The Theft of Sunlight by Intisar Khanani (story reading .TXT) 📕

take this on, the discretion you must practice will protect you as much as any of the people you come into contact with. The snatchers will not abide someone learning about them.”

She’s still asking my forgiveness, still trying to explain. Looking at her, I remember Seri’s laughter, and her family’s sorrow. I remember every child who has been lost from our village over the years, and I understand completely. The snatchers are ruthless. And I will do everything in my power to stop them.

“I understand,” I say quietly. “How do I meet your contact?”

Alyrra grins at me, looking both young and so much older at the same time. “A ride and a walk. I’ll arrange it for you.”

“I look forward to it,” I say. Especially the ride, though I don’t admit that aloud.

As if to prove to all concerned that I am, in truth, her attendant, Alyrra invites me to attend her at lunch. She has arranged for me to meet her contact in the afternoon; attending her in the meantime allows her to begin my introduction to the court. It’s a gentle start for which I’m grateful, considering her family will arrive later today and her attendants then will no doubt be under careful scrutiny.

“She’s getting you out of the way so you won’t be limping around her family,” Jasmine tells me in a rare moment of communication. “Don’t think too much of it, kelari.”

I don’t think the princess gives a rat’s claw about my limp, but Jasmine certainly can’t see past it. “I’m not really sure why you’re so concerned about me,” I tell her with a smile that masks my fury, “but I do appreciate it. Veria.”

Jasmine slides her eyes to the side in a look of utter contempt—as close as she gets, I suspect, to rolling her eyes—and turns her back on me.

Thankfully, it is Mina whom Alyrra brings with us to lunch. We enter a gathering room, lined with sofas and filled with nobles and honored guests, most of them milling about the room in small groups. Across from us, the great double doors that will open into the dining room remain closed for the time being.

“Veriana,” Kestrin says, moving at once to intercept Alyrra. He flicks a glance at me, his head dipping slightly, and then refocuses on the princess. Mina motions me back, and we step aside to stand by an empty sofa while the two converse together.

“In a gathering like this,” Mina explains, “we leave Alyrra to mingle as she wishes. If she’s ever alone, or she motions for us, we join her. Otherwise, we are here as members of the court, and can meet those we know.”

Unfortunately, neither Filadon nor Melly appear to be in attendance, which puts to rest the possibility of my meeting anyone. Across the room a woman stands quietly, tall and slim, her hair gleaming black with a faint sheen of blue, a matching iridescent pattern curving down over the brown of her neck and disappearing beneath the long, layered dress she wears. Two young men stand behind her, dressed in similar robes, with that same pattern upon their skin. It looks almost like fish scales.

“Don’t stare,” Mina says sharply. “That’s the princess of the water people who live off the shore of Lirelei. She’s come for the wedding. You’ll do well not to insult her.”

I swallow hard and drop my gaze. Water people? I’ve heard of them, but they always seemed more myth than reality. “My apologies,” I murmur.

Mina sighs. “I must greet Veria Dinari. I’ll see if I can convince her to meet you. She is Verin Melkior’s wife.”

I nod, recollecting that Melkior is the lord high marshal of the realm, which means his wife will have a high ranking as well. Mina departs, drifting over to chat with a pair of women who might be about my mother’s age.

“Kelari Amraeya?” someone asks from beside me. The voice is velvety smooth, deep and sweet with a lilting accent. It’s the sort of voice that immediately puts me on edge. I turn to find myself facing a faerie, tall and elegant, with eyes so dark they appear fathomless. I blink. The faerie remains.

It wouldn’t be that strange ordinarily. The so-called Fair Folk live across the Winter Seas, and after seeing the merfolk here, I would expect the family to maintain diplomatic relations with Fae lands as well. It isn’t the presence of a faerie that startles me; it’s the presence of this faerie with his night-dark hair cascading over his shoulders, setting off the almost luminescent paleness of his skin and the obsidian depths of his eyes. His beauty is as dangerous as a blade, and as familiar as an ally once met.

“Verin Stonemane?” I say, my voice soft with disbelief. “I didn’t expect to meet you here!”

“Nor I, you,” he replies, bowing with exquisite grace.

I remember, belatedly, that I should have curtsied first and dip into a jerky return, my cheeks warming. Desperate to distract him, I ask the first thing that comes to mind. “How is Storm treating you?”

His lips twitch with amusement—because of course one does not inquire after horses before all else, at least not at court. “She’s a fine mare. I haven’t regretted my visit to your farm. But what brings you to the king’s city?”

Slavers. Stupidity. Or, to be perfectly honest but less precise: “My cousin lives at court and invited me to visit, and now I have somehow become attendant to the princess.”

“I have no doubt you will serve her well,” Stonemane says steadily. He is one of the few who have uncovered Niya’s magical ability, and so he knows very well what lengths I would go to, to protect my own. In helping him leave our home unnoticed by a crowd of suspicious townspeople, I was ensuring his silence about my sister’s secret as much as I was aiding him. In return, he granted each of my sisters and me a gift. Mine was the bone knife now