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He was staring again, he could tell. He just couldn't help it. Reality was absolutely enamored with his trinket. To say that he was surprised wouldn't be accurate, of course he had good taste, he was Reality. What he hadn't expected was the rush of pride he felt while watching his trinket work a social gathering. The human prince easily navigated the complex fae social conventions and didn't even need help avoiding any verbal trickery he was tested with. Everyone who spoke with him was impressed with his skill, and Reality absorbed every drop of praise as if it had been meant for him. It had him walking on air all evening and alleviated the usual soul-sucking boredom of entertaining his father's guests.
It wasn't a large party. Merely a precursor to his trinket's debut ball next week, a warmup to avoid any major errors on the big day when so many more eyes would be watching. Not that it was needed, that dazzling smile that had so charmed Reality was even more effective on empty-headed partygoers. Reality would be surprised if his trinket needed his help at all, though he wasn't foolish enough to abandon a human he actually liked to the whims of Summer Court fae[1]. He'd remain close at hand and watch the show.
"Can I help you, my lord?" his trinket asked innocently. Right, he'd been staring.
"Only admiring my prize, trinket. You are quite the charmer. Not every human would be so comfortable amongst all of these fae."
"Oh, it's nothing." The young prince blushed and buried his face in his wine glass. "I'm used to doing this same sort of thing at home. If anything, it's easier, fey social customs are strictly regimented and each social cue has a specific expected response. It turns a conversation into a dance, a puzzle that I take pleasure in unravelling." Reality loved it when he did that. He could listen to his trinket talk for hours about culture and philosophy, but it was difficult to draw him out and get him to speak, he was so afraid of being boring. To Reality, his trinket could never be boring.
"You have noticed them testing you, I am sure. Lord Ó Conaire attempted twice to take your name."
"I did think it rather bold of him to try that in front of you."
It had been, and Reality had certainly made a note of the disrespect, subtle though it had been. "Mm. I would have stepped in if you had needed me, but you handled it well enough on your own."
There was that smile again. "Thank you, my lord. I made sure to study up. At home, I was always being tested, and mostly by those who disliked me already and would contrive any means for me to fail. Here, where those I meet haven't yet formed an opinion of me, I have an advantage I shouldn't squander. A good first impression sets me up in a better tactical position for the future."
"You, trinket, think like a fae."
"I think like a prince, my lord." What a response! Oh, how Reality adored his trinket. He was just flawless in every way. Nowhere could he have found a better prize than the one he held in his hands now.
Unfortunately, one person always knew when to show up to ruin Reality's good mood. "Divines preserve us, it's Delphinia. Prepare yourself, trinket."
"Your cousin, the one that you hate?"
"Yes, that one, now hush! Ah, Lady Delphinia, What a pleasure." Reality's bright courtesan's grin had a manic edge to it.
Delphinia's answering smile was tamer but no less fake. "Prince Reality. Good to see you out of season[2]. So this is your fiancé? He's taller than I expected."
"Yes. This is my favorite trinket." Reality rested a hand on his trinket's shoulder and was pleased when the human prince relaxed under the touch. "Trinket, meet Lady Delphinia Fiothrey, Duchess of the Eastern Vale."
"Pleasure to meet you, Duchess. I am known as Prince Thanatos of House Iuventus. Your presence is welcome, and the willingness to help me integrate that your people have shown me warms my heart." Still on guard against the loss of his name. How adorable.
Delphinia curtsied. "Prince Thanatos. Welcome to the Court of Estival Splendor. Though your time here may be short, I hope you will find it meaningful." Swinging right out of the gate, I see, Reality thought. Opening with a jab at the human's short lifespan was certainly a choice. "Allow me to introduce the Viscount Odhràn Duibh, he's been visiting my court and relished the opportunity to visit the royal estate."
"And what an estate it is! I consider myself blessed to have been invited to see it," the viscount blustered, and Reality immediately stopped paying attention. The dance of politeness between people who didn't know and didn't like each other was so tedious it bored him to tears. He sparked a bit of magic between his fingers to keep himself entertained.
This continued for what felt like hours but was probably only a few minutes. One sentence in particular, spoken by Duibh, brought him back to the conversation."It's too bad you're otherwise engaged. I'd love to add a pretty thing like you to my court."
Reality seethed. The pride he'd been feeling before curdled inside of him and turned to jealousy. The human prince was his trinket, how dare this man even think of taking him away, let alone speak that thought even in jest? His magic shifted inside of him, wondering if it was needed, but he shoved it down. His trinket had this under control, and his mother would make it a whole thing if he lost his temper at a social event again.
"How are you with languages, boy? Your Fae is excellent, are you pursuing other studies?" That sounded conversational, but the tacit "for a human" was clear. As well spoken as the young prince was, his consonants were clumsy and he regularly stressed the wrong syllables. Anyone could hear it. The "polite" lie was just an insult to his intelligence.
