A Lick of Frost

"Frost," I said, and reached out, but it ran. It ran for the far windows over the acre of marble. It ran as if the surface wasn't slick for hooves. It ran as if it weighed nothing. I thought it would crash into the glass, but French doors that had never been there before opened so that the great stag could run out into the new land beyond.

The doors closed behind him, but the doors did not go away. Apparently, the room was flexible still.

I turned in Doyle's arms so I could see his face. It was him looking out of his eyes now, not the Consort. "Is Frost…"

"He is the stag," Doyle said.

"But does that mean he's gone as our Frost?"

The look on his dark face was enough.

"He's gone," I said.

"He is not gone, but he is changed. Whether he will change back to the man we knew, only Deity knows."

He wasn't dead, exactly. But he was lost to me. Lost to us. He would not be a father to the child we had made. He would never be in my bed again.

What had I prayed? That he would come back to me. If I had worded it differently would he still have transformed into an animal? Had my words been the wrong ones?

"Do not blame yourself," Doyle said. "Where there is life of any kind there is always hope."

Hope. It was an important word. A good word. But in that moment, it didn't seem enough.

CHAPTER 24

"I DON'T CARE HOW MANY GALLY-TROTS YOUR MAGIC CALLS back," Ash said. "You swore you would lay with us, and you have not done so." He paced the room, hands pulling at his short blond hair as if he would pull it out.

Holly sat on the large white couch with the Gally-trot lying on its back in his lap, or in as much of his lap as it would fit, which meant it filled up a large portion of the large couch. Holly ruffled the dog's chest and stomach. Holly of the hot temper seemed more relaxed than I'd ever seen him.

"The sex was so she'd bring us into our powers. She's brought us power."

"Not sidhe-sided power," Ash said, coming to stand in front of his brother.

"I would rather be goblin," Holly said.

"I would rather be king of the sidhe," Ash said.

"The princess has told you that she is with child," Doyle said.

"You've come too late to the party," Rhys said.

"And whose fault is that?" Ash asked. He came to stand in front of me now. "If you had only bedded us a month ago, then we would have had our chance."

I stared up at him, too numb to react to his anger and disappointment. Someone had put a blanket around me. I huddled in it, cold. Colder than I knew how to cure. So fu

There were diplomatic answers I could have given. There were many things I could have said, but I simply didn't care. I didn't care enough to mind my tongue.

I stared up at him. Galen slipped onto the couch beside me. He curled his arm around my shoulders. I snuggled in against him. I let him hold me. He had been standing with the others whom Doyle had called into the living room. Standing in case Ash's anger got the better of his sense. The goblin's anger had been so great that Doyle and Rhys were still standing. They wanted to be up and ready. In case this oh so reasonable brother lost his head.

Galen held me, closer now, but it wasn't for fear of Ash. I think he was afraid of what I might do. He was right to be afraid, because I was so unafraid. I felt nothing.

"Your king, Kurag, is happy with the new strength that has returned to the Red Caps," I said. "He is overjoyed at the Galley-trot. When your king is happy, warrior, you are supposed to be happy in his joy." My voice sounded cold but not empty. There was an edge of anger in my voice like a crimson thread in a field of white.

"If we were sidhe, but we are goblin, and kings are fragile things."

Galen moved a little forward beside me. I read his mind, and knew the goblin did, too. He would shield me with his body. But it wasn't that kind of fight.

"Kurag is our ally. If he dies the treaty between us dies with him."

"Yes," Ash said. "Yes, it does."

I laughed, and it was an unpleasant laugh. The kind of laugh you make because you can't cry yet.

The sound startled Ash. It made him take a step backward from me. No anger would have gotten such a reaction, but laughter, he didn't understand it.

"Think before you threaten, goblin. If Kurag dies then we are honor bound to avenge him," I said.

"The Unseelie Court is forbidden to interfere directly in the line of succession of its subsidiary courts," Ash said.

"That is a bargain that the Queen of Air and Darkness made. I am not my aunt. I have made no such agreement to limit my powers."

"Your guards are great warriors, but they ca

"As I am not bound by my aunt's agreement, I am not bound by goblin rules."

Ash looked uncertain, as if he was thinking on what I had said but hadn't figured it out yet.

It was Holly who said it. "What will you do, Princess, send your Darkness to assassinate us?" He was still ruffling the huge dog, but his face was no longer simply happy. His red eyes stared at me with a weight and intelligence that I hadn't seen before in him. It was a look more often seen on his brother's face.

"He is no longer merely my Darkness. He will be king." But that had been what I was thinking.

"That is another thing that makes no sense," Ash said. He pointed at Doyle. "How can he be king and father of your child, and he," he pointed at Rhys, "and he?" and at Galen last. "Unless you are having a litter, Princess Meredith, you can't have three fathers."

"Four," I said.

"Who…" Then a look crossed his face and the first bit of caution.

"Killing Frost," Holly said.

"Yes," I said, and my voice was back to sounding empty. My chest actually hurt. I'd heard the phrase brokenhearted, but I hadn't actually felt it before. I'd come close, but never truly. My father's death had destroyed me. My fiancé's betrayal had crushed me. When I thought I'd lost Doyle a month ago in the battle, I had felt like my world would end. But until now, I had not truly been heartbroken.

"You can't have four fathers for two children," Ash insisted, but he had calmed a little. It was almost as if he saw my pain for the first time. I didn't think he cared that I was in pain, but it made him more cautious.

"You're too young to remember Clothra," Rhys said.

"I've heard the story, we've all heard the story, but that was just a story," Ash said.

"No," Rhys said, "it was not. She had a single child by all of her brothers. He was marked by each of them. The boy became high king. He was called Lugaid Riab nDerg, of the red stripes."

"I always thought the stripes referred to some kind of birthmark," Galen said.

Doyle's deep voice filled the room, and held an echo of godhead. "I saw that the princess will have two children. They will have three fathers each, as Clothra's son did."

"Don't try your sidhe magic on me," Ash said.

"It is not sidhe magic, it is god magic, and the same Deities serve and are served by all of feykind," Doyle said.

I was ru

"Mistral and Sholto."

I stared at him.

"But that was a month ago," Galen said.

"A month ago," Doyle said, "and do you remember what we did when we arrived back in Los Angeles that night?"

Galen seemed to think about it, then he said, "Oh." He kissed me on the top of my head. "But I didn't even have intercourse with Merry. We'd all agreed I'd make a lousy king. Oral sex doesn't get you pregnant."

"Kiddies," Rhys said, "the raw magic of faerie was out that night. I was still Cromm Cruach, with the ability to heal and kill with a touch. Merry had given life to the dead gardens with Mistral and Abe. She had raised the wild hunt with Sholto. Wild magic was out that night. We were all touched by it. The rules are different when that kind of magic is out and about."