*if you have not completed the story, this contains spoilers from book 3*

Alright, this is a special request short story of Eberon finding love after he became king ❤️

~~~

Walking the streets of a city like Thanantholl in the aftermath of the War of Death and Madness was a heart-shattering affair. The battle that savaged the cobbled stones and ancient trees would live on as a ghost in the hearts of the autumn court king after the visible structures were repaired. But my role today was not to lament what was, but to focus on the future that could be.

"We should make it there by midday meal if we continue at your gracious pace, your majesty."

I whipped my head around to stare at the fox-folk secretary who had been assigned to follow me on my tasks. Short, and wider at the hips than the shoulders, she made for a striking shape for a fae creature. With a bored mask on her face and her large, pointed ears sweeping back from her wavy brown hair, Rala kept the poise of her position as the king's assistant but the underlying, cutting insinuations of a female perturbed. Only the hint of her tail swishing behind her betrayed her annoyance. I think. Even after a month I still couldn't read her.

"Is my pace not suitable to your schedule, Rala?" I drawled.

"The pace of your esteemed gracious majesty could never be anything other than impeccable, King Eberon of Thanantholl and the Autumn Court."

Sarcasm. It had to be sarcasm, only the sly thing hadn't slipped up once in the weeks I'd know her. When Varthas pushed me onto the throat to claim a kinghood I'd refuted more than once at that stars-forsaken meeting, he cursed me. Cursed me to a life of servitude to these lands, of stewardship over these people, and worst of all he cursed me to working with this insufferable fox.

Instead of replying, which I knew would only end in more fluffed up words of pomp and circumstances from my infuriating secretary, I sighed through my nose and continued to Pearl Street. Perhaps slightly faster than I had been going before.

The bell above the shop door chimed merrily, not for an instant betraying the ravaged shelves and splintered counter of the store within. The window that had once been a masterpiece of stained orange glass in the layered pattern of maple leaves was an irreplaceable icon of Pearl Street. A bare, translucent pane now sat humbly in its place.

"My king." The nymph within the shop stopped her task of sanding the boards of the new countertop to bow.

"No, no please don't." The role was too fresh, too raw. When Baeleon died I was as lost as the rest of the Autumn Lands, and we were all still reeling from it.

"Don't be so humble, majesty King Baeleon the-"

"Hush, you," I snapped at Rala, then sighed. "Please take note of the damage on the shop and add whatever details of the bookkeeping remain of inventory."

"Of course," she said in that haughty way of hers.

Turning back to the nymph, I cleared my throat. "I'm sure you've heard form the other shops, but now that the citizens have been placed in housing, temporary or otherwise, I'm attempting to rekindle the commerce of the city. It is your hands, your craftsmanship, and your lifeblood that you pour into your work that has always made Thanantholl what it is. We need our artisans back."

The nymph, a slender blue thing with the calloused fingers telling the tale of her long decades holding a paintbrush, offered a tired smile. "I have heard. Thank you."

"What can we do for you?" I asked, glancing around the room. The broken furnishings were moved to one corner, the floor had been swept, but several canvases had been destroyed by the raid. Pearl Street in particular had become a target for destruction by Bara Khalja's forces. A tactic against morale, I'm sure.

Walking over to one such canvas, I rested my fingers on the torn edges where an arrow pierced an otherwise beautiful depiction of the river that wound in front of the grotto. "Whatever materials would help you get started again, I'll find them for you."

The nymph shook her head. "My materials will come when the weavers are back to making canvas again. I can wait for the necessities to be made first. The looms are better suited to clothing and blankets right now."

She wasn't wrong. "Still, let me contact Eriodus. Wren may already have some to spare."

"The Wylde Witch," the nymph whispered.

I smiled but offered nothing else. My dear friend disliked the nickname, no matter how well it suited her.

"Shall I write the correspondence for you as well, esteemed and gracious majesty? Eberon, king of the autumn lands. May the maple leaves fall for a thousand years at the foot of your throne."

Pinching the bridge of my nose, I gave the most even reply I could. "That will be completely unnecessary, Rala."

This was going to be another long day.

~~~

"My recommendation stands, Eberon," Varthas said. The old tree spirit leaned back in his chair at the meeting table, all of us tired from a morning of arguments and details so minute they couldn't possibly matter.

It was an impossible choice to choose who to protect. The dark things that crept outside the Autumn Lands had already driven many of the rural fae creatures to the remnants of the city. Our food supplies would hurt for this, our trade and rebuilding efforts would hurt without the materials being gathered and the people who worked love into the land. An entire group of nymphs was attacked by something wicked, likely a wraith, and were still recovering from it.

"I understand the concern for the dryad grovelings, but the fact remains that they cannot stay where they are and still expect safety when we don't have the numbers to spare in the guard to watch over them. If we don't make a move on the darker things trying to encroach on the borders, the already weakened city will be attacked by the beasts of the Wyldes."

"Send Thainalan the Ravager." Varthas was visibly tense. "Send any of Baeleon's chosen triquetrams for tasks such as this, but do not abandon your people."

Frowning, I found myself rubbing the obsidian band on one thumb that marked the one I had lost. Thain and I would never have a whole triquetram again, I'd come to terms with that, but after this war, I wasn't willing to take Thain's seemingly endless strength and capabilities for granted again.

"It's hardly an abandonment of the peoples of Thanantholl," one of my other advisors, an incubus named Jazuul, claimed. "We still don't know if the grovelings will awaken after the battle that thrashed through them, but we do know that the people who are here with us now deserve protection."