"Oh, please, I'm not fluent yet. My best languages are the Northland and Southland human languages[3], though, as you can tell, I'm conversational in Faerà, and I've been studying the Dragontongue. My aim is to be able to write poetry in all four. I've quite a long way to go."
"What a well-educated young prince!" Delphinia said snidely. "Divines know his Highness couldn't hope to write poetry in four languages."
"He ought to use you as a scribe. With a head for words and politics like yours, you'd do well with a scroll and ink by the throne." The Viscount's expression evoked a merchant haggling, a vulture circling. Reality knew that look and he did not appreciate it.
Delphinia tittered vapidly. "Yes, when he gets tired of you, you're always welcome at my estate. You'd look a dream in purple and white."
The jealousy caught and flared into rage. How dare they imply he didn't take care of his toys? How dare they imply a lack of education and intelligence on his part[4] while simultaneously saying his trinket was fit for no more than to be a servant? To talk of putting him in livery of all things, when he should wear nothing less than the finest of silks? And, chief among these, how dare they talk about taking his trinket away from him? The human prince belonged to Reality and no other, and he'd be damned before he let anyone else lay a finger on him.
Reality's magic churned inside of him, and his hand tightened on his trinket's shoulder. They just wouldn't stop pushing. The young prince's eloquent deflections were losing steam under the onslaught. "Again, I-I'm sure my lord has duties for me to perform here, I couldn't possibly get away…" Duibh reached for the prince's hand and he stepped back in search of safety, bumping into Reality's chest. He looked up into Reality's eyes, the careful mask of politeness falling away into a look like a startled deer. "M-my lord?" Help me, those eyes pleaded, and Reality saw red.
"Enough." The word hung heavy in the air, or maybe that was the magic that filled the space around them. A rumble of thunder sounded outside, and heads began to turn in their direction. Those who lived in the palace were well aware what that sound meant for Reality's mood, but Delphinia and the viscount didn't have the same kind of experience to tell them what would come next. "Leave him."
"We were only teasing him, Reality, nothing was meant by it," Delphinia began, sensing she may have made a mistake of some kind, but no halfhearted apology would save her from Reality now.
"My trinket is not yours to tease. He is mine, and I will decide his activities and where he goes. You are distressing him."
Duibh wasn't as cognizant. "If he's distressed by a light verbal sally, becoming a prince of the Fae might be a bit much for him. He's only human, after all."
Reality's eyes flashed and a single pulse of magic rippled outward from him, ruffling his trinket's and Delphinia's hair. The viscount wasn't as lucky. Where he'd once stood, the wave of power peeled the layers away until all that remained was a plain moth fluttering confusedly toward the chandeliers on the ceiling. Reality wove copper and glass from the aether into a lantern and imprisoned the wayward insect within.
"Hear me." Reality spoke, and all eyes turned toward him as his voice resonated through the room. "This human belongs to me. You will treat him as a prince of the realm, with all of the deference and respect that entails. Let this man be your example." He held the lantern aloft so that it could be seen by all. "This is the consequence for allowing one's tongue to run free. I expect you all to exercise proper judgement in this matter."
"Y-You… turned him into..." His trinket was shaking, and Reality felt a little bad about it, but that feeling wasn't as prominent as the way his magic rattled the bars of its cage, begging him to use more of it. That wouldn't do.
"Yes. Hold this, would you, trinket?" He handed the prince the lantern. "And come with me, I need to burn off the rest of this energy." His chest itched with the seething magic inside of him, that miniscule display of power hadn't been nearly enough. He stalked off toward his training ground behind the palace, Where he could use his abilities mostly freely.
His trinket, after a moment's startled hesitation, followed him wordlessly, and he felt a pang of victorious satisfaction.
Reality's training ground was more accurately described as a containment zone. At the bottom of an abandoned quarry lay an assortment of wooden training dummies, as singed and scorched as the surrounding stone. Reality spent much time here during his adolescence, and though his control over his power was much better now than it had been, he still used the site often.
His trinket looked around in fascination. "Is this where you go to be alone?"
"Mm. I need not fear harming others inadvertently so far from the court. I come when the divinity is restless, so that I may use up more power than I could otherwise. If you require solitude, it is free for your use as well, though you may encounter me, which I imagine defeats the purpose." He also came out here when the magic tangled up in his stomach and made him sick, or after a particularly frightening incarnation scare[5], if he wasn't too exhausted to leave his bed. He couldn't let anyone know he struggled. It would only alarm them, he could handle it on his own. He always had.
Now, though, that feeling in his stomach wasn't nausea, only bubbling rage. "Set that down over there and step back, will you?" he instructed his trinket, indicating a wooden block about sixty paces away that he often used for target practice. He stripped off his doublet and replaced it with one of the lighter training shirts he kept in a nearby chest. He didn't miss the way the human prince stared.
"W-What are you going to do to him?"
"I'm going to frighten him so badly he'll have nightmares about me for two-and-a half centuries.[6]" He couldn't help the grin that spread over his face. By the Divines, he was going to enjoy this. He so rarely was permitted to act on an emotion he truly felt.
