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“I’ll suffocate if I have to spend more than an hour or two in this waistline,” Alanna huffed, hands pressed against her ribcage as she collapsed onto Daine’s couch.
“I can offer a solution for that, darlin’,” George remarked with a wink. He leaned over, handing her a glass of wine. “Though if any of us have to stay longer than an hour I say we revolt.”
“Hear, hear.” Alanna took the glass and raised it. She looked over toward the mirror and their hostess standing before it. “Speaking of revolution, Daine, how’s the hair coming?”
Daine was working to place a final pin into her updo—but each time she pushed it in, and it wasn’t right, and she pulled it out to re-do it, a few extra wisps jumped free. She couldn’t fix the mess without starting the whole process over, and gods be damned if she was going to have to do this twice. She thrust the pin in firmly, turning to face her friend.
“I don’t see you offering any help!”
Alanna smirked. “Believe me, you don’t want my help.”
“There’s no sense in it that you old hats can get away with your looks as is, and somehow I’m required to pin up to show as ‘presentable’ to the guests. How many years do I need to serve the crown before the rules on me are relaxed?”
Alanna rolled her eyes. The door creaked open in her periphery. “Go through an Ordeal or two, youngling, and we’ll talk. Speaking of!”
She stood to embrace Gareth the Younger as he entered the room. Behind him trailed a knight Daine knew was called Sacherell, and another whose name she could only guess at. Bringing up the rear of their small party was a noblewoman from Legann holding a tall can emblazoned with a design in the shape of a wave.
Gary smiled wide as he turned to the wildmage. “Did I hear you complaining you’ve followed too many rules in this life of yours?”
The company chuckled; Daine blushed. She ignored the comment and turned back to the mirror to ascertain the damage that last pin had done. And then surrendered: it was what it would be. At least it looked like she was trying the part. She smoothed the satin bunching around her waist one last time.
The door on the far side of the chamber slid open as the last to don his attire arrived from the adjoining room. A level of chatter continued to buzz around Daine, but more distant now as she took in the long shadow of the man stepping from their bedroom into the commons.
Numair’s eyes searched the party seated on the couches as he shut the door quietly behind him. At last he found her at the mirror and crossed to her in few strides.
“You look lovely, magelet,” he said softly. A hand rested at her hip, another at her chin. Her arms wrapped around his neck, the two mages falling into place like musicians at familiar instruments.
“You look special,” she replied, eyes twinkling. She meant it, but he caught the quirk in her tone.
They had a complicated relationship with these state affairs. It was no secret why Daine and Numair alone were invited alongside the nobles: each seat at the royal table that night would be reserved for one of the crown’s jewels, be they noble, knight, or mage. The guests were meant to be visible only as place settings—unless they were needed as knives. Together their presence would convey an unspoken message on the breadth of Tortallan power, its mastery of everything from swordsmanship to politics to magecraft.
Daine understood the game that needed to be played, but still playing it lodged a knot in her throat. Try her hardest, she couldn’t extricate the mages’ place at these balls from the implication, tangled as it was with the truth of their power, that they were accepted only as pawns useful in the greater scheme. Servants of the crown.
But then, she would scold herself, they were servants of the crown, weren’t they? To that they’d agreed, and happily so. Those throat-knots were roadbumps, then, to weather as they would.
Daine would do her best to assimilate. But when a comment laid the ruse bare, when she and Numair were introduced as curios rather than people, she couldn’t help but react the way a tiger would in a cage. She would not fall quietly fall into the role of docile servant, and any wisecrack about her animal friends from a well-intentioned guest was liable to set off her fire. Besides, the honored guests expected that role from her, too: A showing of “Daine the untamed” would always engender a chuckle. Even as she strained against it she felt herself playing into their hands, the leash tightening round her neck.
Numair, with his decades of experience playing the part of dutiful palace mage, slipped much more easily into the pretense. Daine often reminded him of the vast difference between the Numair of home and the road—her Numair—and the genteel Numair of palace life. The latter was court Numair, amber drop dangling from an ear, shirts brocaded with gold. A humble servant of their majesties. Palace Numair was also hers, he would tell her, and she knew that was true—but it wasn’t truly him either.
Alanna and Gary, of course, had no issues to this end. Alanna didn’t mind the state dinners other than for their dullness, and the fact that for propriety’s sake, the bulk of the wine was best consumed afterward. But Daine felt the principle of the dinners knot at her core. She worried when Numair lost himself in the role, when he started to believe in the moniker of “palace mage” as main signifier of his worth.
“Nice of you to join the party,” George called to him, breaking into her thoughts.
Numair met his eye across the room and lifted his voice. “Figured you all needed someone here to start the excitement.”
George answered with rude gesture, and the night went on. When just a few minutes remained before the King and Queen would make their entrance downstairs, Gary slipped away so he might arrive early as per custom. Alanna, Numair, and Daine were also supposed to arrive at the herald’s side early, but the other knights and guests continued in deep conversation as Daine pulled Numair aside.
“Do you want to take a shot before this?” she asked quietly.
“Gods, yes.” He cast a grateful smile in her direction and turned to find the liquor. She fished empty glasses from a cabinet and held them out. He poured. The liquor was dark— he’d chosen the spiced drink favored in Tyra. Daine glanced across the room to see Alanna had picked up the Tortallan bitters for the remaining crew. She turned back to face Numair and found him proposing a toast.
“To this being the only mistake we make tonight.” Numair offered.
She scrunched up her face at that one. “I don’t make many mistakes.”
His eyes glimmered as he absorbed her meaning. “In that case, what would you have us toast to, my dear?"
She thought a moment. “To us. As we are.”
He nodded curtly, meeting her gaze. “To us.”
They tossed back. A whoop broke out from the cluster of older knights as another toast was made across the room. Alanna strode over and wrapped an arm around Daine’s shoulder.
“Ready for this one, kids? I bet the herald’s getting antsy.”
Numair jutted his chin at her. “Eighty-some years of this, you’d think you’d’ve learned not to be late.”
“Ten years, you hag,” she retorted. “And I’ll round up the geese if you round up the garden.” She returned to her husband’s side. The group around them drifted toward the door.
A thump of music began below. At this distance, the sound was more a a vibration than a noise.
“Remember next month that you owe us a bottle,” Numair called to Alanna.
“Sure, sure.” She waved a hand behind her as she walked through the door.
Numair looked down at his partner with a thoughtful gaze, then reached to pull the pin from her hair. A curl tumbled free. She smiled.
“Shall we?” he asked, and extended a hand.