Copper Ravens

by Jennifer Allis Provost

  The queen visibly relaxed once we reached a blue floor and sighed with relief once the floor had lightened to green. Before I could ask Micah if this was a newly built castle, or if our queen had a terrible sense of direction, Oriana led us to a courtyard.

  “That was the strangest half-hour of my life,” I muttered. Micah squeezed my hand, and we stepped into the sunshine.

  “Now, tell me,” Oriana said, once we were out in the open air, “where did you find your consort?”

  “The Mundane realm, my lady,” Micah replied. “Sara has since consented to share my home in the Whispering Dell.”

  “How nice,” Oriana muttered. “And why does she not wear her element?” It took me a moment to realize that the last question was directed at me, and I looked down at my dress.

  “I thought others could tell that I am of copper by my hair,” I said. “I didn’t know I was supposed to wear it.”

  “It is not that you have to,” Oriana clarified, “it is a matter of pride. Micah, I’m surprised you didn’t inform your lady.” I looked at Oriana’s clothing, which was a white toga-like garment that draped from a heavy gold collar, leaving her arms and shoulders bare. The cloth was bound about her narrow hips with several lengths of fine gold chain, and gold sandals wrapped around her feet. Oriana must be very, very proud of her element.

  “I…I forgot,” Micah murmured, his silver brows furrowed. I looked closely at Micah’s clothing; his white shirt was edged in silver, and silver buttons graced his coat. “My Sara, please forgive me.”

  “It’s fine,” I said. “After all, I’m only copper.” Not an important metal or anything.

  “Never see yourself as ‘only’ copper,” Oriana said, rounding to face me. She stroked my hair, then her golden fingers travelled to my shoulder and danced down my arm, finally alighting on the small of my back. Even though my clothing separated our skin, I was acutely aware of her fingers as they pressed my mark. Being that Oriana was nuts, I decided to forgive her the personal trespass. “Copper is strong and beautiful, one of the most noble metals in existence.”

  “Is it?” I murmured. “But I’m not precious, not like gold or silver.” Hell, where I come from, they make sewage pipes out of my metal.

  “Does it matter if others see you as precious? Only you can truly assess your worth.” Oriana smiled, her eyes shining like the sun reflecting across a lake in summer. “Always be proud of who you are, my non-precious friend, and show the world your best side. Others cannot judge you by your weaknesses if you only show them your strengths.”

  I opened my mouth, only to shut it with a clack. For the first time, I felt like I had an ally in the Otherworld. I mean, Micah was on my side, but that was different. Other than the pixie, Oriana was the first non-relation who had offered me any guidance in this strange land that was now my home. And having an ally in the Gold Queen must be a good sign.

  “Thank you, my lady,” I said. “I will do my best to follow your advice.”

  Oriana smiled at that, then she applied a bit more pressure to my mark. A sudden jolt, like lightning, shot to my core, while Oriana’s eyelids fluttered and her cheeks flushed.

  “See that you do,” she murmured, caressing my cheek. “Come, let us enjoy our meal.” With that, Oriana wandered off; luckily, Micah took my arm and helped me along.

  “I think I just had sex with the Gold Queen,” I murmured, more than a bit shaken.

  “That was far from an act of love,” Micah said. “Oriana simply favors you. She finds companionship with very few. You should feel honored.”

  “What I feel like is another bath,” I mumbled. And to never let my mark within touching distance of that one, ever again. Before Micah could remind me to behave, we were again inside the dining hall. Oriana must have been hungry, since she had decided to take the direct route on our return. The most notable feature of this hall was the entire lack of a table and chairs; instead, there were several long couches gathered in a semicircle. Oriana lounged across one in true Greek-goddess fashion, and indicated that Micah and I should do the same.

  “Shall we begin with wine?” Oriana asked, then she answered herself. That’s not a sign of the crazy, no, not at all. “No, first a footbath.”

  Without waiting for our response, Oriana clapped and several servants stepped forth, all of them female. They were clad in identical heavy gold belts and diaphanous white skirts, the layers cut to resemble tulip petals. Armed with gold basins and neatly folded linen, they immediately set about removing our shoes and washing our feet. I must admit that, while I initially thought this procedure was more than a bit odd, having a servant girl clean and anoint my feet was an unprecedented luxury.

