An hour ago, Irielle had been prepared to endure the twins.
That, in hindsight, had been deeply unfair.
Ruby and Violet were not at all what the rumors suggested.
Or rather, they were exactly what the rumors suggested, but only if the rumors had been written by people too intimidated to admit they were charming.
They had swept her through half the castle with the energy of a festival and the strategy of thieves.
Ruby talked with her whole body, red hair flying behind her like a banner of cheerful disaster, while Violet moved with quieter precision, adding commentary so dry it kept turning Irielle’s composure traitorously unstable.
Together they had shown her the balcony with the best sunset, the hall where Kaelith once tried to swordfight a statue at fourteen because someone said it looked at her disrespectfully, and the servants’ staircase the family used when they wanted to avoid official company and steal pastries instead.
That last one had somehow led to a story about Kaelith sneaking a half-frosted cake into her room at sixteen and then getting caught because she left an entire trail of icing down the corridor.
“She blamed the dog,” Ruby had said with perfect seriousness.
“There was no dog,” Violet had added.
“There could have been.”
Irielle had laughed.
Actually laughed.
And the twins, who had paused for half a heartbeat in shared delight when they heard it, had wisely not made too much of the moment afterward.
They simply kept talking, kept walking, kept being so alive and ridiculous and affectionate with each other that Irielle had found herself answering them more than she intended.
They told her things about Kaelith too.
Some of them were infuriating.
Some were funny.
A few were unsettling in their softness.
“She acts like she doesn’t care about anything,” Violet had said while leading Irielle through a gallery full of old demon rulers who all looked dramatically difficult, “but she absolutely does.
She just prefers to look like she doesn’t.”
Ruby had nodded.
“She hates when people cry in front of her because she never knows what to do, but she always fixes it somehow.”
“That sounds contradictory,” Irielle had said.
“It is,” Violet replied.
“That’s Kaelith.”
Ruby, walking backwards for part of the way because apparently dignity was optional in this family, had added, “She also flirts when she’s uncomfortable, lies when she’s scared, gets vicious when she feels cornered, and thinks she’s very subtle about all of it.”
“She is not subtle,” Violet had said.
“Not even a little.”
And Irielle had listened.
That was perhaps the strangest part of all.
Now it was dinner time, and Irielle sat at a long table with too much gold candlelight and not enough emotional stability, realizing that the laughter from earlier had made this quiet feel sharper.
Ruby and Violet were here, positioned across from her in such a way that they could exchange glances over every conversation like conspirators raised by luxury.
Malvoria sat at one end of the table, all dark elegance and dangerous calm.
Elysia sat beside her, softer and warmer, somehow capable of making even a formal dinner feel less like an obligation and more like something shared.
Kaelith was not there.
Irielle noticed the absence immediately.
Not because she expected anything else, exactly.
Kaelith had made it very clear that this marriage was a catastrophe, and she had looked more than ready to throw herself into irresponsibility on principle.
But still.
This was Irielle’s first night here.
The first dinner in this castle.
The first evening in the wake of a political marriage no one seemed quite willing to call by its proper name.
And Kaelith was not there.
Irielle took a small sip of wine and set the glass down carefully.
“Is she coming?”
Ruby looked up first.
Then she brightened with the gleeful honesty of a woman who had never met discretion and did not intend to start.
“Oh, she never comes for dinner,” Ruby said.
She only comes when it’s an important dinner.”
Violet, at least, had the decency to wince faintly at the phrasing.
“Ruby.”
“What?
It’s true.”
Irielle kept her expression cool and untouched.
Inside, however, something narrow and annoyed tightened under her ribs.
Well, she thought, I am not surprised.
Truly, she was not.
Kaelith had been almost offensively clear about how little she wanted this marriage.
Of course she would vanish the first chance she got.
Of course she would leave Irielle to make polite conversation with her family while she went off to drink or flirt or tumble into some warm bed that did not involve legal complications.
Still.
It was vexing.
Not because Irielle wanted her there.
