A Kiss of Shadows (43 page)

“Three.”

“Be reasonable,” I said.

“Five,” he said.

“Eight,” I countered.

He grinned. “Six.”

“Done,” I said.

Kurag stared at me for a heartbeat or two. “Done.” He said it softly, as if even at the moment he spoke he was sure it was the wrong thing to do.

I raised my voice so it would carry throughout the room, standing with feet braced wide apart. It must have looked like an aggressive stance, but I wasn't trying for aggressive. I was trying not to let my body sway to the swirling inside my head. “The alliance is forged.”

Kurag raised his own voice. “Forged only after you share flesh with my goblin.”

I held my hand out to Kitto. He laid his hand on top of mine, a light touch of smooth flesh. I raised his hand up to my face. I tried to bend down and kiss the back of his hand, but the room swam. I had to straighten up and raise his hand with both of mine, spreading the small perfect fingers wide. I'd never held a man's hand that was smaller than my own. Sucking a finger would have been the most sexual thing I could do, but I'd sucked the last piece of flesh I wanted tonight. I laid a gentle but full kiss on his open palm. I didn't leave a lipstick print behind, which meant I'd worn it all off sucking on Kurag's arm.

Kitto's strange eyes widened.

I raised my mouth away from his hand, slowly, so that I rolled my eyes at Kurag as I came up over the goblin's hand, as if it were a fan. “We'll get around to sharing flesh, Kurag, don't worry. Now join me, Kitto. The queen awaits me and all my men.”

Kitto darted a glance at Kurag, then back to me. “I am honored.”

I looked up at the tall king. “Remember this, Kurag, as I share flesh with Kitto in the nights to come: that it was your own lust and cowardice that gave him to me, and me to him.”

Kurag's face changed from yellow to a dark orange. His great hands balled into fists. “Bitch,” he said.

“I spent many a night at your court, Kurag. I know that to have me share myself with another sidhe is nothing to you. For only sharing flesh with a goblin is true sex to you. Anything less is merely foreplay. And you have given me over to another goblin, Kurag. The next time you try and trick me into your bed, think where your trickery has gotten you and me.”

I felt my strength ebb as I finished the speech. I stumbled, just a step. Strong hands caught me at both arms—Doyle on one side, Galen on the other. I looked from one to the other of them and managed to whisper, “I need to sit down, soon.”

Doyle nodded. Galen kept his arm at my elbow and slid his other arm around my waist. Doyle's hold stayed on my arm but became firm as stone. I let go with my upper body, letting them take most of my weight while to other eyes I appeared to be standing just fine. I'd perfected this particular technique many times being dragged by the Guard before my aunt, when she demanded I stay on my feet and I couldn't do it alone. Some of the guards would help you pull the trick off. Some would not. Walking was going to be interesting.

Doyle and Galen turned me toward the open doors. One high heel scraped loudly on the stones. I had to do better than that. I concentrated on picking my feet up just enough to walk, but Galen and Doyle were holding me up. The world narrowed down to me putting one foot in front of the other. Gods, but I wanted to go home. But the queen was waiting, and being kept waiting wasn't one of her strong suits.

I caught a glimpse of Kitto moving just behind us and to one side. According to goblin etiquette, he was my consort, my boy-toy. Yes, he could hurt me during sex, but only if I were stupid enough to get into bed with him without negotiating a contract of what was and was not acceptable. Rhys's injuries could have been saved if he'd known goblins, but most of the sidhe simply saw them as barbarians, savages. Most did not study the law of savages, but my father had.

Of course, I wasn't planning on having sex of any kind with the goblin. I was planning to share flesh with him—literally. The goblins loved flesh better than blood or sex. To share flesh meant both sex and the greater gift of an allowed bite that would leave a scar until your lover died. It was a way of marking your lover, showing that they'd been with a goblin. Many goblins had special scar patterns that they used for all their lovers so that people would see their conquests at a glance.

But whatever I had to do to cement the bargain, I had the goblins as my allies for the next six months. My allies, not Cel's, not even the queen's. If there was a war between now and six months from now, the queen would have to negotiate with me if she wished the goblins to fight on her behalf. That was worth a little blood, and maybe even a pound of flesh, if I didn't have to lose it all at once.

Chapter 32

 

A DIP LAY IN THE STONES JUST INSIDE THE DOOR. A PLACE WHERE FEET
have turned for thousands of years, pivoting on their heels to mount the low dais to either side of the room. I could have walked this floor in the absolute dark, but tonight I tripped on the small depression in the floor. Sandwiched between two guards, I should have been solid as inside a wall, but my ankle twisted and threw me so violently into Doyle that it brought Galen with me. Doyle caught us for an instant, then we were all in a heap on the floor.

Kitto was there first, offering a hand to Galen. I caught the look on Galen's face as he stared at that small hand, but he took it. He allowed the goblin to help him to his feet. There were other guards who would have spit on the hand instead of taking it.

It was Frost, one hand holding my knife, who took my hand and raised me to my feet. He wasn't looking at me. He was searching the area for threats. It had been subtle. If the spell had been a little less vicious, I might have chalked it up to blood-loss-induced clumsiness on my part, but the spell had been too large, too much. You did not bring down two of the royal guard in an unceremonious heap because the woman in the middle tripped.

