Page 76 of Afterlife (Evernight 4)
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ASH
I hate him.
And I’m starting to hate this room with its pretty furnishings, the closet full of pretty gowns, the window with its view of trees, and the pink sky.
I’m not staying here. I’m leaving first chance I get.
Think, Ash, think. There has to be something you saw, something you heard that will aid your escape.
A riddle. A curse. The Decay. The Empress.
“The land is dying.”
“I brought you here to help us.”
Help, how? Why won’t he say what he expects from me? Could I help him, accomplish what he brought me here for, and then go free?
“I’ve already been punished for bringing you here.”
What had the gold-crowned Lesser Faerie said to him in the throne room? “The punishment for crossing the gate without her permission is to take another year off.”
A year off what? Why had he seemed so stricken?
“Does the riddle say I’m to be your prisoner?”
No. He’d replied ‘no’.
Does that mean the riddle says I shouldn’t be his prisoner, or that it doesn’t matter if I am? Aren’t Fae riddles and deals supposed to be phrased exactly, not leaving loopholes? Can the Fae themselves be caught in a trap of words? Is this what this is about? Was it a treaty gone awry, a deal with the Empress where he failed to fulfill his side of the bargain?
A blight, a disease on the land, its crops, plants, and animals. I could sympathize with that, even though I’ve lived inside the walls of a palace all my life. We spoke to the farmers bringing their produce to the kitchens, the farm hands telling us of the crops dying—from the frost, from the hail, from the locust, from the various blights. But what could I do to undo them?
Why wouldn’t he tell me the entire riddle? If it’s really only half. Maybe that was it, the whole thing. A riddle about me.
At least those two Fae women—Auria and Zylphia—put the woolen dress and cape on a chair for me, along with the boots. If I manage to escape the palace, I’ll be ready.
But it’s looking grim. Not only is my door locked but the palace is a veritable labyrinth. I’ll need time to find the way out—and for that, I first have to escape this room. I rattle the handle for the hundredth time, wondering if there is a latch outside that I could lift, if the key is still in the lock on the outside so I can turn it.
Somehow.
Breaking into and out of rooms never interested me. If only Pete was here. He’d know how.
A vise grips my chest. All the while I was in the human lands, I longed to be accepted back into the royal chambers, to reclaim my birth right, to behold beauty and art.
Now, so far away, I find that I long for the familiar smells of the kitchens and the cook’s heavy hand, for the silly conversations with Pete and the peaceful routine of it all. I had a place in that world.
Even the thought of the thin gruel makes me feel positively nostalgic.
I stand at the window and fight with myself. I have to stop rattling the handle, be patient, bide my time a little. Sooner or later, someone will come with my dinner, won’t they? And then maybe I can make my way out.
True enough, after some indeterminate time has passed, a key turns in the lock and it swings open. I turn, unable to hide my relief. For a moment there I thought nobody would come.
“Jassin.” I smile at him. “You’re here.”
“You thought we’d let you starve?” He walks inside carrying a tray with a bowl of soup and a chunk of bread. “You’re our guest.”
“I seem to have angered the king. What do I know of the ways of the Fae? Maybe you like to let your prisoners starve.”