Rala stiffened at my side, though I was the only one who seemed to notice. The pause in the scratch of her pen the only indication that she was upset. I'd gotten better at reading her now, the weeks together had revealed some of her more subtle hints. A small movement next to one eye, even as her focus remained on recording the meeting notes, was all I needed to see to know she was disgusted.

"Speak," I said softly to my side. Rala was strong-willed, and while she danced around her words she did have an admirable sense of loyalty to the Autumn Court. Call it a whim, say I'd grown to trust her despite her wicked tongue, but I wanted to hear her thoughts on the subject.

It took her a moment to realize I was speaking to her. When she paused her scratching pen and looked up, she cocked one eyebrow. "Me, your esteemed majesty Eberon?"

The names had gotten shorter, though remained entirely unnecessary. "Yes," I replied. "What are your thoughts on the grovelings outside the walls?"

Rala eyed the room, setting her pen down and tucking a wavy lock behind one ear. Her golden eyes rolled over each advisor before coming to rest on me. Her mouth moved with slow precision, choosing each word carefully. "My humble viewpoint may be short-sighted in such company, but there is never a reason to leave behind even the smallest chance that those grovelings will awaken."

The table was quiet. The conflict we'd all been arguing over tipping slightly in favor of the grovelings now, or at least as much of a leaning as anything had swayed this room all morning.

Jazuul was the one to break the silence. "What do you propose as an actual solution then?"

Even I bristled at that, but Rala kept her cool. "I propose, advisor, that instead of using the guards to watch over the grovelings you find a way to move things around so they remain guarded."

"The grovelings are delicate," Varthas said sadly. "We cannot transplant them."

Rala's gaze moved to the elder advisor with a clever spark in her eye. "The grovelings aren't the only things that can be moved, advisor. Just last night you tabled the discussion on the rebuilding of the archers' barracks." Rala flipped through the pages of notes she'd brought with her, surprising me by including past meetings in her paperwork and not just documents relative to today's issues at hand.

"When you last left off, the barracks decidedly could not be rebuilt on the previous ground due to extensive damage, or at least it would take extra caution to build without further damaging roots of a structurally integral tree to the barracks."

"So, what are you saying?" Jazuul asked.

"I'm saying, move the barracks to the edge of the grovelings. In the event that something were to encroach on the area, the best archers in the land would already be there. I have about two dozen pages of complaints I found in the scribes' office from before the war, the archers have always been dissatisfied with being on the opposite end of the city from the walls over the gate where they are stationed. Moving the barracks near the grovelings would put them-"

"-so much closer to the gate they guard," Varthas finished. "Yes . . . yes that's absolutely right."

I stared at her, this clever thing that was right under my nose this whole time. The table was already in rapid discussion of the logistics of such a move, but Rala just put her head back down and resumed taking notes. Where there should have been pride on her face or at least satisfaction, there was only a mask of annoyance.

~~~

The River's Edge was back up and running, a highlight of my reign so far as the restaurant reserved me a secluded table where I could enjoy the music, the food, the dancing, and manage to keep out of sight around the screen of ivy. It was a rare treat to get away from the throne and the advisors and the work, if only for a few hours.

Certainly, there would be days of rest ahead. Baeleon managed many of them for himself. But now, with the rebuilding still fully underway in a city that had been devastated by war, this was a rare treat. A treat I hoped to share with my triquetram, if he'd gotten my message.

The wine was cool, sweet, and crisp. The music was peaceful, far too soon after the war for the electrifying revelry that the River's Edge was often known for, but it still begged those who heard it to dance.

My vantage point allowed me to watch the dancers from a discreet distance, and it was soothing to see the court willing to dance again. So for a long time I watched. Watched and drank and sang for the sake of no one but myself as I enjoyed the fleeting traces of nights out with my friends, relived now through the dancing strangers.

And then, one of them caught my eye. Skirts flying around her hips, she danced and danced and danced. It was as if no one watching could matter to her in that moment more than the music that ensnared her. The way the moonlight shone through the treetops dappling her wavy hair with silver was a dream.

Moving as fluidly as the water The River's Edge was so named for, I was entranced. But in one more low swirl of the skirts, I saw a familiar feature. The fox tail peeking out of her silhouette snapped me to attention. There weren't that many fox-folk left, and when I looked up for the shape of the ears and the narrow shoulders that had accompanied me day after day these past months I recognized her right away. Rala.

It was hard to consider her outside of her role in the palace, but here I was faced with it. She looked . . . happy. Dancing with no one but herself.

"Eb." Thain's low voice shook me out of the trance as he sat across from me at the little table.

"Thain," I said, running a hand through my hear. "Stars. Yes, I was just . . . distracted."

"I could tell." The smallest smile, the briefest flash of one anyway, spread across his lips before settling into the same face he usually wore. There were always glimpses of the playful fae underneath the veil of Thainalan the Ravager he wore for everyone else.

"You're in a good mood," I said.

"And you're changing the subject," he mused. "Who were you looking at?"

I couldn't stop myself from stealing one more glance at Rala as the crescendo that would end this particular song spun her around and around until she dipped low, balancing herself with one raised leg as she ended the song in a flourish.

When I looked back, Thain's eyes were not on me, but on the dancers. He didn't say anything more on the subject, but he didn't have to. There was no hiding things from your triquetram, particularly not when that other part of your soul was Thain.