Lux [h.s]

eighteen

Cora was sitting in front of the window of the wagon, staring at the lights of Caloir shining beneath as they went down the hill. They looked like a bunch of fireflies in the night, glittering around and filling her with a warmth she'd never known before.

She'd never left Beilyn before—not counting the small adventures Harry had taken her on—and she didn't know if it excited or scared her to know that, days away of travel from her home, there were places as beautiful as that city.

She watched it come closer and closer, blinking brighter and brighter, until they made a turn and it disappeared from view.

After a while they stopped, and Harry entered the wagon holding the white box he'd picked up some days before. Cora shot up in surprise, retreating into the corner as he put it down on the bed.

"Get changed," he told her, "I'll send Thalia in to help." He left without waiting for her reply, and she stepped closer to the mysterious box, a frown on her face.

The box was for her?

Cora opened it and pulled up the fancy fabric inside. It was a sunset red dress, elegant and refined, heavy in her grasp. She put it on the bed, and its golden embroidery shone in the light of the candles.

A note fell on the floor, and she picked it up.

Be like fire tonight, was written inside in crimson ink, bright and beautiful, but deadly all the same.

A smile curved her lips, and she closed her hand around it just as Thalia entered the wagon.

She took the dress she'd left on the bed and draped it over the chair. "Take that off, I'll help you."

Cora obeyed, not wanting to give her any more reasons to find fault in her. She put on the red dress, the rich fabric feeling so foreign on her body, and Thalia went up behind her, helping her lace it up before making her sit on the chair. She brushed her hair with a wooden comb and clasped it behind her head with an intricate gold hairpin.

Her fingers stilled on her shoulders. "Why are you sad?" she asked. "Don't you think it's a pretty dress?"

Cora glanced up. She could see her reflection on the glass of the window, the night on the other side. "I just wish I didn't feel so much like a pawn." She was struck by the truth of her words in the moment she spoke them, and it almost left her breathless.

She was only there because Harry needed her to work for him. Because he knew a way to utilise her, and she was letting him do it. She'd never felt so much like a means to an end before.

Thalia hummed. "Everyone is a pawn, don't you think?" She fixed her hair one last time, and then she let her stand up.

Cora turned around, only then noticing that she was dressed even more elegantly than usual. Was she coming along as well?

They put on their cloaks and walked out. Harry was waiting for them outside, and Cora felt as if someone had punched her in the gut in the moment she saw him.

He'd swapped his usual plain-looking shirts for a richer one, embroidered with lace and little pearls that shone in the candlelight. Matched with the elegance of his midnight blue coat, he looked like nobility embodied. Beautiful and dangerous all at once—that was the truth to who he was.

"Don't you look like a treasure?" he murmured as soon as his eyes landed on her. His eyes seemed to glint in the night, his eyelashes made longer and darker by the shadows and something like stardust on his eyelids. Whether it was fay fashion or her own brain playing tricks on her, Cora couldn't tell.

Her cheeks went up in flames. She'd never been one to cow under flattery, but when it came from Harry, whose looks were so breathtaking he didn't seem real at all, she couldn't help but feel honoured.