  Once we were cleansed to the standards of the Golden Court, at least to the ankles, a new team of girls stepped forward. One carried a pitcher, presumably the wine in question, and the rest bore surprisingly plain glass goblets.

  “Now,” Oriana began, once she had sampled the wine, “I am aware that many things changed while I was…captive. Please, Micah, tell me of the all the good things that occurred. I am all too familiar with the rest.”

  13

  Our meal with the Gold Queen stretched long into the afternoon, though I must admit that I ate precious little. Knowing that mice—and rats!—could be included in any and all of the dishes laid before us, I stuck to fruit presented in its original, tree-ripened state. I assumed that any rodent I found inside an apple or peach would be the fault of the rodent, and not Oriana’s kitchens.

  If the queen noticed my lack of appetite, she didn’t comment on it, though she herself seemed far more interested in liquid refreshment; I don’t think she’d recognize the bottom of a goblet if it snuck up and kicked her in the arse. Just when I was making a mental note to schedule an Otherworldly intervention, Oriana began recounting one of many ways Ferra had tortured her—after stripping all the gold from Oriana’s body, Ferra had kept her chained to the iron throne with golden shackles. It had been hideously painful, yet Oriana had refused to complain, terrified that Ferra would remove her only contact with her metal. That nightmare became a reality when Ferra grew bored with her docile prisoner, and threw Oriana into the oubliette.

  Yeah. Oriana gets to drink all she wants.

  Once Micah had told the drunken queen everything that had occurred with regard to the Metal Elements, and had shared what bits he knew about the other four Elements, three frickin’ times, Oriana suddenly stood. She declared herself to be both exhausted and filthy, and let her tulip-skirted attendants lead her away, I assumed to bathe and sober up a bit. Or maybe she only wandered off to find more wine, who knew? Having gotten the impression that we’d been dismissed, Micah and I let ourselves out.

  “All the floors are gold here,” I murmured. I looked up and down the corridors; everything was gold, with no trace of the multicolored tiles we’d trekked over earlier. “Why is part of the Golden Court not gold?”

  Micah pursed his lips, his signal that I was asking about something that nice people didn’t talk about in public. “This site is very old,” he said, at length. “There was magic here long before Oriana.”

  “Before Elementals?”

  Micah squeezed my hand. “Yes.”

  Huh. I’d thought that Elementals had always existed. Before I could ask who was here before, and where they’d gone, we’d reached the bustling courtyard. Micah squeezed my fingers even harder, but I’d already gotten the hint. When I squeezed back, he smiled.

  “I’m glad to see our queen so improved,” Micah said, once we were outside the palace.

  “That was improved?” A vision of Oriana having a conversation with her wineglass flitted behind my eyes.

  “Oh, very much so. Not once did she fall to the ground wailing, nor did she rend her garments or her hair, and she set nothing on fire. I’m quite pleased with her progress.”

  If that was evidence of progress, gods help us if she regressed. I kept my thoughts to myself as we travelled the metal pathways back h
ome, and once we were back on the manor’s grounds, I was so excited to soon be out of those pinchy green shoes that I forgot all about our insane queen and spooky pre-Elemental magic. Before I could change, or even put on a pair of sneakers, I was met by a pleasant surprise—while Micah and I were off at the Golden Court, Ash had completed my sword.

  The blacksmith had personally delivered it only a short while earlier, and Mom had accepted it on my behalf. From the way she kept absently wiping her hands, I assumed that Ash had arrived in his usual filthy state. Nice to know that he didn’t bother cleaning up when he made deliveries to his lord’s home.

  Regardless of the dirty hands that forged it, the sword itself was a thing of beauty. It was perfectly balanced, and I held it as effortlessly as if it was an extension of my arm. Delicately engraved ravens and oak leaves swirled down the length of the wickedly sharp blade, and the steel hilt was accented with incised copper filigree.

