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“I had only hoped to help you snag the prince’s attention.”
I don’t have to ask which one—I know she’s talking about Rainer. I blush.
“Don’t act like you were doing me a favor,” I say.
“Humans,” they mutter. “Believe it or not, playing tricks and pranks is our way of showing our fondness.”
I yank a bunch of dresses aside in the armoire, searching for something better than they picked out for me. They can entertain themselves another way, not by making me their joke.
“Yes, I tricked you into that purple thing,” they admit. “Partly for amusement—it can get dull around here—but mostly because I’ve been waiting for the day you stand up for yourself. I figured throwing you to the wolves might be the quickest way to sharpen you up.”
Their words remind me of something similar Rainer said once, about fighting for myself. “What do you mean?”
“You came to us so weak, so broken, Alessia. You would never stand a chance here—anywhere for that matter—with how namby-pamby you were.”
“Namby-pamby?”
“Weak-kneed. Spineless—”
“Pathetic,” I finish. I plop to the ground, resting my head against the armoire.
“We weren’t making fun of you, Alessia. We were pushing you to stand up for yourself.”
“By bullying me?”
“Bullying is not the term we’d use. Fae don’t take as much offense to insolence and sass as humans do. If a fae cares enough to help you grow—to push you to be stronger—well, they care about you. It’s as simple and as complicated as it sounds.” They shrug.
“Ah, so you do care about me.” I smile smugly at Das Celyn. “What was that you said about me? I’m growing like a wart on your arse?”
Das Celyn laughs even harder, wiping a small bit of moisture that gathered beneath their left eye. “Like a fungus on an unwashed buttock.”
“Yeah that’s a very heartening term of endearment.”
They grunt, continuing to rummage through the armoire without sparing me a glance.
Their words bring Rainer to the forefront of my mind. He let me stay here, despite clearly not wanting to. He pushed me to train.
But he also pushed me away.
After experiencing his vulnerability in that nightmare last night, I’m starting to think his unsympathetic act is just that—an act. There has to be a reason he’s pushing me away, and maybe I can convince him to open up to me, or at the very least, stop pushing me away.
Is he afraid to get close to others because he lost his parents? Or is there more to it? Is he truly afraid of hurting me?
I’m choosing to overlook the use of his fearcaller power on me. At least temporarily. We’ve made too much progress over the past month for everything between us to be phony. And now that I know our dreams together are real, that dream-Rainer himself is the real Rainer, it’s easier to forgive him.
He’s not human, after all. He’s fae. They have different rules and standards than I’m used to.
After letting my anger and shock subside, his words finally sunk in: he’s not the one invading my dreams, I’ve been invading his. I’m not sure how it’s possible, or what it means except that he hasn’t been violating me like I initially assumed.
If I’m not mistaken, it’s as if he hadn’t noticed it was truly me in his dreams until I mentioned it at brunch. Even with his indifferent mask on, he couldn’t hide the flash of shock that coursed through him at the revelation, which confuses me further.
“Das Celyn?”
“Hmm?” They grunt as they pull a few dresses out, but I’m not partial to any of them.
“What do pink roses mean?”
“Pale pink, coral, or fuchsia?”
