Berthen's arrival surprises everyone, including Geddis.
Cree cooperates with being sent to the dungeons—attended by enough other illegitimate persons to discourage anyone who might want to cause that elf to disappear.
The royal salon hasn't been used since Hastheem was killed. (Leathin, when he visited, had held court in the small garden outside—which, Geddis understands, is also where Hastheem died.)
Berthen looked at that room, the dust and dirt covering it, and called for an air user to clear it, overtly showing an acceptance of non-elves in his lands (since air is a human affinity).
Geddis wonders if that precedent counts as sabotaging the isolationism Berthen has going on in Marsdenfel, right now. She'll have to ask Dakadza, whenever she sees him again. But then, others who've left her haven't returned for years, so by then, she probably won't care to ask anymore, if she even remembers.
Berthen insists that Geddis stays with him as he questions various witnesses, and she finds out far more than she wanted to know about how Saf is on fire and the king is dead and nobody knows who his heir is supposed to be.
Geddis isn't sure how the last one is possible, but she does at least get a report that her sister made it to a boat headed for the Pardys Isles before things got really bad. There's no word about Silva's husband, though, beyond a mention of 'a' faerie—and Nirmoh's type of faerie always has a bodyguard, so which faerie is it?
As for the issue of one elf that attacked her and the other that beat and killed her attacker, she gets a front-row seat of the details as Bethen finds them, assisted by Hei's brisk organization and implementation of Berthen's desire to interview the persons involved.
He and Hei get along remarkably well.
Geddis might be the only one surprised to find out that her attacker's death had actually been illegal, though, considering how "The montai sometimes killed each other, back in Marsdenfel."
"Leathin ignored that the law applies to everyone in the realms, not just those of the realms, and those fights fell into a borderland of 'arguably legal,' anyway, since he accepted Lallie's authority over them, so her rules could trump his, where they were concerned." Berthan's gaze follows Hei as she bustles about, figurative smacking those who fight her organization.
(Geddis's favorite might be when Hei sweetly told the man bellowing that he had places to be that of course the king wouldn't begrudge him taking care of his incontinence, though the woman snidely refusing to believe Berthen was the king being escorted out of the realm entirely was a close second.)
The way he watches Hei bothers Geddis. It isn't lust—which would be uncomfortable enough, with he still looks like a child, to her eyes, and she thinks he'd still seem that way to an elf, too. (But he's past sixteen. Shouldn't he be an adult?)
There's appreciation, especially whenever she pulls off another slap, but the underlying emotion seems to be dread.
After Berthen finally wraps up the questioning and tongue-lashing for failures to follow proper procedure (which Hei and Kaul are not exempt from), Geddis takes advantage of that (and the distraction of the people bringing in lunch) to discreetly ask, "Why do you watch her like that?"
His sharp look makes her glad they're public enough he won't fling a knife at her, but his expression softens into something sour. "I have to marry someone like her."
"Isn't that a good thing? She seems good at managing all...this."
"She does, yes," he answers blandly. He glances at Geddis as he stretches a little, gives a little shake of his head and takes a few step towards the nearest exit. "Never mind. One batch of questions done. One more to go."
Geddis takes a moment to realize he's waiting for her to come with him, and she stumbles a little as she hurries to do so, and they head out. "What else is there to ask them?"
"Your protector. You bed him, too?"
Heat floods Geddis—first embarrassment, then anger. Yes, she'd been Leathin's mistress, and she'd since become Dakadza's lover. That didn't mean—
"I apologize," he says curtly, before she snaps. "That was... I can't say out of line, since that's relevant to what happened, but I should've handled that question better."
"How can that be relevant?"
"Bedding him would give grounds for him to think you family, which could be leverage to ignore the battery. As it is, the previous attacks on the two maids would have excused the killing if the killing were immediate. As it is, the elf—"
"Cree," Geddis supplied.
Berthen mutters something in felvish that sounds like an invective. "Of course they are."
Geddis frowns at him. "His body being unusual doesn't say anything about the kind of person he is. He's the one who started the chain and all to help the refugees get in safely..."
The windmilling arms of a refugee toppling off the path fills her vision. She swallows hard. "Get in safer."
"Is he a he?"
"What kind of question is that? I thought he was a thee until Kaul explained the name."
"Okay, so Cree lives as a thee, probably views himself as male." Berthen stops abruptly, just outside the earshot of the elves loitering by the dungeon entrance. "I don't suppose you'd be willing to make sure he's gotten a clean shirt?"
The question is quiet, discreet, and a bit of extra red tints his skin.
Geddis takes a few seconds to connect the question—a few witnesses mentioned that Cree had removed his tunic to wipe up the blood.
And then she connects the question to what he'd said about Hei.
"You like men?!"
It comes out too loud. She realizes that even as it slips out, but too late to stop herself from saying it more than loud enough to get the loiterers' attention.
They're startled, still piecing it together, even as Berthen's tight-lipped and narrow-eyed at her. "Thank you, Feyim."
The politeness is expressed through gritted teeth.
"I'm sorry," she says quietly.
It's not enough—she knows that even as the murmur starts building and the people around them look at Berthen with surprise or pity or revulsion.
The refugees from Salles make all too obvious how dangerous that one is.
She forces her volume to drop. "I didn't realize elves could be like that!"
Pity enters his expression, then, towards her. He sighs, rubs his face, and slumps with weariness. "We exist in every kind, Geddis."
"I was wondering about that," Hei cuts in.
Geddis helps, and a vine catches the knife Berthen flings at Hei.
She doesn't flinch.
She does, however, glance down at the blade as she plucks it out of the vine that grows...from her sleeve? How does that work?
Hei passes the blade back to Berthen. "Nice design. They're supporting you, then?"
"I don't know. My grandmother bought them."
"Oh." She squints at Berthen's hands as he puts the knife away, then shrugs, a bit self-consciously. "For what it's worth, I really am sorry about this. I got distracted and was too far away when it all went down, and Kaul thinks beating an idea out of someone actually works."
How would hurting someone change their mind about anything? It might stop them from acting on the idea, but beyond that...
"He seems more the punitive sort in general," Berthen comments.
"For people he views as enemies, yes." Hei glances at Geddis. "He's downright protective and helpful with those of us he considers family."
"He's not your father, then?" Geddis asks, then flinches. Someone had called this elf Heilé, which means she's illegitimate. Asking about her father is rude.
"He helped my mother raise me, so he's my father that way, at least. Only the Creator knows if he sired me, too." Hei squints at the dungeon.
"Doesn't your mother?" Geddis blurts, then flushes. "Just...forget I asked that."
"I knew I should've checked that affinity." Hei's gaze drops to Geddis. "Stay here, please."
Berthen starts asking something, then scowls at the dungeon, mutters another felvish invective, and storms in.
Hei catches her skirts in her hands and has the vines climb out of her sleeves and back up over her arms.
Those loitering outside look confused, even the few who seem to be trying to guard.
Geddis shrugs helplessly.
Then she takes a deep breath, carefully pulls up her water magic, and follows the elves who she's pretty sure where robbed of their childhoods even more than she was.