  “Ash knows that I’m of copper?” I murmured, tracing the delicate hilt that had somehow been wrought by that oafish man. Micah and I had retreated to our bedroom, since I felt that meeting one’s first sword was a somewhat private matter. “And a Raven?”

  “All know that the Lord of Silver has lost himself to a copper girl,” Micah said. “And all know that the Raven clan was instrumental in Ferra’s demise.” He stood behind me, his arms wrapped around my waist while we admired the sword—my sword—together.

  “Let me change, and then you can give me my first lesson,” I said as I wiggled free of his arms.

  “I advise against changing out of your lovely clothes,” Micah said. “You should learn sword fighting while wearing one of your gowns, so you will understand how to compensate for their restrictions.”

  “Micah, that’s ridiculous!” I suspected he was having some sort of damsel in distress fantasy that featured me waving a sword while my skirts whipped around my legs. “And I hardly ever wear dresses.”

  “You know I wish you’d wear them more often.”

  Good gods, if it wasn’t babies, it was dresses. “Okay. I’ll let you teach me sword fighting while I’m wearing a dress, on one condition.”

  “Name it, my Sara.”

  “You, Mr. Silverstrand, must wear a skirt.”

  His smile faded, and his eyes glazed over in mingled horror and disbelief. “Why would I do such a thing?”

  “Well, you seem to think it’s no big deal for me to wield an edged weapon while dressed to kill,” I explained. “Prove it.”

  “Your argument is flawed.”

  “How so?”

  “As a man, I would never don such a garment.”

  “In the Mundane realm there are entire countries where men wear skirts. All the time.”

  “You’re making—”

  “Are you insinuating that your consort is lying to you?” My hand flew to my breast in mock outrage. “How could you ever, ever, suggest such a thing?”

  Micah stared at me, his mouth smushed into a crooked line. “When next I venture to the Mundane realm, I will verify this claim,” he warned.

  “Go ahead. The place is called Scotland.” After a bit more glaring and grumbling, we fashioned a passable kilt from one of our bed sheets and Micah’s sword belt. (He outright refused to wear one of my gowns. Spoilsport.) He wouldn’t even put it on in front of me, but retreated to his dressing room, muttering curses that would make even Mom blush. And I think I heard him throw a few things.

  When Micah finally emerged in his skirted glory, he proclaimed that our lessons should take place in the gardens, as much for the open space as the soft ground to land on. And, you know, the fact that it was somewhat removed from the manor so no one would see his bare knees. Being that I had no reason to dispute his logic, off we went.

  The walk through the manor was entertaining, to say the least. We encountered no one but silverkin, yet Micah’s eyes darted after every noise. Who would have thought the confident Lord of Silver could be so undermined by a simple garment? I felt like I’d won already.

  The ideal sparring location turned out to be the far side of the maze, that had no stone benches to stumble over, or potential onlookers to witness Micah’s humiliation. It really was a shame that we didn’t have an audience; what with Micah’s sword, black boots, and white lace-up shirt, he was totally rocking the sexy pirate look.

  “You’d make a great pirate,” I teased.

  “Pie rat?” Micah repeated. “First, you trick me into donning this humiliating garment, and now you compare me to a rat that eats pies?”

  “No, not a rat.” I sighed; he was just tormenting me. I hoped. “A pirate. Buccaneer. Sailor of the high seas.” Silver eyes stared blankly at me. “Have you ever been to an ocean?”

  “Of course.”

  “A pirate drives a boat on the ocean.”

  “Sara, one does not drive a boat. One sails a ship.”

  So he did know what I was talking about. “Can you start teaching me now? I don’t want your legs to get chilly,” I added, smiling sweetly.

  Micah’s eyes narrowed, but he began my first real sword fighting lesson. First, he glided his hand along both of our blades, his palm flush to the edge. I shrieked when he did this with his own sword, but after he showed me he wasn’t bleeding, he explained that he’d added an enchantment to our weapons, to make them safe for our little practice session.

  “Did you blunt the edges?” I asked, watching intently as he repeated the procedure with my sword.

