Fox and Faun by Dani Smith

Author:Dani Smith [Smith, Dani]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: QuickDraw Studios
Published: 2019-10-09T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

A week passed quietly. Iona remained shut in her room, locked away to grieve the horrors that had befallen her people. Ashe avoided her, but found himself pining in a strange, unclear way.

Finally, one morning, the sun had just peeked over the eastern horizon when the doors to the Doomhand library swung open for the first time in ages. A small army of servants set to work, throwing faded drapes open to flood the neglected space with morning light, releasing innumerable dust motes to dance between bookshelves. The woody, almost-vanilla scent of old paper and the slight tang of moldering tomes surrounded Drake and Snow as they stood watching the hustle and bustle of dusting, rug scrubbing, and gas jet lighting. Snow barked orders to the servants as the chief paced the wide room, scanning the spines of countless books climbing the high walls. In his massive hands, Drake clutched a long slender box carved from ebony wood and inlaid with gleaming silver.

“What’s that?” Snow asked, strolling up behind his master. Drake shrugged, almost shyly, a strange gesture for such a man.

“A trinket,” he muttered.

“Let me see.”

Grunting, Drake handed Snow the box, who opened it, his pale face pensive as he gazed down. Slowly, he closed it.

“She already wears your collar, Drake,” he said. “Don’t you think this is a bit gaudy?”

“I’ll keep my intentions to myself, then!” snapped Drake, snatching the box back.

“As you wish.”

“Where is she?” Drake shouted, and the servants cowered away from him with their feather dusters and perfumed lamp oil.

“She is being prepared for your presence,” Snow advised. “Patience, remember?”

Drake grunted a sour reply. The servants, still rattled, went back to their work.

“Tell me,” Snow began, strolling after his boss as the big satyr strolled around the library, “this library was your mother’s?”

“Indeed,” Drake muttered. “She adored this place. My father, of course, found such activities to be superfluous.”

“Your father was a warrior?”

“Yes,” Drake growled. “Built this compound and ruled the city beyond with an iron fist. I endeavor—” He held one huge hand up and squeezed it aggressively into a fist. “—to do the same.”

“I think you have succeeded,” Snow said, pausing in stride to admire himself in a gilt-framed mirror. “Fine wives, all of Shale City under your thumb. Your father would be proud.”

“He would have been surprised,” Drake grumbled, fingering the long wooden box again. “My elder brother—long ago killed in battle—was his ideal son.”

“And you?”

“More like my mother. She was his least favorite wife.”

Drake reached up and pulled a book from the nearest shelf, scanning the dusty cover.

“So, you have read some of these?” Snow asked, fascinated.

“Most of them,” Drake murmured, lost in some distant reverie.

Snow cleared his throat loudly, and Drake looked up. “Your wife arrives,” Snow announced. Iona was standing in the open doorway of the library, gazing evenly at the two men.

She wore a high-waisted white dress with a beaded purple sash, and a handmaid had woven her incredibly long hair into two thick braided plaits that hung down her back and brushed the floor behind her.

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