Damsel

Damsel is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.Copyright © 2023 by Netflix, Inc.All rights reserved.Published in the United States by Random House Worlds, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.RANDOM HOUSE is a registered trademark, and RANDOM HOUSE WORLDS and colophon are trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.Based on a screenplay written by Dan MazeauDirected by Juan Carlos FresnadilloLIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATANames: Skye, Evelyn, author.Title: Damsel / Evelyn Skye.Description: First edition. | New York: Random House Worlds, 2023Identifiers: LCCN 2022055290 (print) | LCCN 2022055291 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593599402 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780593599419 (ebook)Subjects: LCGFT: Fantasy fiction. | Novels.Classification: LCC PS3619.K935 D36 2023 (print) | LCC PS3619.K935 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6—dc23/eng/20221122LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022055290LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022055291Ebook ISBN 9780593599419randomhousebooks.comBook design by Elizabeth Rendfleisch, adapted for ebookTitle page art by tetyanatr/stock.adobe.comOrnament by migfoto/stock.adobe.comCover design: Cassie GonzalesCover illustration: Ruben Irelandep_prh_6.0_143148854_c0_r0 ContentsCoverTitle PageCopyrightElodieElodieElodieLucindaElodieElodieElodieElodieIsabelleElodieElodieElodieIsabelleCoraElodieElodieElodieElodieFloriaCoraAlexandraElodieElodieVictoriaElodieLucindaElodieVictoriaElodieElodieElodieVictoriaElodieElodieVictoriaElodieAlexandraElodieElodieFloriaIsabelleAlexandraElodieHenryElodieFloriaElodieElodieElodieKhaevisElodieFloriaLucindaElodieFloriaEpilogueDedicationAcknowledgmentsAuthor’s Note on the Dragon LanguageAppendix A: Primer on Khaevis Ventvis Phonology and PronunciationAppendix B: Overview of Khaevis Ventvis Grammar and SyntaxAppendix C: Khaevis Ventvis–English Dictionary, AbridgedAppendix D: English–Khaevis Ventvis Dictionary, AbridgedBy Evelyn SkyeAbout the Author ELODIEINOPHE WAS THE sort of place for which the globe moved backward. While the rest of the world progressed, barren Inophe slid further and further into the past. Seventy years of drought had reduced the duchy’s meager croplands to endless sand dunes. The people harvested their gardens of cacti for water, and they existed in a system of bartering—a length of homespun cloth in exchange for the chore of mending a fence; a dozen eggs for a tincture to ease a toothache; and on special occasions, a goat in exchange for a small sack of precious imported flour.“It’s a beautiful place, despite everything,” Duke Richard Bayford said as he rode his horse to the edge of a plateau that overlooked the soft brown landscape, broken up here and there by the lean branches of ironwood trees and the yellow flowers of acacias. He was a tall and wiry man, his face wrinkled by four and a half decades under the relentless sun.“It’s a beautiful place because of everything,” his daughter Elodie chided gently as she rode up beside him. At twenty, she’d been helping him with the Duchy of Inophe for as long as she could remember, and she’d one day inherit the role as its steward.Lord Bayford chuckled. “You’re right as usual, my dove. Inophe is beautiful because of everything it is.”Elodie smiled. Below their plateau, a long-eared fox sprang from the shade of a desert willow and chased something—probably a gerbil or lizard—around a boulder. To the east, undulating dunes rose and fell, mountains of sand cascading toward a glittering sea. Even the dry heat on Elodie’s skin felt like the welcome embrace of an old friend.There was a rustle in the scrub behind them.“Pardon me, Lord Bayford.” A man emerged, carrying a staff. A moment later, his herd of bearded gray desert goats followed, indiscriminately biting off the heads of spiny flowers and their thorned stems and swallowing them whole. If only the people of Inophe had such gums and stomachs of iron, they’d be able to survive much better in this harsh clime.“Good day, Lady Elodie.” The shepherd swept off his tattered hat and dipped his head as the duke and Elodie dismounted.“How may we be of service, Immanuel?” Lord Bayford asked.“Er, your lordship…My oldest son, Sergio, is about to be married, and he’ll be needing a new cottage for his family. I was hoping that, uh, you might be able to…”Before the pause could grow awkward, Lord Bayford jumped in. “You need building materials?”Immanuel fiddled with his staff but then nodded. Inophean tradition held that fathers gifted their sons with new homes on their wedding day, and mothers gifted their daughters with handmade gowns. But decades of impoverishment meant it was harder and harder for the old ways to continue.“It would be an honor to provide the materials for Sergio’s cottage,” Lord Bayford said. “Do you need assistance with its construction? Elodie is particularly good with rigging solar stills.”“True,” she said. “I’m also good at digging latrines, which Sergio and his wife can use after they’ve drunk the water they collected in the solar stills.”Immanuel’s eyes widened as he stared at her.Elodie cursed herself under her breath. She had, unfortunately, a gift for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. When faced with social interaction, especially the expectation that she say something, Elodie seized up—her shoulders tightened and her throat went dry, and her once coherent ideas tumbled on top of one another like books from an upended shelf. Then she’d end up blurting out whatever thought had landed at the top of that pile, and it would inevitably be inappropriate.That wasn’t to say she was unappreciated. The people respected her devotion to Inophe. Elodie rode several days every week under the scalding sun from tenancy to tenancy, checking on what the families needed. She helped with everything from building rat traps around henhouses to reading tales of princesses and dragons to children, and Elodie loved every moment of it. She had been raised for this. As her mother used to say, giving yourself to others is the noblest sacrifice.“What Elodie means,” Lord Bayford said smoothly, “is that she doesn’t mind getting her hands dirty.”Thank goodness Father is still in charge, Elodie thought. One day she would be duchess of these lands. But for now, it was a relief that the duchy had the charismatic Richard Bayford at its helm.Elodie kept an ear on the conversation as Immanuel detailed how much wood and how many nails he would need, but she turned her body so she could look past the dusty landscape to the open water beyond. Ever since she was a child, the sea had soothed her, and as she focused