The Fae Prince and I by Joss Fitch

Author:Joss Fitch [Fitch, Joss]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: anonymous
Published: 2023-12-25T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter seventeen

Romilly

Chapter I’d never witnessed anything so mesmerizing.

The fae dancer swayed upon the ground, moving his body in a fluid rhythm that seemed to intoxicate the mind. With the candle in his hand, he set fire to his chest. Moments later, his entire body was alit, and he continued his dance as he was joined by four other fae dancers similarly engulfed in bright orange flames.

The assembled audience responded with a collective gasp of admiration, and my ladies-in-waiting clapped behind me as we sat upon a risen pier to view the show. The Lighting of the Five Fires was something I’d only read briefly about in books about the fae. It was an annual ceremony the fae observed to celebrate the harvest and set the stage for the colder seasons ahead. To my knowledge, it was the first time humans had ever been allowed to attend. Many of the people I’d met at the reception were dotted between the fae in the crowds, dressed in their finest for their first real foray into fae territory.

I sensed the unease among them as the ceremonial drums quickened their tempo. There was a savageness to this entire affair that wouldn’t be permitted in the halls or balls in Azurelund. Not even the rowdiest rural community hall would be so brazen as to create such a spectacle. But the fae had opened their doors and their lives to us through this treaty. We had to adjust.

Adjusting was easier said than done.

My gaze drifted toward a tree on the other side of the field under which several figures lingered. Like a magnet, I could feel the pull of Prince Averett’s presence. I sensed his presence during the night, just beyond the threshold of that door. After our swimming lessons the day prior, he’d led me back to the palace on horseback. We’d hardly said a word. And when we parted in the courtyard, he’d barely acknowledged me, forcing me to recognize once again that Prince Averett had warned that we’d remain strangers at the end of this week.

And yet, I still felt his pull.

“Fae rituals are infinitely more diverting than human ones, wouldn’t you say Princess Romilly?” Lady Tessa sat to my left in a gown of crimson and gold. There, at the base of her throat, was the same emerald pendant that Miss Phoebe claimed was the source of her beauty. She smirked at the humans below us, as if she were the queen herself.

“They are certainly wonderful,” I replied coldly.

It wasn’t a lie. Where many of my fellow humans felt uncomfortable, I was left simply feeling fascinated. What a beautiful thing to be able to free yourself from social constraints and celebrate the music deep within your bones. Just two dances with Prince Averett at the ball and I’d been ready to dance the entire way home. As the fiery dancers reached the culmination of their routine, they lit the five massive pyres that awaited them at the top of the hill. One by one, the dancers extinguished their own flames, and returned to their original forms.

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