Frost's hand forced me to take my full weight on my own two feet, and one of my feet wasn't up to it. Pain shot through my left ankle. I gasped, going to one foot. Frost had to catch me around the waist, lifting me completely off the ground, pressed against his body, encircled in his arm. He was still searching for the attack—the attack that wasn't coming, not here, not now.

Rhys was moving around the floor, checking for other traps. None of us moved very much until he nodded, still crouched on the floor.

Doyle was on his feet. He hadn't taken out the other knife. He met my eyes. “How badly are you hurt, Princess?”

“Twisted ankle, maybe the knee, too. Frost swept me off my feet before I could tell.”

That earned me a glance from Frost. “I can put you down, Princess.”

“I'd rather you carry me to a chair.”

He looked at Doyle. “It's not a matter for knives, is it?” He sounded almost wistful.

“No,” Doyle said.

Frost snapped the blade closed one-handed. To my knowledge he'd never handled a folding knife of any sort, but he made the gesture look smooth and practiced. He slid the blade into the back of his waistband and scooped me up in his arms.

“What chair would you prefer?” he asked.

“This one,” the queen said. She was standing in front of her throne on the far raised dais. Her throne rose above everyone else's, as befit her position. But there were two smaller thrones on the dais just below her own, reserved for the consort and the heir, usually. Tonight, Eamon was standing at her side, his chair empty.

Cel was sitting in the other small throne. Siobhan was at his back. Keelin was at his feet on a small cushioned stool, like a lap dog. Cel was looking at his mother, and there was something very close to panic on his face.

Rozenwyn moved up beside Siobhan. She was Cel's second in command, Frost's equivalent. Her cotton-candy hair was piled in a crown of braids atop her head, like a bowl woven of pink Easter grass. Her skin was the color of spring lilacs, her eyes molten gold. I'd thought her lovely when I was small, until she made it clear that I was lesser than she. It was Rozenwyn's hand-shaped scar across my ribs, she who had almost crushed my heart.

Cel stood so violently that it slid Keelin down the steps with the leash straining between them. He never looked at her as she got to her feet. “Mother, you cannot do this.”

She looked at him, hand still guiding us toward Eamon's empty chair. “Oh, but I can, Son. Or have you forgotten that I am still queen here?” There was an edge to her voice such that, if it had been anyone but Cel, they'd have thrown themselves down on the floor in an abject bow, waiting for the blow to fall. But it was Cel, and she'd always been soft with him.

“I know who rules here now,” Cel said. “What I am concerned with is who shall rule after.”

“That, too, is my concern,” she said, still in that so calm, so dangerous voice. “I wonder who could have set such a powerful spell just inside the throne room without anyone else noticing it.” She looked around the huge room, settling her gaze on each face in its small throne. There were sixteen chairs on each side of the room on raised daises. Smaller chairs clustered around them, but the main chairs held the heads of each royal family. She studied them, especially the ones nearest the doors. “I don't see how anyone could have worked such a spell and had no one notice it.”

I looked at the sidhe nearest the doors and they avoided my gaze. They knew. They had seen. And they had done nothing.

“Such a powerful spell,” Andais continued. “If my niece had not been supported by two guards she might have fallen and broken her neck.” Frost was still standing with me in his arms but had made no move to come closer. “Bring her, Frost. Let her sit beside me as she is meant to,” Andais said.

Frost carried me forward. Doyle and Galen bracketed him, one right, the other left. Rhys and Kitto came like a rear guard.

Frost went to both knees on the bottom step that led up to the throne. He knelt with me in his arms as if it were no strain, as if he could have stayed like that all night, and there would have been no tremble in his arms. I wondered briefly if his knees ever fell asleep from being forced to kneel too long.

The others dropped to their knees a little behind and to either side of us. Kitto didn't just go to his knees, he flattened himself to the floor, facedown, arms and legs outstretched like some kind of religious penitent. I hadn't fully appreciated his problem until then. There were very specific types of bows and curtseys that you gave depending on your rank and the rank of the person being met. Kitto was not royal even among the goblins. If he had been, Kurag would have mentioned it. It had been a double insult to give me a goblin that was also a commoner. Kitto was not allowed to touch the steps except with express invitation. Only members of other sidhe royal houses were allowed to go to both knees in the throne room, without bowing the body in any way.

Kitto didn't know what the protocol was, so he'd taken the absolute lowest road. I knew in that instant that he'd cooperate with taking flesh instead of sex. He was more interested in staying alive than in any false sense of pride.

“Come, sit, Meredith. Let us make this announcement before another trap is sprung.” She glanced at Cel when she said that last. He was my bet for the spell, too, but only because he was always one of my first choices when something nasty happened to me in the court. Andais had always looked the other way for Cel's sake. Something had happened between them, something that had changed Andais's attitude toward her only son. What had he done to turn her from him?

Frost stood in one easy motion and carried me up the steps. I could feel his legs push us upward as he carried me. He laid me gently in the chair, sliding his hands out from under my body. He went down on one knee in front of me, cradling my left foot in his lap.

