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I blinked at them. I was feeling something, but discomfort wasn’t it.
“Very well.” Bradach rescued his clothes from the floor, and bowed his way to the door. “I’ll save you a seat at dinner.”
I was suddenly very glad to be attending that dinner. Why had I dismissed Bradach as the court’s jester? Aeris did nothing but snap and bark at him, but given a few sweet words and ice off a mountain, and she was ready to have her way with the man right there on the chaise.
Mama’s stories were of friends falling in love, but Alisdair was never going to make it easy. I wasn’t wooing the banished heart of a man who was half in love with me already. I was trapping and capturing the heart of a beast who swore to give me anything but.
Besides,I mused, following Aeris and Eadaoin down to the dining hall.Bradach is Alisdair’s companion. Who better than his bedmate to teach me the ways of seducing him?
A flash of anger roared in my chest at the thought that Bradach wasstillhis bedmate. A thought I’d been trying hard to ignore. Alisdair marked me so that another man couldn’t touch me. I had no such marking on him, and of all the promises he made me during the mating ceremony—fidelity wasn’t one.
Together, we entered the dining hall, and my eyes blew wide. Beasts. Savages. Can’t control themselves.
Aeris was being kind.
There wasn’t a single utensil in sight. The faeriken tore at the meats, cheeses, bread, and vegetables with their bare hands, while snarls, snaps, and demands for more filled the air. A ring of masticated remains surrounded the long, oaken table and high-backed velvet-covered chairs. All the makings of a beautiful, formal dinner in a royal palace—if not for half the guests scrambling over the table to tear apart a turkey, and attacking each other for the bigger piece.
Alisdair sat at the head of it all with food that was only for him—easily seen from the fact that no one else dared look at his chicken, turkey, slab of beef, tray of bread rolls, four mugs of ale, and the fruits and vegetables from my tributes.
No. No one else dared lay a finger on his food... because they’d lose a finger bringing it that close to his mouth.
Alisdair was more the beast than the man. Long claws shredded the chicken and shoveled its tender meat into his mouth. He snatched up a mug and drained it, spilling ale all down the sides of his face and soaking his half-exposed chest.
“That is enough!” Aeris roared, making me jump. A dozen heads snapped up—growls, screeches, hisses, squawks, and barks peeling from their throats. Aeris screeched right back. “Get a hold of yourselves! Your queen is in your presence, and she is used to finer things and proper decorum. You will sit in your seats. You will chew and swallow your food before taking another bite, and youwilluse utensils!”
They all glared and groaned... at me. I truly was in another land because to look at my fath—King Salman with the fury they were throwing me was to be smote for treason. I knew because Emiana witnessed him do it when a peasant dared to look at him with the contempt he deserved.
Even the sweetest, gentlest dog will growl if you try to take their food while they’re eating. Some instincts are too deeply ingrained, and protecting your meal is one of them.
Slowly, I rounded the table and made for the empty seat next to Alisdair. Had Aeris called down for them to leave a seat for me, or was it always sitting empty—the constant symbol that their queen was too high and refined to eat with lowly faeriken?
Quietly, I reached for my seat. Aeris was quicker and pulled it out for me to sit down.
Alisdair scoffed. “Lo and behold, our table manners have been found lacking. Get your bibs and forks, everyone.”
Mocking laughter went up around the table.
“Will that satisfy you, little bird, or should I have a servant cut your food for you? Possibly chew it for you too? They can also—”
I pounced on the food, shoveling it into my mouth faster than I could chew. I’d never been at a table with this much food in my life. And meat! So much meat of all kinds and types. The rare times I had a full belly, it was full on the meager vegetables from our garden. It was then I realized Aeris had been instructing the cooks to feed me the dainty portions worthy of a princess. Why hadn’t I demanded to eat with everyone weeks ago?
Blown brows and hanging jaws stared at me. I blew past them all and narrowed in on Alisdair’s hand. “Are you going to eat that?” I snatched the turkey leg from his slackened grip and let out a belch that made Alisdair jerk in his seat.
I met the wide eyes with round eyes of my own. “What’s everyone looking at me for? If you’re not going to eat this, I will.”
Alisdair let out a strange and terrible sound, making me slow my chewing to give an expression more shocked than Aeris’s.
He laughed. Full-blown, raucous, pounding-the-table belly laughs. “You heard my queen.” He gave me the first real smile I’d ever seen on his lips. Not a smirk. Not a mocking grin. But a smile. “Let’s eat.”
The faeriken descended on the food—eating almost as fast as me. The pretty silk sapphire gown Aeris chose for me was ruined by spilled ale and food stains in minutes. Everyone was too focused on unhinging their jaws and shoveling food inside to chatter, and wasn’t that the way it should be?
Memories flashed through my mind of Emiana sitting at a mile-long table, picking at her apple-sized portion of a meal, and being forced to stop eating every time someone insisted on making meaningless small talk with her. Apparently, it was rude to eat while someone was speaking to you, or speak while you were eating. The result was Emiana always went to bed hungry.
“Fuck that,” I belted, “and fuck table manners!”
“Yeahh!” bellowed my court—laughing and pounding the table with their mugs.
Bradach clapped Alisdair on the shoulder. “You did good with this one, my lord. Dare I say better than you deserve.”
