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His voice had reminded me of the sound of chimes in a gentle wind. Now it was a painful croak. "You did not do this, Princess."
His eyes flickered toward what I knew was the outer door, though I could not see that part of the room. His face closed down, and for a moment where there had been hopelessness there was rage. A rage that he stuffed down, and hid behind eyes that showed as neutral a face as he could find.
I prayed that Andais hadn't seen that moment of rage. She'd try to beat it out of him if she had.
The queen swept into the room dressed in a loose, flowing black robe. It left open a triangle of white flesh, the flat perfection of her stomach and a trace of her belly button. There was a thin cord tied across the high, tight planes of her breasts that kept the front of the outfit from spilling open completely. There were long, wide sleeves that left most of her forearms bare. She must have been called away on important business to have put on that much clothing with Crystall still in her bed. He wasn't hurt enough for her to be finished with him.
She'd tied her long black hair back in a loose tail of hair. The ribbon she'd chosen was red. I'd never seen her wear red before, not even a spot of it. The only red the queen liked on her person was other people's blood.
I couldn't have explained it, but that red ribbon made my stomach clench tight, and my pulse speed. Andais slid onto the bed in front of Crystall, but close enough that she could stroke the untouched flesh of his back. She stroked him idly as you would a dog. He flinched at her first touch, then settled down and tried not to be there.
She looked at us with her tricolored eyes: charcoal, to the color of storm clouds, to a pale winter gray that was nearly white. Her eyes went so perfectly with the black hair and the pale skin. She was so made for Goth fashion, like Abe, except she was scarier than any Goth on the planet. Andais was serial-killer scary, and she was my father's sister, my queen, and there was nothing I could do about either.
"Aunt Andais," I said, "we have arrived from the hospital to tell you much news." We had already agreed that we needed to be clear from the begi
"My queen," Doyle said, doing an awkward sitting bow as far as the bandages would allow.
"I have heard many rumors this day," she said, in a voice that some thought was a throaty, seductive sound, but that had always filled me with dread.
"Goddess knows what the rumor's are," Rhys said as he moved back to stand by the bed, near me. "The truth is weird enough." He said it with a smile and his usual teasing lightness.
She gave him a flat look that was anything but friendly. There would be no lightening her mood if that look was any indication. She turned those angry eyes back to Doyle.
"What could possibly injure the Dark itself?" Her voice was angry, and almost disinterested. She knew, somehow she already knew. Who the hell had talked?
"When the Light appears, the Darkness must leave," Doyle said, in his best flat nothing voice.
She ran the bright redness of her lacquered nails down Crystall's back. She left red lines, though she didn't quite break the skin. Crystall turned his face away from the mirror and from her, afraid, I think, that he could not control his expression. "What light is bright enough to conquer the Darkness?" she asked.
"Taranis, King of Light and Illusion, is still potent in his hand of power," Doyle said, his voice even emptier than her own.
She dug fingernails into Crystall's back just below the shoulder blade, as if she meant to dig a handful of flesh out of his back. Blood began to show around her hand, like water filling a hole in the ground, slowly seeping upward.
"You seem preoccupied, Meredith. Whatever could be the matter?" Her voice was almost conversational, except for that edge of cruelty.
I decided to concentrate on the things that might distract her from tormenting the man in her bed. "Taranis attacked us through the mirror in the lawyer's office. He injured Doyle, and Abeloec. He was trying for me when Galen got to me safety."
"Oh, I doubt he meant to injure you, Meredith, even in his madness. I suspect he was trying for Galen."
I blinked at her. The way she said it meant that she knew something that we did not. "Why would he target Galen?"
"Ask yourself first, niece, why he accused Galen, Abeloec and Rhys of raping the Lady Caitrin." Her hand dug deeper into Crystall's flesh, causing tiny red lines to begin to trickle over his skin.
"I do not know, Aunt Andais," I said, and fought to keep my own voice even and empty. I was trying not to show either fear or anger, though right now, fear was by far the strongest emotion. She was pissed, and I didn't know why. If she knew about the offer of the Seelie throne to me, then she might be pissed at that, but if I blurted it out, she'd think I felt guilty and I didn't. She was always so difficult to deal with, like being in the middle of a minefield. You know you have to get to the edge, but how to do that without getting blown up, that was always the question.
"Oh, come, Meredith, think. Or are you so little Unseelie and so much Seelie that all you can think about is fertility?"
"I thought my fertility was supposed to be the thing I thought about most if I am to be your heir, Aunt Andais?"
She drew her fingers together, forcing a sound from Crystall. She'd made bloody scratches in his back like some evil flower carved into his flesh. She raised her pale hand so I could watch his blood drip down her fingers.
"Are you going to be my heir, Meredith, or is there another throne that calls to you more?"
There, she'd said enough that I could address it. "It is true that when Taranis was subdued by his nobles they offered me a chance at his throne."
"You told them yes." She hissed it at me, standing and striding toward the mirror.
"I did not. I told them we would have to discuss such news with our queen, with you, Aunt Andais, before I could say yes or no."
She was at the mirror now, blocking our view of the bed and Crystall. Her anger had awakened her power. Her skin was begi
"I heard you jumped at the chance, you ungrateful little bitch."
"You have been lied to then, Aunt Andais." I fought to keep my voice neutral.
"Yes, remind me that you are my bloodline, my last chance to have someone of my line to rule after me. If you would but get with child, Meredith. Goddess knows you're fucking everything in sight. Why are you not with child?"
"I do not know, Aunt, but I do know that we came directly here from the hospital. We came into the house and to this mirror. We came to call you and tell you all that has happened. I swear to you by the Darkness that Eats all Things that I did not tell the Seelie I would sit upon their throne. I told them we would have to speak to our queen before we could answer them."
Her eyes had begun to dim. Her power was begi
"You truly did not agree to sit on the golden throne and forsake our court?"
"I did not."
"I must believe you, niece of mine, but the Seelie Court is thick with knowledge that you will be the next Queen of their court."
Doyle reached across his body and touched me with his good arm at the same time that Rhys touched my shoulder. I touched Doyle's thigh lightly and laid my hand on Rhys's hand. "What they say, or think, I ca
"Why not?" she asked.
"I have friends and allies among the Unseelie Court. To my knowledge I have no such thing at the Seelie Court."
"You must have powerful allies there, Meredith. They are voting Taranis unfit to rule even as we speak. They will then vote you queen. They would not do that unless you had been approached by the nobles of that court. You must have been courted by them before now. There must have been many secret meetings that I did not know of, and that none of our guards reported to me."
I was begi
"I know Hugh. He is a political animal. He would not have offered it to you unless he had a reason to do so. You swear to me that he has never before approached you about this?"
"I swear," I said.
"Darkness, tell me exactly what happened?"
"I fear, my queen, that I will be useless for this. To my deep shame, I was unconscious through most of it."
"You don't seem that injured."
"Halfwen healed me at the hospital or I would still be there."
"Abeloec," she said.
Abe stirred behind us on the bed. He'd tried very hard to go u
"Do you know why Taranis would target you?"
He sat up slowly, careful of his back, and ended by half kneeling almost on all fours behind us. "Once my power was necessary for the choosing of a queen, as Meabh's power was to the choosing of a king. I think Taranis heard rumors that my power was returned to me, in part. I think he feared that I would help turn Meredith into a true queen of faerie. If we had known that any noble was dreaming of offering her the throne, then the accusations against me would have made some sense. He wanted me away from the princess."
"Galen," she said, "why did he target you?"
Galen looked flustered for a moment. He shook his head. "I don't know."