A Stroke Of Midnight

I could feel Frost’s body shudder against mine. “I thought what we endured by the queen’s hand was bad enough…” He shook his head. “Such stories.”

“We ca

“Being imprisoned and tortured isn’t going to improve that,” I said.

“No,” he said.

“Tell her the rest,” Frost said.

Doyle sighed. “You remember that the queen allowed Cel’s need to be slacked by one of his guards.”

I nodded. “Yes, and that night there was an attempt on both my life and the queen’s.”

“Yes, but we are still not absolutely certain Cel ordered it. It could simply have been those loyal to him moving in desperation to rescue him before he goes so mad that everyone sees him for what he is.”

“You think the nobles would refuse to follow him?”

“If he tried to do to the court what he has done to his guard, yes,” Doyle said.

I settled back in the curves of their bodies, fur and leather. “What has he done?”

“No, Meredith,” Doyle said, “perhaps later when we have the luxury of time and hours to go before we would sleep. None of it is comforting bedtime stories.”

“We have a murder investigation; trust me, we won’t see sleep for hours,” I said.

“What you need to know,” Doyle said, “is that he has fixated on you.”

“Fixated how?” I asked.

They exchanged another look. Doyle shook his head. But Frost said, “She needs to know, Doyle.”

“Then tell her. Why must I always be the bearer of such news?”

Frost blinked at him, and fought not to show on his face what he and I were thinking. We hadn’t known that bringing bad news bothered Doyle. He had been the Queen’s Darkness, and the Darkness could speak hideous truth and be unmoved, or so it had seemed. It was as if the one outburst had stripped Doyle of some part of himself.

Frost said, “As you will then.” He looked down at me. “He called one of the women guards by your name and swore that if his mother is so determined to have you with child, it will be his seed in your body.”

I looked into that handsome face, and wanted to ask if he were joking, but I knew he was not. It was my turn to shudder. “I would rather die.”

“I’m not certain he would care,” Doyle said softly.

“What do you mean by that?”

“One of the lesser fey died during one of Cel’s rapes.” Doyle sighed again, and a look came into his eyes I hadn’t seen often—fear. “He liked that she died during the sex. He continued to rape her corpse until her body became quite decayed.”

I felt the blood drain from my face.

“Or so his guard say,” Frost said.

“You saw their eyes, do you truly believe they lied?”

Frost let his breath out in a long sigh, and shook his head. “No.” He bent over me, hugging me, burying me beneath a spill of silver hair. “I am sorry, Meredith, but we felt you needed to know.”

“I was afraid of Cel before,” I said.

“Be more afraid now,” Doyle said. “Someone like that ca

“Power returns because of Meredith,” Frost said.

“Yes, but once power is reborn in the sidhe, it will be like a gun. It will not care how it is used.”

“The Goddess may abandon us forever if the power is misused,” I said.

“I thought as much, but think of the damage we could do before she took back her new gifts.”

We sat on the floor and contemplated new possibilities for even larger disasters. Doyle hugged me tight, then stood up, and shook himself like a dog. He settled the leather coat around his tall frame, and said, “I thought to keep the news of Cel and his new madness until after we had brought the police inside, but…” He slid the dark glasses over his eyes, so that he was the tall, dark, inscrutable Darkness. Only the silver shine of his earrings gave him color. “We will escort you to the police and the FBI. I am sorry for losing control as I did, Princess, and for delaying us further.”

I let Frost help me to my feet. “One fit in over a thousand years, I think you’re overdue.”

Doyle shook his head. “It is my fault that Rhys and the police are waiting in the cold. Inexcusable.”

I touched his arm, but it was hard muscle encased in leather, as if he could not allow himself any softness. “I don’t think it’s inexcusable.”

“If she comforts us again, we will be even later,” Frost said.

Doyle smiled, a quick flash of teeth. “It is nice to be comforted instead of punished.” He held up the fur cloak. “Please, just for now. We will find something else more to your liking, but just for now.”

I still didn’t like the idea of wearing the cloak, but after what I’d just heard about Cel and his guard, it seemed a lesser evil. I allowed him to put the cloak around me. “How does it look?” I asked.

The wall quivered like a horse’s skin when a fly lands. Doyle shoved me behind him. Frost already had his sword naked in his hand. Doyle aimed a gun at the rock wall.

A full length mirror surrounded by a gilt frame floated up through the stone, shining in the darkness of the room.

I peered at it around Doyle’s body, my pulse in my throat. “Where did that come from?”

Doyle still had a gun pointed very steadily at the bright surface. “I do not know.” Almost all the fey could use mirrors to make a sort of phone call. Doyle and some of the other sidhe could travel through mirrors. We stood waiting for a figure to appear, for something terrible to happen. But the mirror just hung on the wall, as if someone had put it there to be a mirror and nothing more.

The tip of Frost’s sword lowered.

Doyle glanced at us. “Why did it appear? Who sent it?”

Frost stepped closer to the mirror. “Meredith, look at yourself in the mirror.”

Doyle looked skeptical but he moved so I could see myself. The red and gold of the fur went well with my hair and skin, and brought out the gold in my eyes. With the hood up, I looked delicate and a little ethereal, like something between a Victorian Christmas card and a barbarian princess. Well, a small barbarian princess.

“Now, thank the sithen for the use of the mirror, and say you no longer need it.”

I frowned at him, but did as he suggested. “Thank you for the mirror, sithen. I do not need it right now.”

The mirror stayed on the wall, as if it had always been there.

“Please, sithen, a mirror could be used to harm her, please take it away,” Frost said.

It felt as if the very air shrugged, then the wall quivered again, and the mirror began to sink back into the wall. When the wall was empty stone once more I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.

“Are you saying the mirror appeared because I asked how I looked?”

“Hush,” Frost said, then he nodded.

“Now that,” Doyle said, “is interesting.”

“The sithen hasn’t answered to whims since—” Frost stopped as if trying to think how long.

“Long enough, my friend, that I, too, am not certain when the last time was.”

“So is this good,” I said, “or not?”

“Good,” Doyle said.

“But dangerous,” Frost added.

Doyle nodded. “I would be careful what I said aloud from now on, Meredith. An idle comment could have grave consequences, if the sithen has truly returned to that much life.”

“What do you mean?”

“The sithen is a living thing, but it does not think like any living thing I have ever known. It will interpret what you say in its own way. You ask how you look, and it gives you a mirror. Who knows what it might offer you, depending on what you said.”

“What if I yelled for help, would it do anything useful?” I asked.

“I do not know,” Doyle said. “I have heard of it giving you objects you asked for, but never touching people. But there are enchanted items locked within its walls, things that simply vanished. Some theorize that they did not go back to the gods, but inside the very walls. There are things that I would not want appearing before you without more help than this.”