ask him outright. It soothed my heart some small amount to know that he was thinking of me and made the effort to bring me a little flower every morning before I was even awake.
I also started reading books that Victor began to leave in a stack beside my daily flower—works of fiction or histories that appeared on my nightstand like magic as well. My new morning ritual consisted of cleansing myself and then taking a book and a steaming cup of tea to the window seat to read. The birds flitting around in the courtyard quickly became a source of daily entertainment, even though watching them made me feel a little wistful. There were so many times when my brother and sister had talked me into flying off into the Black Woods with them to escape our tutor sessions as children. Since I was the youngest, of course I wanted to tag along with them, and then I’d continued to gallivant around in the treetops with Apollo, long after my siblings had outgrown such childishness. Our parents had truly had their hands full. Watching the little birds hopping around in the snow outside and squabbling over whatever they found made my heart a little sore at the memories, but I loved seeing their little daily dramas. In a matter of days, every time I cracked my window open, they came fluttering over to the ground below it for crumbs of bread that I tossed to them.
Each day I felt a little better, got a little stronger, and grew a little lonelier.
Perhaps because I didn’t need as much of his help for getting around or caring for myself, Victor thought he didn’t need to be around as often. Or maybe I’d embarrassed myself so badly in reaction to him that he didn’t want to be around me. I saw less and less of him as the days passed and I hated it. Of course, he always made sure I had plenty of options for food, and somehow, he paid close enough attention to know which foods I preferred, even when I didn’t pay enough attention to myself to realize it. The fire was always built up to the perfect level for warmth in the room, and he seemed to know when I’d finished a book or grown bored with it, because it would be replaced the next time I woke. He even realized I had been pressing his flowers in between the pages of the books to save them, because I would find them, perfectly pressed, beside the new ones. But any time I tried to engage him in conversation or ask him questions, he would look out the window and his eyes would turn white, and then he’d excuse himself and slink away like our grumpy palace cat when she’d been disturbed one too many times from her favorite pillow.Although maybe “prowling lion” is a more fitting description for him,I thought, when I considered the way his body moved and the air of authority he carried.
This morning he found me on the window seat, thumbing the brittle, yellowed pages of the book of poems I was reading as I watched the snow falling in wet clumps outside. The birds hadn’t even come today. They were probably tucked away in the trees with their little feathers all fluffed out for warmth. It occurred to me that even though I was healing, not all that much had changed in my circumstances. I was still trapped in a bedroom all day. Sure, I was alive, but I was bored. And now that my oldest friend was gone and my new husband wasn’t even interested in me, I was lonely. I’d been relieved at the thought of not having the maids around constantly, but at least they weresomeone. So when he knocked on the door frame, I didn’t expect much. He slipped into the room when I looked up, looking uncomfortable as usual—his cheeks flushing pink at the apples and his gaze taking a meandering journey around the room before finally landing on me. I couldn’t help letting my own eyes drink him in like he was water in a scorching desert. He might not have been much for company or conversation, but he sure was nice to look at. He swallowed three times before he spoke.
