Seduced by Moonlight

"And you would have us believe that this half-breed mortal has done what pure sidhe blood has not?" Miniver pointed at me in what I thought was an overly dramatic gesture, but it did show the sleeve of her dress to perfection, flashing the slits of cloth open so that the blue cloth of the underdress showed through. Sometimes if you've lived nearly forever, you think overly long about how things appear. "This abomination ca

I thought abomination was a little harsh, but I said nothing, for in a way it wasn't me she'd challenged, it was the queen.

"I say who will and who will not sit on the throne of this court, Miniver."

"Your obsession with a hereditary monarchy of your own bloodline will be the death of us all. We have all seen what happens on the dueling ground when one of us shares blood with that thing. They become mortal through the disease that her blood carries."

"Mortality is not a disease," Andais said, quietly.

"But it kills like one." Miniver looked out over the court, and there were a lot of faces turned to her. Many showed by either silence or nodding that they agreed with at least this much. They, too, had worried about my blood. "If this mortal becomes queen, then we are honor-bound to take blood oath from her, to bind us to her. To take blood oath, very much as we take on the dueling ground." Miniver looked up at Andais, and there was something close to pleading on her face. "Don't you see, my queen, if we take her blood into us and bind ourselves to her mortal peril, then we could lose our own immortality? We would cease to be sidhe."

It was Nerys who stood up and said, "We would cease to be anything."

Three, then four others of the noble houses of the Unseelie stood. They stood and showed their support for what Miniver had said. Six houses out of sixteen stood against me. That was something we had not foreseen. Or I had not.

Doyle had gone very still under my hand. All my men had gone very still, except the goblins at my feet and the Red Cap at my back. Either immortality didn't mean the same thing to them as it did to the sidhe, or other things were happening with the goblins. Things I had not quite grasped.

"I say who will be my heir," Andais said, "unless you wish to challenge me to personal combat, Miniver, Nerys, all of you. I will gladly fight you each in turn, and this arguing will cease."

Miniver shook her head. "Your answer to everything is death and violence, Andais. It has led us to be childless and near powerless, but our immortality, you ca

"Then challenge me, Miniver. Make yourself queen, if you can."

If Miniver's anger could have flown across the room and struck Andais, the queen would have died where she sat, but Miniver's anger did not have that kind of power. The day when the fey, any fey, could have killed with simply an angry thought was centuries past.

Andais looked at Nerys. "You, Nerys, do you wish to be queen? Do you wish it enough to challenge me to a duel? Defeat me and you can be queen."

Nerys just stood there, staring at her with tri-grey eyes that nearly mirrored the queen's own. Nerys's long black hair was done in a series of complicated braids that hung like a heavy cloak at her back. Her dress was white with touches of black in the trim, the belt, the lace at her wrists. She looked cool and collected. There was no sense of outrage that Miniver vibrated with.

"I would never presume to challenge the Queen of Air and Darkness to a duel. It would be suicide." Her voice was quiet, and somehow dark. But there was no anger in it, nothing that could give true offense.

"But attacking me from secret, an assassination attempt, that would not be suicide, would it?" Andais's smile was not pleasant. "Not if you didn't get caught."

Nerys just stood there, looking up at the throne, with no hint of fear, no panic, no anything. If Andais thought she could frighten Nerys into a confession, she was wrong. Nerys was going to force Andais to produce proof. Did she not understand that we had proof? Did she think that with Nuline's death, she was safe?

"Assassination is a pretty business, so long as you are not discovered." Andais looked down the line of standing nobles, I think so that she did not single Nerys out, but it was like many things tonight, in trying to do one thing, another thing was accomplished.

Miniver began to move through her people to the space between her table and the next. Some of her people touched her arm; she shook her head, and they let her go. She walked out from between the tables, her back ramrod-straight, like something carved of gold and amber.

"Do you have something to say, Miniver?" Andais asked.

"I challenge the princess Meredith to a duel." For someone who had seemed so angry, she was strangely calm as she said it.

People at her table cried, No, do not do this. She ignored them, and kept her Seelie face pointed toward the dais. She never looked at me, only at Andais. She asked for my life, but it was not me she asked it of.

"No, Miniver, it will not be so easy as all that. The princess has had one assassination attempt tonight. We do not need two."

"I would have preferred my spells to work earlier tonight, but if she will not die from a distance, then I will do it here, now."

My face gave nothing away, because it took a few seconds for me to realize what she'd said. Andais looked amused, her eyes glittering.

Doyle had stood, putting himself more in front of me. My other guards moved to shield me from her sight, and whatever she might do. I had to peer between them to see that more of the armored guards spilled around her to form a half circle. She was as tall as any of them, and there was nothing fragile or fearful about that shining figure. She seemed very sure of herself.

"Are you admitting, before the entire court, that you tried to assassinate Princess Meredith earlier tonight?" Andais asked.

"I am," Miniver said, and her voice rang through the room, matter-of-fact, as if now that the worst was happening she didn't need her anger anymore.

"Take her to the Hallway of Mortality, and leave extra guards."

They began to close around her, but Miniver's voice carried: "I have given challenge. That challenge must be answered before my punishment begins. That is our law." I think the guards might have managed to take her away, but there were other voices.

"Regrettable as it is to agree with such an undeniable criminal," Afagdu said, "Lady Miniver is correct. She has challenged the princess, and that challenge must be answered before any action may be taken about her crime."

Galen spoke from behind me. "So she tries to kill Merry earlier, fails, and now she gets another try. I don't think so."

"It is our law." Doyle's hand had reached out, and I took it, resting my face against the nude line of his hip. Nervous touching.

"No," Andais said, "the young knight is right. To allow her to go forward with this challenge is to reward her for trying to assassinate a royal heir. Such treachery will not be rewarded."

"When it was Cel and his allies who challenged the princess over and over, you did not intercede," Nerys said. "You were more than willing that Meredith take the field when it was your son behind the duels. We all knew that Cel meant her death. Meredith did her best to give no offense to anyone, yet sidhe after sidhe found an excuse to challenge her. When you challenge a mortal being to duel after duel against the immortal sidhe, what is it but an assassination plot by another name?"

Andais shook her head, not as if she did not agree but as if she didn't want to hear. "Take Miniver away, now!"

"No one is above the law, except the queen herself, and the princess is not yet queen." This from another of the lords who had stood when Miniver gave her rant against my mortality.