His trinket had other plans. "Haven't you scared him enough? You turned him into a moth, I don't think he'll be mouthing off to you again anytime soon." the prince hugged the lantern to his chest almost protectively.
Reality sighed and rolled his eyes. "It's not as if I could leave him that way. Mother would throw a fit. And I have to do something about the level of comfort some have with disrespecting me to my face."
"I can handle a few unkind words, you don't have to—"
"This is not about you!" Reality snapped. His magic fizzed, and he suppressed a shudder of discomfort. "You belong to me. Your actions and others' opinions of you reflect on me. And I am not some common faery bound by the laws of courtesy to accept any insult sufficiently veiled. I am the Prince of Verdure, and I have not only the power but the responsibility to maintain the honor of my house by whatever means I find necessary." He snatched the lantern from his trinket's hands and set it on the block himself. "Now, stay out of the way. You are prettier undamaged."
His trinket was still talking, but Reality ignored him, focused on lining up his shots and deploying his energy barriers to prevent the insect from being destroyed by the shockwaves. A little concussive force should be enough to remind Duibh who he was dealing with. He conjured a bead of compressed flame, one of his favorite spells, and launched it. The explosion was spectacular, detonating a meter to the right of its target, and Reality allowed himself a laugh and the rage to fizzle out into elation. The lantern shuddered, but Reality knew what he was doing. He wouldn't break it.
A second shot, then a third. Reality shook his shoulders to loosen them, getting into a rhythm. It was just as he'd loosed the fifth spell that he heard his trinket shout "No! I won't let you kill him!" and saw him lunge for the lantern. It was too late to call the magic back. Reality acted on instinct, grabbing at his trinket's arm and yanking him backwards away from the explosion, which hit exactly where it was meant to. The lantern, and the fae-moth within, remained intact.
There was a moment of silence, both of them just standing in shock, but once he was sure his trinket was alive, Reality had space to be angry. "Divines preserve us, what possessed you to do a thing like that? I could have killed you! Your faith in my control is flattering but unfounded—" He stopped. It took him a moment to identify the sound that had given him pause as stifled sobs. Why was his trinket crying? "T-Trinket? Are you unwell? I did not mean to… frighten you…"
The red mark that sprang up on his trinket's pale skin was distinctly hand-shaped, and no one would be able to mistake those long fingers as belonging to anyone but Reality. His heart dropped. He had forgotten his strength, forgotten how fragile humans were. He'd always had a habit of breaking his toys. He'd promised his father he'd be careful with this one, but the hurt and betrayal in those crimson eyes, welling with tears, told him everything he needed to know about his failure. The human prince tucked the injured arm against his body and stumbled wordlessly off toward the palace. Reality didn't follow. He turned back toward the lantern and let off another salvo of spells.
[1] The fae of each of the seasonal courts have a tendency toward a particular temperament. Summer Court fae like the Fiothreys are the capricious tricksters of human folklore, as likely to bless as to curse and more concerned with what will entertain them than the wellbeing of others or the structural integrity of their surroundings. They won't go out of their way at all, whether to help or to hurt. A human's best defense is to be politely boring, so that they are bound by courtesy and it would be easier to find something else to do than to find a loophole in the social contract to exploit[back].
[2] When out of season, it's rare for one of the seasonal courts to hold a social event. They tend to spend the off season "living their lives," as it were, taking care of intracourt business and spending time with their families. They will attend the in-season events, of course, but otherwise rarely travel or make contact with humans.[back]
[3] The languages spoken in the Reach and the Southlands were once related, but drifted apart after centuries of separation. For a native speaker of one, the other would be much easier to acquire than either Faerá or the Dragontongue, if only because human mouths are meant to produce these sounds.[back]
[4] Reality, in his words, "did not read." This wasn't to imply that he couldn't, he was Reality Fiothrey and he could do anything, he merely found it difficult and claimed the symbols shifted when he attempted to focus on them, and therefore he chose not to do so. His arcane studies tutor had suggested his affinity for runic sigils was so high that it disrupted similar processes, which made him sound more impressive. Thus, it was the explanation he accepted.[back]
[5] When the divinity made its (disturbingly frequent) attempts to escape from his body, Reality was usually under the care of the court wizards and diviners. If his body were ready, the Divine Reality would incarnate through him smoothly and there would be nothing to worry about, but it was not, and so preventing that incarnation was paramount. As he grew older, the power grew stronger, and often they feared he would not be able to hold it back, but Reality Fiothrey was nothing if not a man of iron will. Even if he battled the transformation for hours, he would always emerge victorious. It took a toll on him, though, and he was sometimes bedridden for days afterward. The Chief Diviner's utmost worry was that an incarnation event would occur when Reality was yet too exhausted from the last to put up a fight.[back]
[6] Reality did not often use contractions or colloquialisms, a habit ascribed to the Divine Reality's influence. In times of strong emotion, however, a new speech pattern could emerge. Reality reported feeling the most like himself in these moments.[back]