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“Shouldn’t you be resting?” I ask as she slips the vest on and lets it hang loose on her shoulders. “The Opal Court⁠—”

“I’m not tired.” She tightens the laces on the front of the shirt, covering the stone and the scars, but I cannot forget their presence. “And we have plans to make.”

“Plans can wait until you’ve recovered.”

She tucks the shirt into her trousers with efficient movements and buttons the vest closed. “I told you. I’m fine.”

Dressed in the silver and white of my sithe, she’s still a wild thing, pretending to belong among us. And yet, the Silver uniform suits her well enough to unnerve me. As if in claiming her, my sithe has itself been claimed.

“Hold still,” I tell her, stepping closer.

Her eyebrow arches. “Is that an order?”

“A request.” I let the royal mask slip. “Please.”

She squares her shoulders and tilts her chin in silent challenge. “What are you up to, Silver King?”

I raise my hands, telegraphing each movement. “May I?”

After a heartbeat of consideration, she says, “Go ahead.”

My fingers find the delicate ear cuffs cloaking her in fae glamour. I remove them gently, revealing ears with a slight upward sweep, neither fully human nor fully fae.

Curiosity gets the better of me. I trace one from the familiar curve to its newly tapered tip.

Amalia shivers.

Her hand flies to her ear. “What was that?”

I still. “Did I hurt you?”

“No.” Her brow furrows as she rubs the tip between two fingers. “It just... I’m not used to having anything up there to feel.”

Despite myself, amusement tugs at me.

But it fades as I study her.

The glamour I placed upon her is gone. I am certain of it. Yet her eye remains solid brown.

I reach for her again, slower this time, and brush my thumb along the cheekbone beneath it. I search for the telltale touch of magic and find nothing.

Amalia goes very still. “What?”

“You are still hiding from me.”

Confusion creases her brow. “What are you talking about?”

“Your eye.” My thumb lingers beneath it. “I have seen its true color, yet this glamour remains even after I stripped away my own.”

Her confusion vanishes. “Oh.”

“Let me see all of you,” I request.

Her hand stalls halfway up, betraying the vulnerability she tries so hard to hide. Then she reaches for her dark brown eye. I watch, fascinated, as she removes a strange, circular device I’ve never seen before. The thin material peels away and takes the borrowed brown with it.

“It’s a contact lens,” she explains at my confusion. “Human technology to improve vision. Or, in my case, to hide that I’m fae-touched. Back home, such a thing could get me blinded or bound to dark witches.”

She blinks several times, then lifts her chin without flinching.