Wren doesn’t so much as smile. “Still, call it off.”
“Call it off yourself,” he snaps, feeling childish. “As I remember from the ship, we had a plan. If you wish to change it now, go right ahead.”
She shakes her head. Her hands are clenched into fists at her sides. “No, it must be you. Come on, it’s not as though a marriage is what you want, not really, right? No matter how you say you feel. It was a clever thing to do—a clever thing to say. You’ve always been clever. Be clever now.”
“And break things off with you? Cleverly?” He sounds brittle, resentful.
She actually looks hurt by his tone. Somehow that makes him angrier than anything else. “I should never have come here,” she tells him.
“You can go,” he reminds her.
“You don’t understand.” She wears a pained expression. “And I can’t explain.”
“Then it seems we are at an impasse.” He folds his arms.
She glances down at her hands, which are gripping each other tightly, fingers threaded together. When she looks back up into his eyes, she seems sorrowful.
“I shall see you at the feast,” he says, attempting to regain his dignity.
Then he turns and stomps off toward the woods, before he can say more things he will regret. Before she takes the chance to hurt him worse. He feels petty, petulant, and ridiculous.
Rubbing the heel of his hand over one eye, he doesn’t look back.
Striding toward Mandrake Market with a picnic basket in his hand, Oak feels a perfect fool.
Several people bow low when he passes, as though sharing the same path is a singular honor. He wonders if he would feel less awkward if he had grown up entirely on the isles and wasn’t used to being treated as nothing special in the mortal world.
He gloried in it when he was younger. Loved how all the children here wanted to play with him, how everyone had smiles for him.
And yet you knew it was false. That was part of what drew you to Wren—she had your measure from the ftrst.
But though she had his measure, he wasn’t sure he had hers. Mother Marrow was summoned north by Bogdana. Mother Marrow gave Wren the gift of that cottage where she and her people spent the night.
Mother Marrow knew something of their plans.
Mandrake Market, on the tip of Insmoor, used to be open only on misty mornings, but it’s grown into a more permanent fixture. There, one can find everything from leather masquerade masks to charms for the bottoms of shoes, swirling tinctures of everapple, potion-makers, and even poisons.
Oak passes maple sugar in the shape of strange animals, a lace-maker weaving skulls and bones into her patterns. A shopkeeper sets out trays of acorn cups full to their tiny brims with blood-dark wine. Another offers to tell fortunes from the pattern of spit on a page of fresh parchment. A goblin grills fresh oysters over an outdoor fire. The midday sun stains everything gold.
Like the growth of the market, stalls and tents have given way to more permanent structures. Mother Marrow’s house is a sturdy stone cottage with none of the fancifulness of walls shingled in candy. Out front, an herb garden grows wild, vines tied so they weave over the top of a diamond-paned window.
Steeling himself, he raps on the wooden planks of her door.
There is a shuffiing from the other side, and then it opens, squeaking on dry hinges. Mother Marrow appears in the doorway, standing on clawed feet, like those of a bird of prey. Her hair is gray as stone, and she wears a long necklace of rocks carved with archaic symbols on them, ones that puzzle the eye if you look too long.
“Prince,” she says, blinking up at him. “You look far too fine for a visit to poor Mother Marrow.”
“Could any grandeur be great enough to properly honor you?” he asks with a grin.
She huffs, but he can tell she’s a little pleased. “Come in, then. And tell me of your adventure.”
Oak moves past her into her cottage. There is a low fire in the grate and several stumps before it, along with a wooden chair. Another threadbare chair sits off to one side with knitting equipment piled in a basket at its feet. The yarn seems freshly spun, yet not carded well enough to remove all the bits of thistle. On the wall, a large, painted curio cabinet contains an array of things that don’t reward observing too closely. Tiny skeletons covered in a thin layer of dust. Viscous fluids half-dried in ancient bottles. Beetle wings, shining like gems. A bowl of nuts, a few shaking and one hazelnut rolling back and forth. Beyond the cabinet, the prince can see a passageway into a back room, perhaps a bedroom.
She urges him to sit in the wooden chair by the fire, the back carved in the shape of an owl.