Certainly not.
It was the principle of it.
The insult of being brought to a new castle, installed into a room, and then abandoned on the first night like a parcel someone no longer wished to sign for.
Annoying woman, she thought.
Malvoria, who missed very little, glanced at Irielle over the rim of her glass.
“She does that when she is upset.”
Irielle looked at her.
“Avoid family dinners?”
“Run first.
Feel later,” Malvoria said.
“It’s an old habit.”
Elysia gave Malvoria a look that was half fond and half reproachful.
“You make her sound more feral than she is.”
“She is more feral than she thinks.”
Ruby nodded instantly.
“That’s true.”
Violet added, “But only selectively.”
Irielle had no proper answer to that, so she looked down at the first course placed before her, a delicate arrangement of roasted vegetables glazed in something fragrant and unfamiliar.
It smelled warm and spiced, richer than elven food, less restrained somehow.
Elysia noticed her hesitation immediately.
“It’s not very spicy,” she said gently.
“Though if you prefer milder food, I can have something else brought.”
The offer was so immediate and unforced that Irielle almost did not know what to do with it.
“No,” she said.
“This is fine.”
Elysia smiled.
“Try it first.
If you hate it, we’ll rescue you.”
Ruby leaned forward.
“And if you love it, then welcome to the demon realm.
We solve at least forty percent of our emotional problems with good food.”
“Forty?” Violet said.
Against her better judgment, Irielle tried it.
The flavor surprised her.
Rich, yes, but balanced.
Warm rather than overwhelming.
Familiar ingredients treated with less caution than elven kitchens usually allowed, and somehow made better for it.
Elysia watched her face.
“Well?”
“It’s good,” Irielle admitted.
Ruby made a tiny victorious sound.
Violet looked smug on behalf of the entire castle.
Malvoria took a measured sip of wine.
“You look astonished.”
“I am not astonished,” Irielle said.
“You are a little astonished,” Violet told her.
Again, Irielle nearly laughed.
This family was exhausting in a wholly different way from her own.
The elf court exhausted through pressure, silence, and expectation.
Here, the exhaustion came from being seen too quickly, spoken to too easily, drawn into warmth before she had decided whether it was safe.
It should have made her recoil.
Instead, as course after course arrived and Elysia coaxed her into tasting dishes she had never seen before, as Ruby kept slipping in scandalous stories about Kaelith’s youth and Violet corrected them with suspicious accuracy, something in Irielle’s tightly held posture began to ease despite herself.
Not much.
A fraction.
Enough that she noticed the change and immediately distrusted it.
At one point Elysia asked whether she liked honeyed figs, and when Irielle admitted she had never tried them, Malvoria herself passed the small silver dish toward her without a trace of ceremony.
At another point Ruby launched into a dramatic retelling of Kaelith once trying to jump from a second-story balcony into the fountain below because she was “bored and overconfident,” and Violet added, “She missed,” so dryly that Irielle laughed aloud before she could stop it.
All four of them looked at her.
Not in shock.
In pleasure.
And that, absurdly, felt more dangerous than judgment ever had.
By the time dessert appeared, the edge inside her had not vanished, but it had changed shape.
She still did not know what to do with Kaelith.
She still did not know what six months here would become.
She still did not know whether kindness from Malvoria and Elysia came from pity, strategy, or something more sincere.
But she had eaten well.
Then Ruby, completely without mercy, said, “If it makes you feel better, Kaelith is probably pretending not to think about you while thinking about you very loudly.”
“Ruby,” Violet said.
“What?
She does that.”
Irielle lowered her spoon.
“I highly doubt Kaelith is thinking about me.”
That answer came too quickly.
Ruby and Violet exchanged the sort of glance that made Irielle instantly regret contributing to the conversation at all.
Malvoria’s mouth curved, slow and unreadable.
Elysia, traitorously warm, only said, “You’ll learn.”
Learn what, Irielle did not ask.
Because she was suddenly, irritatingly, not sure she wanted the answer.