My stranded words formed a lump in my throat. A fair one never lied. I tore my gaze away from him, away from that look in his eyes I couldn’t put to name—or canvas.
“No, I wouldn’t. Given your assurances, ravens would be—acceptable.” Mortified by how stiff I sounded, I clenched my fists until my fingernails dug into my palms. “We can discuss the remaining terms tomorrow.”
He brightened at the mention of “tomorrow” and bowed his head in assent. “I look forward to it,” he replied eagerly, and just like that, all was forgiven. Stifling a smile, I picked up a palette knife by accident before I found my brush.
After he left, I couldn’t shake the notion that he’d insisted on ravens for a reason. I was almost finished cleaning up by the time the explanation occurred to me. My cheeks warmed, and a wistful pang plucked a sweet, sad chord in my stomach. It was simple, really. He didn’t want me to forget him once he’d gone.
The remaining weeks blurred together. The season didn’t turn. Yet there in my parlor, while the fields outside simmered beneath a summer sun, a vital change swept through me. When Rook wasn’t there, I thought about him. During our sessions, my heart pounded as though I’d just run a mile. I tossed and turned half the night, tortured by the cipher of his unpaintable eyes, driven restless and half-wild by the moonlight spilling through my window, which I swore was brighter than any moon preceding it. This must be what the awakening of spring was like, I thought. I was alive in a way I never had been before, in a world that no longer felt stale but instead crackled with breathless promise.
Oh, I knew that how I felt toward Rook was dangerous. Incredibly, the danger made it better. Perhaps all those lonely years of keeping a polite smile frozen on my face had driven me a bit off-balance, and the madness just didn’t kick in until I’d had a taste of something new. Walking on a blade’s edge every time we exchanged a curtsy and a bow, knowing one misstep could topple me into mortal peril, made the blood sing in my veins. I exulted in my own cleverness. Of all the Crafters in Whimsy, I knew fair folk best. As the days trickled through my fingers like water, slipping past no matter how fiercely I held on to them, hurtling me toward the inevitable end of a moment I wanted to last forever, my assurance that I could handle Rook strengthened to iron.
And I might have continued believing that if I hadn’t figured out what was wrong with his eyes during our very last session.
“Gadfly told me the first time you painted him, your feet didn’t reach the floor,” Rook said, which was how it started. “He spoke as though it was merely . . . Isobel, how old are you? I’ve never thought to ask.”
“Seventeen,” I replied, breaking free from the painting to watch his reaction.
During our first few sessions he’d sat stiff as a board, apparently under the impression he’d interfere with my work if he moved so much as a hair. Now that I’d assured him I was far enough along that his posture didn’t matter, he sprawled sideways on the settee so he could glance out the window constantly, as though it pained him to miss even one cloud or passing bird. But even so he spent most of his time looking back at me. The rapport between us had grown perilously casual.
His reaction wasn’t quite what I anticipated. For a long moment he only stared, his expression close to shock or even loss. “Seventeen?” he repeated. “Surely that’s too young to be a master of the Craft. And you’re already fully grown, aren’t you?”
I nodded. I would have smiled if it hadn’t been for the look on his face. “It is young. Most people my age don’t perform at this level. I started painting as soon as I could hold a brush.”
He shook his head. His gaze drifted to the floor. Preoccupied, he touched his pocket.
“How old are you?” I inquired, perplexed by the air of melancholy that had fallen over him.
“I don’t know. I can’t—” He looked out the window. A muscle moved in his jaw. “Fair folk hardly pay years any mind, they pass so quickly. I don’t believe I can tell you in a way you’d understand.”
What must it be like? To meet someone, to forge a connection, all in the span of one golden afternoon—only to find out that for her, each passing minute was a year. Each second, an hour. She would be dead before the sun rose the next day. A keen, quiet pain twisted my heart.
That was when I saw the secret hidden deep within his eyes. Impossibly, it was sorrow. Not a fair one’s ephemeral mourning, but human sorrow, bleak and endless, a yawning chasm in his soul. No wonder I hadn’t been able to identify the flaw. That emotion didn’t belong to his kind. Couldn’t belong.
Time stopped. Even the dust motes glowing in the air seemed to go still.
I had to be sure of what I’d seen. I crossed the room in a trance and brought my hand to his cheek so lightly I barely touched him. He hadn’t been paying attention, and he made the smallest movement—almost a flinch—before he looked at me. Yes, the sorrow was truly there. Along with it, hurt and confusion, to a degree that I wondered whether he even understood what he felt, or whether it was as alien to him as so many aspects of the fair folk were to us.
“Have I offended you?” he asked. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply . . .”
“No, you haven’t.” Somehow my voice sounded normal. “I’ve just noticed something I need to work on before your portrait’s finished. Could you hold your head like this for a few minutes?”
Aware that I was taking an immense liberty, I raised my other hand, cupped his face, and gently turned it toward my easel at just the right angle for the light to strike his eyes. He allowed me to handle him in silence, his breath warming my wrists, watching me all the while.
This was our last day together. The first and final time I’d ever touch him. The knowing of it pulsed between us like a heartbeat. With our gazes locked, another truth became unmistakable. I felt a connection between us as tangibly as a hand-shake or a grip on my shoulder. I knew he felt it too.
Dizzy, I stepped back and slammed the door on it before it could take form. Dark spots swam around the edges of my vision and cold panic squeezed the air from my lungs. Whatever this was, it had to end. Now.
Walking along a blade’s edge was only fun until the blade stopped being a metaphor.