  “They are as sharp as ever,” he replied, to my relief. I wanted to have a sword for at least an entire day before it was wrecked. And I wanted to do the wrecking. “I merely asked the blades to harm neither me nor my consort.”

  Magic just seemed to get cooler by the day. “And they agreed?”

  “They did.”

  “Huh.” I flicked the pad of my thumb against the edge; it still looked sharp, but it felt smooth, almost like the edge of a porcelain plate. “How long does the spell last?”

  “Not a spell, love,” Micah clarified. “The metal has agreed to abide by our terms. Treat your sword well, and you will have an ally for life.”

  “I like allies,” I murmured. I stroked my thumb against the not-sharp-to-me edge again, then I grinned at Micah. “Well? Let’s get started.”

  After a few brief instructions about the proper way to hold a sword, and a few terrible (even for me) pirate jokes, I stood back and affected the stance Mom taught me. Based on Micah’s expression, it was quite an improvement from the yoga pose.

  “En garde!” I waved my new sword with a flourish. At that, Micah shook his head and smiled, and our lesson began.

  Perhaps it was because the sword was made for me, or maybe I really had inherited some of my mother’s warrior-queen blood, but swordplay seemed to come naturally. Before the wars, and our lives taking the express route to hell in a hand basket, I’d taken classical dance lessons. Swordplay turned out to be quite similar, with the feints and jabs like a graceful dance between opponents. Micah said as much, complimenting my fast learning after a successful parry that neither of us thought I’d make.

  “It must be the skirt slowing you down,” I teased. “What have you got on under there, anyway?” I used my sword’s point to lift the edge of his makeshift kilt, but Micah knocked the blade away. “Oh, so you’re modest now?”

  “I am nothing of the sort,” he snapped. “This is… unnatural.” He gestured at his decidedly unmanly getup.

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you! Really, Micah, this dress obsession of yours has got to go.”

  “A wager, then?”

  The man in the skirt wants to make a bet. Intriguing. “What sort of wager?”

  “One more bout. If you win, I will never speak ill of your man’s clothing again.”

  “And if you win?”

  “You’ll wear that dress for each and every one of our lessons.” He was grinning as he spoke, and, being that I was panting like I’d just run a marathon, I couldn�
��t figure out why. Then I followed his gaze to my heaving, sweaty, pushed up by a corset bosom.

  The poufy-haired bastard really was having a damsel in distress fantasy.

  Oh, now I was mad.

  I came at him in a flurry, swinging and striking like a madwoman. In fact, I was acting like such a madwoman that Micah had no trouble fending me off. He even laughed as he parried my ineffectual blows.

  “If you could only see how lovely you look,” he said, executing another parry that left our hilts locked together.

  I’ll show him what’s lovely. I dug my heels into the soft ground and braced myself, shifting the brunt of his force onto my shoulder. Grinning wickedly, I slipped my free hand underneath his skirt, grabbed him, and squeezed. Micah’s eyes went big as saucers, but he did not admit defeat. Instead, he ducked his head and bit my breast. Hard!

  I yelped and hopped backwards, dropping my sword in the process. Being that I still had hold of Micah’s most valued possessions, he moved with me, and we hit the ground as a tangled knot of limbs, thankfully with neither of us accidentally injuring the other. Once we stopped laughing, talk turned to who had won the bout.

  “I made you fall,” Micah said. “And you dropped your sword.”

  “I think the fight was done when I grabbed you,” was my retort. “After all, you wouldn’t want to get hurt here.” Since I’d retained my handful of Micah, I gently traced all the places he’d rather not enjoy an injury.

  “That would be terrible,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to the pink impression his teeth had left in my breast.

  “I can’t believe you bit me.”

  “Does it hurt?” he asked, now intent on unfastening my bodice. It was always much easier for Micah to get me out of these confounding outfits than it was for me to get into them.

  “It does,” I murmured. “You should kiss it. Twice.” He did, and again and again, while his deft fingers worked on my corset. Once he freed me from my bone and satin cell, I sat up and shook out my hair, having decided that he owed me somewhat more of an apology. I was still in my gown, from the waist down anyway, and Micah was technically fully dressed, but my, that skirt of his did make things easier.