Cruel Beauty

“‘Fair’? I think demons must use that word differently than we do.”

“Let me tell you a story from before the Sundering.” He turned back to me, and I readied myself to try for another key. “Once upon a time, there was a man whose wife took ill but a month after their wedding, and in three days she was nearly dead. The man went into the woods and called upon the Kindly Ones, who offered him this bargain: his wife would live and for ten years he could enjoy her love, but after that time they would hunt him through the woods and feast their dogs upon him. Yet most kindly, they offered him this chance to escape: if at the end of ten years he could name just one of the Kindly Ones, they would allow him to live the rest of his days in peace.”

Frustratingly, Ignifex remained a few paces away, one hand rested against a bookshelf, completely absorbed in his story. Trying to look absorbed as well, I rose quietly and stepped to his side.

“The man agreed. His wife lived, but she was bedridden ever after and drove him half-mad with complaints. She bore him a daughter, but the child was simpleminded; she said nothing but a single nonsense word all day long, no matter how he beat her. So the man lived in misery for ten years. When his time was up, he tried to bargain for his life by offering up his daughter instead.”

I plucked a pair of keys from one of his belts, my hands as light as a feather, and I tried to ignore how smug he sounded. As if the man had done wrong for the sole purpose of proving Ignifex right.

“The Kindly Ones refused, but before they set their dogs upon him, they told him that the word his daughter said was the name that could have saved his life. Had he been kinder to her, he might have guessed it and lived. Tell me, was that not justice?” He smiled and caught my clenched hands in his.

“He was a terrible man,” I agreed, tugging at my hands. His grip was like iron. “But it seems to me that if you break a thing, you can’t complain that it’s in pieces.”

Ignifex shifted his grip to try prying my hands open. In an instant I had ripped my hands free and spun around, flinging the keys across the room as Ignifex grabbed my waist from behind.

“No honest people ever bargained with the Kindly Ones.” His breath tickled my neck. “Only the foolish. The proud. The ones who believed they deserved the world at no price.”

I hoped that he couldn’t feel the key still nestled in the stomach of my dress. “Is that what you think of those who make bargains with you?”

I remembered Damocles saying, I’ll do this for her if it costs my soul. Certainly he had been a fool, perhaps in a way he’d been proud, but he had been more than willing to pay.

“Of course.” Ignifex let go of me and chuckled as I stumbled forward and caught myself against the table. “It’s what I thought of your father when he came to me begging for children.”

I remembered Father saying, I determined to save Thisbe, no matter the cost, his voice stiff and dry as if he were describing a Hermetic experiment, not explaining how he had come to sell me.

“A lifetime devoted to felling the Gentle Lord, forgotten as soon as he saw his woman’s tears, even though he knew how it would end. So eager to sin for her, he couldn’t even bother thinking through his wish enough to realize that he’d asked for his wife to have healthy children, but not for her to have a body that could bear them and survive. He deserved what he got and she did too.”

My hands clenched on the table. I remembered kneeling in the family shrine, telling Mother just the same thing. Remembered feeling it for years, even if I never let the words form.

I whirled around and slapped him across the face.

“Never speak of my mother that way again,” I said.

My hand stung from the blow, and it felt like more of a trespass than when I had tried to stab him, but I couldn’t take it back. Not yet, with the fury still writhing in my stomach.

His grin got wider. “But I’m welcome to speak of your father?”

I clenched my teeth. I wanted to deny it, but I hated my father and some part of me enjoyed hearing Ignifex blame him for everything.

“You are a fit bride for me,” he went on. “More than I expected, and I always hoped your father would pick you.”

“You watched me?”

“Now and then.” He stepped forward. “I watched all your family. Your father, punishing you because he wasn’t brave enough to punish himself. Your aunt, hating you for proving your mother would always have the whole of his heart. Your sister, pretending that smiles would make the darkness go away. And you. Leonidas’s sweet and gentle daughter, with a world of poison in your heart. You fought and fought to keep all the cruelty locked up in your head, and for what? None of them ever loved you, because none of them ever knew you.”

“Yes.” I could barely choke the word out; my whole body was taut with rage. “You’re right. They never knew me. They never loved me. And I certainly never deserved their love.” I shoved him a step back. “Does that make you happy? Do you think, if you can condemn the whole world, that will make you guiltless?” I stepped toward him. “Because if you do, you’re an idiot. My father and my aunt wronged me, but I am still a selfish, hateful girl who loves her life more than Arcadia, so I deserve to be punished.” I had him backed up against a bookshelf now. “Or do you think that your masters excuse you? Because I don’t see how you’re any different from your bargainers. The Kindly Ones furnish your castle and lend you their power, and you think you’re a prisoner? Even if you can’t fight them, you could still reject them.”

Our faces were barely a hand’s span apart. My throat ached; I realized I had been shouting into the face of the Gentle Lord. In a moment he would mock me with that perfect smile until I had no more pride left, or he would finally grow angry enough to punish me, or—

He dropped his gaze.

He looked down and to the left, no smile on his face, his jaw tight. As if he didn’t have an answer. As if he cared what I had said.

“I’m sorry I slapped you,” I muttered.

“ . . . It’s all right.” He still wasn’t quite looking at me. “I suppose I shouldn’t have mentioned your mother.”

“And why do you keep acting like I won’t hurt you?” I whirled away from him, tears stinging at my eyes and little shivers ru

He caught me again by the waist; I tried to pull free and instead sent us toppling backward to land against the bookcase amid a small shower of books. I ended up in his lap, and in a moment his arms were locked around me.

“Well,” he said mildly, “as you may have noticed, I am not so easy to kill.”

I held myself rigid against the warmth of his arms. “I’m sure I’ll think of something.”

“Do you know why I love you?”

I opened my mouth but couldn’t speak.

Ignifex went on as calmly as if we were a normal husband and wife who discussed their love every day. “Everyone who ever bargains with me is convinced that he is righteous. Even the ones who come sad-eyed and guilty—they weep to the gods that they are si

“How could you know that?” I demanded.

“Because they always believe the price I tell them. They always think they can pay it, because they think they are only paying for the wish itself, and deep down they believe they deserve that wish by right. What they don’t understand is that they aren’t buying the wish, they’re buying the power to accomplish it. And that power—the power of the Kindly Ones—has an infinite price. So they all deserve what they get.” His arms tightened around me. “But you know what you are, and what you deserve. You lie to me but not to yourself. That’s why I love you.”