Hemlock & Silver

by T. Kingfisher

clearly wondering when this alarming child would go away.

Isobel sat up straighter, clearly struck by a sudden thought. “Wait, what are you going to wear?” “I had planned on wearing clothes, but I am open to suggestions.”

“But look at this! This is a marvelous color on you,” said Isobel, holding a swatch of pale green silk against my arm. “That is a dreadful color on me. I would look like a walking shrubbery.”

Noblemen notice beauty mostly by its lack. Women know that they are only as powerful as their face, and so they will slather poisons into every wrinkle, merely to keep what little power they have.

“Probably the green ones were just startled.” “Oh, I don’t doubt it.” He toasted the absent vine devils with his wine. “I can’t imagine I’d be very friendly if I was minding my own business and a pack of young fellows with machetes came barging into my garden. Still, it’s not the sort of thing you think of when there’s one fastened on to your cheek.”

Aaron said, with marvelous patience, “Are you telling me that you poisoned yourself, then rushed down here in order to save a pet chicken?” “He’s not a pet. He’s more of a colleague.”

and then the moment passes, and the shadows become friendly again, and you realize that you nearly fled in terror from your father’s second-best coat.

“I’m not crying,” I informed him, my voice thick with tears.

Me

Blessed Saint Adder, was this man doomed to be present at every humiliating moment of my life? Retching and sick and sobbing … Maybe I can get explosive diarrhea and round out the set.

“Cats can be loyal,” I argued. “Yes, but they’re fundamentally lazy.”

Cats are immensely lazy lol.