Power & Majesty (29 page)

‘Bitch!’ he screamed, and backhanded her. Delphine rocked back against the wall and fell in a crumpled heap.

Right, well, that was enough then.

‘Get yer filthy hands away from her!’ Macready yelled, striding towards them. He was too short to be intimidating, but the accent usually did the trick for him. Everyone in Aufleur knew that Islandsers were crazy.

‘Who the hell are you?’ asked Teddy.

The fop hadn’t even glanced at the moaning figure of Delphine on the ground. He was far more concerned with shaking vomit from his pretty clothes.

‘I’m the feller who’s telling you to leave the lass alone,’ Macready said with just a touch of menace.

Teddy looked uncertain. ‘I said I’d see her home.’

‘Fine job you’re doing of it too,’ Macready laughed. ‘Get out of here, friend. That shirt of yours will need to soak.’

Teddy glanced down at the horror show that remained of his very expensive suit. ‘Real silk,’ he muttered. ‘Fine, you’re welcome to her.’ He walked away, putting his hands in his pockets.

Macready muttered a word that would have made his mammy bat him around the head with a ladle. He stared down at the crumpled heap that was Delphine. ‘And luckily,’ he said with heavy irony, ‘I know where you live.’ He knelt, brushing back her short blonde hair. ‘Come on, lass. Let’s have those lids open.’

She moaned as she recognised him. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I’m a free service they offer with every twelve tots of gin. Can you get yourself to your feet?’

‘Noooo.’

Macready pulled out a handkerchief and rubbed vomit from her lips. She had managed to keep her dress completely clear of it—obviously the lass had hidden talents. ‘Be glad your stomach’s empty then. If you wish to be carried, it’ll be over my shoulder.’

‘Go away,’ she sighed, closing her eyes again. ‘Leave me here to die.’

Macready looked up and down the little alley. No one in sight, and they were a long way from the safety of her front door. ‘Sadly, my lovely, that’s not an option.’

A
shiol fell out of the sky and crashed hard on grass and stone. This was someone’s elegant courtyard garden, set into the steepest side of the Avleurine hill. He spat blood, and gasped for air. When he had recovered enough strength to move his body, he rolled on his back and stared up.

Velody was still fighting the terrors above. She soared across the blistering sky, her talons outstretched. It was beautiful to watch her. She danced back and forth as lightly as that needle of hers when she was hemming cloth. Ashiol breathed in and out for a few moments, noting a new rasp on one of his lungs, and watched Velody save the city.

‘Quite a sight,’ said a light voice above him as Poet melted out of the shadows.

Ashiol chose not to sit up. He was quite comfortable where he was. ‘She doesn’t do too badly.’

‘Indeed,’ said Poet, his eyes following their Power and Majesty as she wrestled with the spreading sky pattern they had always called the burnplague. Motes of light spat from Velody’s fingers, quenching the dangerous mass
blister by blister. She was careful, as ever, not to let any of the acid touch her. ‘Why, she scarcely needs the Lords and Court to support her at all. Which would be why we have remained uninvited to join you in the sky for nearly four market-nines.’

‘She has to learn everything the sky has to throw at her,’ said Ashiol, trying not to sound defensive. ‘It’s more of a challenge if she handles it alone.’

‘You fight at her side,’ said Poet.

Ashiol swallowed an angry retort. ‘She is still in training.’

‘Of course. You wouldn’t want her to have to handle such business alone.’ Poet’s narrow eyes blazed down at Ashiol. ‘She should be accompanied by a warrior she can trust at her back. And that would not describe any Lord of our Court, naturally.’

Now Ashiol sat up, if only to place his back to Poet. ‘When Velody is more comfortable with the Court, she will make greater use of your…talents.’

‘How is she to become more comfortable with us, my King, if she never comes near us?’

Ashiol had known this was coming. ‘She must build up her strength and skills before she is ready to deal with the Court.’

‘The Court who swore allegiance to her as Power and Majesty?’ said Poet. ‘Yes, I can see why you might wish to shield her from us.’

‘Lords and Court have forsworn themselves before,’ Ashiol growled. ‘She’s not like us, Poet. She doesn’t know the intricacies of the Creature Court, the challenges and pissing contests, the language of body and blood—’

‘And how, my King, shall she ever learn our dance if she is not allowed to take that first step?’ Poet was so close behind Ashiol that his breath tickled his ear. ‘I want this demme to rule us, truly rule us as our Power and Majesty should. Do you want the same?’

Fury rose up in Ashiol’s chest. He restrained himself
from swinging around and punching Poet through the face. ‘Do you presume to know better than me?’

There was no response. When Ashiol did look behind him, Poet was gone. ‘Damned rat moves faster than I do,’ he muttered.

