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Holly Black

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“You think because you've got that good royal blood in you, you're better than us,' says the ogre, pressing one long fingernail against the prince's shoulder. 'Maybe you are. Only way to be sure is to have a taste.' There's a drunken wobble to Oak's movements as he pushes off the ogre's hand and obvious contempt in his voice. 'The difference in flavour would be too subtle for your palate.”

“How will they sell rubies?' I ask him. 'Why not leave them something more practical?' 'As a prince of Faerie, I flatly refuse to leave cash. It's inelegant.' Tiernan shakes his head at both of us, then pokes at the foodstuffs selecting a handful of nuts. 'Gift cards are worse,' Oak says when I do not respond. 'I would bring shame to the entire Greenbriar line if I left a gift card.' At that, I can't help smiling a little, despite my heavy heart. 'You're ridiculous.”

“We learned something of her capabilities.' 'And you want me to tell you that was worth you being poisoned?' the knight demands. 'I'm always being poisoned. Alas, that it wasn't blusher mushroom,' the prince said nonsensically. Tiernan nods his chin at me. 'That girl thinks you're a fool for even being here.' I scowl, because that's not what I meant. 'Ah, Lady Wren,' Oak says, a lazy smile on his mouth. Marigold hair brushing his forehead, half-hiding his horns. 'You wound me.”

“You have an unusual voice,' he says. 'Raspy. Quite fetching, really.' 'I damaged my vocal cords a long time ago,' I inform him. 'Screaming.' Oak steps between us, and I am grateful for the reprieve. 'What a fine gentleman you make, Jack.' Jack turns to the prince, his sinister smile dropped back into place. 'Oak and Wren, Wren and Oak. Delightful. Named for woodland creatures, but neither of you so simple.' He glances at Tiernan and Hyacinthe. 'Not nearly as simple as these two.”

“Once, the thing I am wearing was a sundress, with fluttery sleeves. A diaphanous white gown that flowed around me when I spun. I found it in a shop late one night. I'd stripped off the clothes given to me in the Court of Teeth, left them behind, and put them on instead. I liked the dress so much that I wove myself a crown of hellebores and danced through the night streets. I stared at myself in puddles, convinced that so long as I didn't smile, I might even be pretty. I know it doesn't look like that anymore, but I can no longer picture myself in anything else. I wish Oak could have seen the dress as it was, even though it hasn't looked that way in a long time.”

“I stomp back through the hall to my room and swing open the door, only to find Oak lounging in one of the chairs, his long limbs spread out in shameless comfort. A flower crown of myrtle rests just above his horns. With it, he wears a new shirt of white linen and scarlet trousers embroidered with vines. Even his hooves appear polished. He looks every bit the handsome faerie prince, beloved by everyone and everything. Rabbits probably eat from his hands. Blue jays try to feed him worms meant for their own children.”

“Wren, you have plenty of reasons not to trust me right now, but I do intend to stop Lady Nore. And I believe we can. Though I plan on bringing back Madoc, we will still have gone a deed no one can deny was of service to Elfhame. Whatever trouble I will be in, you'll be a hero.' I am not sure anyone has considered me that, not even the people I've saved. 'And if I decide to part ways? Are you going to tie my hands and drag me along with you?' He looks at me with trickster eyes beneath arched golden brows. 'Not unless you scratch me again.' 'Why do you want to help him?' I ask. Madoc had been willing to use Oak as a path to power, at the least. 'He's my father,' he says, as though that should be enough.”

“Behind the abandoned house, two faerie horses chew on dandelions as they wait for their riders. Slight as deer, with a soft halo of light surrounding their bodies, they glide between the trees like ghosts. Oak goes to the first. Her coat a soft grey, her mane braided into something that looks like netting, and which is hung with gold beads. Tooled leather saddlebags rest against her flanks. She nuzzles into his hand.”

“At seventeen, he has grown tall, towering over me, lithe and finely muscled. His hair catches the moonlight, warm gold threaded with platinum, bangs parting around small goat horns, eyes of shocking amber, and a constellation of freckles across his nose. He has a trickster's mouth and the swagger of someone used to people doing what he wanted.”

“A young man with goat feet and horns, wearing a shirt of golden scale mail and holding a thing-bladed rapier, steps in the pool of light near a building. His face is expressionless, like someone in a dream. I note the curls of his tawny blond hair tucked behind his pointed ears, the garnet-coloured cloak tossed over wide shoulders, the scar along one side of his throat, a circlet at his brow. He moves as though he expects the world to bend to his will. ... His amber eyes are bright, like those of a fox, but there is nothing warm in them.”

“Do you want to play a game?' He shuffled closer, eyes bright. Reaching into his pocket, he produced some little metal figures. Three silver foxes resting in the middle of his callused palm. Inset chips of peridot sparkled in their eyes. ... 'How do we play?' 'You throw them.' He formed a cage of his hands with the foxes inside, shook it up, and then tossed them into the grass. 'If they land standing, you get ten points. If they land on their backs, you get five points. If they land on their side, no points.”

“Why would you want me after all I have done?' Hyacinthe asks, anguished. 'Why does anyone want anyone else?' Tiernan answers. 'We do not love because people deserve it- nor would I want to be loved because I was the most deserving of some list of candidates. I want to be loved for my worst self as well as my best. I want to be forgiven my flaws.' 'I find it harder to forgive your virtues,' Hyacinthe tells him, a smile in his voice.”

“Madoc makes a snorting sound, then turns to me. 'I am sure that Wren here wouldn't mind taking Lady Nore's castle and lands for herself.' I shake my head at the absurdity of the statement. He raises his brows. 'No? Still sitting at the table and waiting for permission to start eating?' That's an uncomfortably accurate way of describing how I've lived my life.”

“The wise old hag told them to gather up snow and form it into the shape of a daughter. 'They did this. The girl they made was delicate in form, with eyes of snow, and lips of frozen rose petals, and the sharply pointed ears of their people. When they finished sculpting her, they smiled at each other, captivated by her beauty.' ... 'When my breath blew across the girl, the spark of life lit within her, and they could see her eyelashes twitch, her tresses shiver. The child began to move. Her little limbs were slender and nearly as pale a blue as the reflection of the sky on the snow she'd been made from. Her hair, a deeper blue, like the flowers that grew nearby. Her eyes, that of the lichen that clung to rocks. Her lips, the red of that fresh-spilled blood.”