Gild (The Plated Prisoner, #1)

by Raven Kennedy

I try to keep a positive outlook on life, even if I am in my own person-sized birdcage. A pretty jail for a pretty relic.

It gives me the crawling caterpillars in my stomach—not butterflies. I’m jealous of those free-flying bitches.

I’m an oddity, a commodity, a rumor. I’m the king’s favored. His prized saddle. The one he gold-touched and keeps in a cage at the top of his castle, my body bearing the mark of his ownership and favoritism. The gilded pet. I’m the darling of King Midas, ruler of Highbell and the Sixth Kingdom of Orea. People flock to see me just as much as they come to look upon his gleaming castle worth more than all the riches in the entire realm. I’m the gold-plated prisoner. But what a pretty prison it is.

“Come on, you little gilded prick sticks,” I mutter as my arms strain.

Does it really matter if your cage is solid gold when you aren’t allowed to leave it? A cage is a cage, no matter how gilded.

But memory and time aren’t friends. They reject each other, they hurry in opposite directions, pulling the binding taut between them, threatening to snap. They fight, and we inexplicably lose. Memory and time. Always losing one as you go on with the other.

I’m ridiculously fun. You kind of have to be when the only person you hang out with is you. I wouldn’t want to bore myself.

Nobody launches an attack on Fourth Kingdom. King Ravinger is called King Rot for a reason. He’s powerful and brutal and vicious. What the hell is Midas thinking?

Queue the real MMC. Can’t wait.

How to please a man. As if that should be a woman’s—saddle or otherwise—sole purpose for living. The edge of my lip curls with the hint of a sneer.

this connection with another person. Not an alliance for similar goals, not anything driven by politics or society or even lust. But a simple friendship. Just two people who enjoy talking to each other, who can share stories and meet in laughter, conspiring only for one another’s amusement.

It’s the arrogance of men, to think so little of women. And it’ll be their downfall too.

There are no more fae. …Or so people think.

I feel like she's FAE, or part FAE anyways. He has horns she has ribbons I just feel like the abnormality implies the magic of FAE in their blood.

A tip? A tip to bring him here? Frowning, I look at the captain, as if staring at him hard enough will give me answers.

Probably Midas's wife

“How did you know about her? I didn’t mention her in any of the messages I sent.” “You had your tip, and I had mine.”

Digby???

Because I just turned the motherfucker solid gold.

Gasp. It’s giving that she’s the powerful one & Midas uses her and acts like it’s his power.