Velody swooped overhead, catching Ashiol’s eye as she blasted the last of the burnplague blisters back where they came from. For a moment, his blood sang with pride.
Why in hellfire shouldn’t I try and keep her away from the monsters for as long as possible?

Poet’s taunting voice still gnawed at him though, somewhere low in his spine.
So what’s going to happen, little King, when she finally has to dance with the monsters? You’ll have a fight on your hands to stop them eating her alive. The moment your back’s turned, who’ll keep her safe and whole and sane?

He had to put that out of his mind now, he had to. When things got rough, Velody would be strong enough to handle it.
She’ll have to be.

Finally, the sky was clean and clear. Velody withdrew from chimaera shape and glided down through the nox air to where she had left Crane and, more importantly, her clothes. She was glowing with triumph. She hadn’t panicked when Ashiol was hurled out of the sky, and she had definitely outclassed him in this particular battle.

‘Did you see?’ she called out eagerly to Crane as her feet touched down on the soft lawn of the highest slope of the Alexandrine, in the grounds surrounding the Church of the Faceless Child.

The sentinel brought her silk coat to her and stood behind her to wrap it around her bare shoulders, helping her shrug into the sleeves. ‘Very nice.’

‘Is that the best you can do?’ she asked indignantly, turning so fast that she didn’t give him time to lower his arms. She stood for a moment in his loose embrace, breathing hard. His eyes held her, and she backed away a
step or two.
Careful, Velody. You’re power-drunk after battle. Keep the flirting to a minimum.

She was beginning to understand why half the Court had fallen into bed with each other at one time or another. It was heady and rich, this afterglow of battle. Nox after nox, she fought her instincts to throw herself into Ashiol’s arms and find out if their bodies would choreograph as well together in private as they did in the sky. A sense of self-preservation had kept her from making that particular move though. Ashiol was a predator through and through, and she was vulnerable enough without making it a hundred times worse.

Crane was another matter. Oh, so pretty, and she didn’t miss the look of admiration that filled his eyes when he was near her. Every pore in her body told her he was safe, that he would never hurt her.

Still, she had promised herself to resist this new sensuality as much as possible. The last thing she needed was complications, and sleeping with one of her sentinels would create more complications than even she could imagine.

A teasing look came over Crane’s face. ‘What do you want me to say, Majesty?’

She belted her coat firmly. ‘Perhaps a more effusive compliment than “very nice”?’

Crane hesitated.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing. You don’t need me to tell you how good you are in the sky.’

‘I suppose not.’ She frowned. ‘So what aren’t you saying?’

‘Majesty?’ he replied innocently.

‘Don’t “Majesty” me. You’ve got doubts. Tell me what they are.’

‘It’s just…you haven’t been down below yet, have you?’

Velody’s lips thinned a little. It was a sore subject. Ashiol had described the underground city of the Arches so well
that she thought she could find her way through the Shambles to the Haymarket without a map to guide her, and yet there was always an excuse to prevent her from actually setting foot in the place.

‘He doesn’t think I’m ready yet to deal with the Court in their territory,’ she said.

Too much time spent with the sentinels lately. When any of them said ‘he’, they meant Ashiol. She would not be surprised to learn that an unqualified ‘she’ meant Velody every time. Strange, to be the centre of somebody’s world after barely a month of acquaintance. Stranger, perhaps, that Ashiol and the sentinels had so quickly become the centre of hers.

Crane’s head snapped up. ‘Not their territory, Velody. Yours. And I don’t think you should be waiting for Ashiol to tell you when you’re ready to deal with the Court, above or below. You’re the Power and Majesty. Aren’t you?’

She sucked in a breath. That
Aren’t you?
was verging on rebellion. How long had Crane felt like this? Would Macready and Kelpie back him up if they were here? ‘The Court haven’t touched me yet. None of them have challenged my authority. I’ve barely seen any of them since that nox in the Gardens.’

‘They’re frightened of Ashiol,’ said Crane. ‘
He
keeps them at bay. Half of the Creature Court think he’s still out for revenge for what happened to him last time he was among us, and the other half…they’re biding their time. As soon as they think you’re worth ripping apart, they will. The minute Ashiol’s back is turned.’

‘You have a great deal of faith in my abilities,’ Velody said sharply.

Crane clenched his fists. The look he shot her was so blazing that she was surprised it didn’t burn her skin. ‘This isn’t a game, Velody.’

‘I never thought it was.’ She used what she had come to think of as her ‘political’ voice, the calm and measured speech of a King to her subjects. So far she had only been
able to try it out on the sentinels—it had little effect on Ashiol for some reason. ‘Your concerns are genuine, Crane, but your anger…I don’t understand where your anger is coming from.’

The voice did its trick. Crane breathed in deeply, his fists uncurling. Finally he sighed and dropped to his knees. ‘Forgive me, Majesty. I forgot myself.’