I looked out into the room. I'd never been allowed on the dais. I'd never seen the view from up here. It wasn't so very high, or so very grand, but there was a sense of rightness to it.

“Bring a stool for Meredith to prop her ankle upon. When I have made my announcements, then Fflur may attend her.” She seemed to be speaking to no one in particular, but a small cushioned footstool floated toward us. I looked out of the corner of my eyes, deliberately not looking directly at the floating stool. A pale wisp of a shape showed like a white shadow holding the small stool in slender ghostly hands. The white lady set the stool beside Frost's leg. I felt that pressure as if the weight of thunder filled a small piece of air. It was the feel of a ghost standing far too close. I didn't have to see her to know she was there now. Then the pressure eased, and I knew she'd floated away.

Frost lifted my foot onto the much lower stool. I swallowed a gasp at the movement, but the pain had helped clear my head. I didn't feel faint anymore. It was the third attempt on my life in a single night. Someone was very determined.

Frost moved to stand behind my chair as Siobhan shadowed Cel, as Eamon had moved back to stand by the queen.

Andais stared out over the assembled nobles. The goblins and lesser folk, those invited at all, had spilled back in to fill the long ornate tables to either side of the room. But even Kurag did not have a throne to sit upon in this room. He was just one of the rabble here.

“Let it be known that Princess Meredith NicEssus, daughter of my brother, is now my heir.”

A gasp ran through the room from mouth to mouth like a wind, until there was nothing but silence. A silence so thick that the white ladies rose into the air like half-seen clouds and began to dance on the tension of it.

Cel was on his feet. “Mother.”

“Meredith has come into her power at last. She bears the hand of flesh as did her father before her.”

Cel was still standing. “My cousin must have used the hand in mortal combat, and have been blooded in front of at least two sidhe witnesses.” He sat down looking confident again.

The queen gave him a look so cold that his confidence faded from his face, leaving him unsure. “You speak as though I do not know the laws of my own kingdom, my son. All has been accomplished according to our traditions. Sholto!” she called.

Sholto stood from his big chair near the door. Black Agnes was on one side of him, Segna the Gold on the other. Nightflyers hung from the ceiling like great bats. Other creatures of the sluagh filled in around him. Gethin waved at me.

“Yes, Queen Andais,” Sholto said. His hair was tied back from a face that was as handsome, as arrogant as any in the room.

“Tell the court what you have told me.”

Sholto told of Nerys's attack on me, though not why she'd done it. He told an edited version of the events, but there was enough. He did not mention Doyle, though, and I found it a strange thing to leave out.

The queen stood. “Meredith is equal to Cel, my own son, in all things. But as I have only one throne for them to inherit, it will go to the one who is with child first. If Cel makes one of the court women with child within three years, then he will be your king. If Meredith is with child first, then she will be your queen. To ensure that Meredith has her choice of the court's men, I have lifted my Guard's celibacy geas for her and her alone.”

The ghosts whirled overhead like happy clouds, and the silence deepened as if we were all sitting at the bottom of some deep, shining well. The looks on the men's faces ran from surprise to disdain to shock, and some went straight to lust. But in the end almost every male face turned to me.

“She is free to choose any among you.” Andais sat down on her throne, spreading her skirts out around her. “In fact, I believe she has already begun the selection.” She turned those pale grey eyes to me. “Haven't you, Niece?”

I nodded.

“Then bring them forth, let them sit at your side.”

“No,” Cel said, “she must have two sidhe witnesses. Sholto is only one.”

Doyle spoke, still kneeling. “I am the other.”

Cel slowly sat back down on his own throne. Even he would not be so bold as to question Doyle's word. Cel stared at me, and the hate in his eyes was hot enough to burn along my skin.

I turned from his hatred to gaze at the men who were still kneeling at the foot of the dais. I held my hands out to them. Galen, Doyle, and Rhys rose and walked up the steps toward me. Doyle kissed my hand and took up his post beside Frost at my back. Galen and Rhys sat by my legs, the way Keelin sat beside Cel. It was a little subservient for my taste, but I wasn't sure what else to do. Kitto stayed pressed to the floor, motionless.

I turned to my aunt. “Queen Andais, this is Kitto, a goblin. He is part of my bargain with Kurag, Goblin King, to bind an alliance between the goblin kingdom and myself for six months.”

Andais's eyes raised upward. “You have been a very busy girl tonight, Meredith.”

“I felt the need of powerful allies, my queen,” I said. My eyes strayed to Cel even though I tried not to look at him.

“You must tell me later how you managed to get six months out of Kurag, but for now, call your goblin.”

“Kitto,” I said, holding my hand outward, “rise and come to my hand.”

He raised his face without moving his body. The movement looked almost painful in its awkwardness. His eyes flicked to the queen, then back to me. I nodded. “It's all right, Kitto.”

He looked back to the queen. She shook her head. “Get up off the ground, boy, so a doctor may attend your mistress's wounds.”

Kitto rose to all fours. When no one shouted at him, he came to his knees, then to one knee, then very carefully to his feet. He came up the steps too quickly, almost a run, and sat down at my feet with something like relief on his face.