She bit off an entreaty to drop the formality. If he felt the need for it, who was she to deny it him? She moved towards him and laid her hands on his fair hair. They touched each other so easily, Ashiol and the sentinels, and she had no doubt that it reflected the way the whole Creature Court were with each other. There was an entire language to touching that she was slow to learn. Living with Rhian had schooled her to avoid even the most casual of touches for the longest time.

His sigh told her that the touch had been appropriate. The tension was already leaving his body. She stroked his hair gently. ‘What’s wrong, Crane?’

‘I’m on edge.’

‘
Really
?’ she responded in mock surprise. Crane laughed at that, which she saw as a positive sign. She knelt beside him, taking his hands in hers. More touching, carefully calculated. ‘You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.’

‘This is how you should win over the Court,’ he said, half-serious. ‘They’ve been bullied and ruled and kinged over for so long. I don’t think anyone ever thought of mothering them to death.’

‘Tell me what’s wrong, or I’ll send you to bed without supper.’ That joke didn’t go down nearly as well.

Crane’s face was still. ‘Our Captain died three years ago this nox. The eve of Vestalia is a hard anniversary. That’s all.’

Velody squeezed his hands between hers. ‘Is that why Macready was like a bear with a sore head all evening?’

‘And why Kelpie worked herself to exhaustion over the last few days, so she wouldn’t even be awake for it. Yes.’

‘I’m sorry. I’ve never lost anyone close. You’ve all lost so much.’

It wasn’t entirely true. She was still troubled by the dreams, the overlapping memories of the family who had loved her. Several times she caught herself about to relate an anecdote about one of her brothers, and then she would press her lips together and walk away. It was an old hurt even if the memories were fresh.

Crane’s hands were hot under hers. At least, she thought they were. It was hard to draw the line between her ordinary Velody senses and the otherworldly senses that belonged to the Creature King and the Power and Majesty. Heat poured off the young sentinel in waves.

‘There are compensations,’ he said, and there was a tremor in his voice. Slowly, he lifted her right hand and kissed it across the knuckle.

It occurred to Velody that the heat might not be coming from Crane after all. It was her. She was overwhelmed by the scent of him, sandalwood and wool and skin.
I promised myself I wouldn’t do this
, she thought desperately, but the thought wasn’t enough to stop her kissing him back as his mouth tipped up to hers and his hands slipped around her.

Too much touching, far too much touching!
Her flesh came alive with the thought of how easy it would be for him to unknot the belt of her silken coat and have her naked in his lap…

Ashiol’s nearby presence was like a bucket of cold water. Velody drew back in a hurry, brushing her coat as if to erase Crane’s fingerprints from the fabric.

‘You did well,’ said Ashiol as he came out of the darkness, unclothed and glowing like a Lord. The burns from the skyblisters still marked his torso, but he was oddly calm. Last time he was thrown from the sky in mid-battle, the anger had rolled off him for hours afterwards.

Crane hesitated for a fraction of a moment before he grabbed Ashiol’s long black coat and handed it to him.

Velody took advantange of the moment to look for the rest of her clothes, and found them neatly piled in the shelter of the church’s portico. The combination of skirt and wraparound blouse was the best arrangement for these noxtime romps—she was pleased to be able to slide on the long wool skirt without disrupting her long coat. Normally she could cope with being naked around Ashiol, but it seemed inappropriate this nox. The mere thought of nudity was enough to make her blush hotly.

If she had sensed Ashiol approaching, what had he sensed? Did he know what had been going on with Velody and Crane? Saints, did he know what she was
thinking
at the time? That would be so much worse.

Ashiol was also fully clothed when she returned to the two men. ‘I liked the way you did those rapid transformations,’ he said. ‘You’re more relaxed in the sky these days.’

‘Yes,’ she said.

Crane didn’t seem bothered by their near miss. Was it usual for sentinels and Kings to be physically close in all senses of the word? Velody knew there had been something between Ash and Kelpie at some time, though neither of them gave much sign of it.

‘When was your birthday?’ Ash asked suddenly.

Velody blinked before realising that it wasn’t her he was talking to.

‘Lupercal,’ said Crane, a little defensively.

‘You’re overdue for your swords. Shall we see the Smith tomorrow? If the Power and Majesty approves.’

Velody nodded. Ashiol had a tendency to let her know of her duties in this roundabout manner. He really was the Power and Majesty in all but name. She didn’t have the knowledge or confidence—let alone the desire—to do it alone yet.

I have to face the Court sooner or later.

Perhaps if they continued in this fashion for long enough, Ashiol would realise that he could do a perfectly good job himself as Power and Majesty. Velody could go
back to her life as if all this had been a strange, dreamlike holiday. It was difficult to imagine this otherworldly rooftop existence as being anything but temporary. Apart from anything else, the life expectancy wasn’t all that promising. Except for Priest, every member of the Court was under forty years old.