Song of the Fairy Queen (32 page)

“The patrols have already increased, because of the Hunters. I can add little there.” Kyri said, pacing.

She wandered over to the map table, eyeing it. Then she frowned, going still as cold rushed through her.

“Morgan, Oryan, when did these turn?” she asked, mildly alarmed, pointing to Haerold’s wandering forces.

That single finger of Haerold’s army, that branch, had moved.

Morgan came over to the table, looked at the placements and then at Oryan, before turning his eyes to Kyri.

Oryan said, puzzled, “Word came yesterday.”

“The Fair,” Morgan said.

A breath sighed out of her. “Yes. There’s a small glen near there.”

Oryan looked at Morgan, whose jaw had tightened. “A show of force then.”

Looking at both men, Kyri said, “It’s not so great a problem. We’re a very mobile people, the Fair. It will be an uprooting for those who live there, but not insurmountable. Haerold underestimated us there.” With a thin smile she shook her wings free as her eyes unfocused slightly. “They’re leaving even now.”

That was somewhat of a relief.

Morgan let out a breath.

“That’s what Haerold has been doing, searching for and identifying Fairy lands, holding his people in a central location until he had a glen located,” Morgan said.

“You still have to respond to that, though, Kyri,” Oryan said worriedly, “or risk facing open war. There will be some among the other Kingdoms who would see it as an act of disrespect to another King if you don’t.”

However much Morgan wanted to deny it, he couldn’t.

“It’s also a trap,” Morgan said, stating what they all knew, his fear for Kyri sharp. “For Kyri. So, we’ll have to plan around that as well.”

Pacing, Oryan said, “Sending an embassy won’t do.”

“We’ve seen what he did with my last one,” Kyri said.

They’d nearly forgotten.

Caernarvon.

Oryan took a breath and nodded.

She gave them both a look that was more like the old Kyri and rolled her eyes.

That eased Morgan a little.

Kyri took a long deep breath. “All right. So I must meet with him and expect both treachery and a trap. Meeting him on the steps of his castle isn’t a choice, not beneath and behind his walls with all those archers.”

“You have the right to change the meeting place, Kyri,” Oryan said.

“But to where?” she asked.

“We also can’t forget the wizard or wizards,” Morgan said, remembering the battering Kyri had taken when she’d come back for him.

“There are ways around her or them,” Kyri said.

Morgan fingered the pendant around his throat.

She smiled and shook her head.

“No, Morgan, that is one of mine,” she said, tapping it lightly, looking up at him. “My gift to you.”

It suddenly struck him what she meant.

His eyes went to her wings.

So, all along he’d had one of her feathers over his heart.

Kyri nodded and smiled.

Morgan closed his hand around it.

“In any case,” she said wryly, “those only work for you and your people and that because the Fair are magical in and of ourselves. They do me no good at all. But I do have my own magic. I’m not completely defenseless.”

Morgan remembered the storm on the plains.

“That takes care of one problem, then,” Oryan said, “Now, about the location. Haerold won’t want to go far from Remagne and he’ll want his spectacle so he’ll still control the place. Could you hover?”

“I’m afraid not,” Kyri said wryly. “Not many creatures hover well. Hummingbirds and bees, but I’m not as light as they and although my wings will adapt to many formations, I can’t move them that fast. At best I can only hover for a few minutes, not much longer.”

Her eyes flashed sideways at Morgan.

Remembering that morning in the forest, watching as she bobbed up and down so tantalizingly, her slender ankle in his hand and remembering how it had ended, Morgan hid a smile.

That wouldn’t be enough time and they all knew it.

Morgan looked at Oryan. “How about the main city gates?”

“That high tower over them?” Oryan asked, envisioning the city, and looked to Kyri.

Frowning, she tried to picture it.

Morgan had gotten into the city himself.

Kyri had flown, but most of the buildings had been little more than dark shadows against the night sky. The trip out had been no better, her concern for Morgan blinding her to anything except him.

She shook her head. “I don’t remember.”

“We’ll take a look at it. It’s a pediment, mostly decorative,” Morgan said, sketching it out.

Morgan hated the whole idea, but knew Oryan was right. It might not stop Haerold from declaring war on Kyri and all of Fairy, but it would certainly keep him from being able to justify it to his people and to the Kingdoms around them. “If you fly to the top you should be relatively safe.”

Relatively.

With wizards involved, relatively safe was all they could be sure of.

Nothing would make him like this and it was clear Kyri wasn’t comfortable with it either. Nor was Oryan, who frowned deeply, his head lowered until his chin nearly met his chest.

“Fly in,” Oryan said, “parley with Haerold and then fly out. “

“With some insurance,” Morgan said, “and precautions.”

“If only it could be that simple, that easy,” Oryan said.

The tent flaps had been thrown open to allow all of those who’d been waiting outside to enter Oryan’s tent. Morgan took two steps inside and stopped at the sight, transfixed, his breath caught in his throat. Oryan froze in step beside him and there were soft gasps of amazement from Caleb and the others behind them.

Geoffrey and his people stood off to one side proudly.

Within the shadows of the tent, illuminated only by the flickering uncertain lamplight, Kyri simply shimmered.

A delicate vision in silver, white and gold, her head slightly bowed, she stood slender and lovely, her back as straight as an arrow. Bound only by a simple fillet of gold around her forehead, her hair fell loose in tight curls over her shoulders, down past her waist. One hand was lifted gracefully to hold it back. The dress was simple, elegant, and lovely, a slip of gold silk covered in silvery white lace that caressed her body and then flared from her hips to swirl around her legs and feet.

Her wings were opened around her, arched and slightly cupped, shining and brilliant, reflecting the lamplight.

As beautiful as Morgan had always thought her, she looked radiant and absolutely, breathtakingly, stunning.

It was the first time he’d ever seen her dressed as a Queen and she was every inch of one, from the top of her lightly crowned head to the tip of her slippered toes.

Not for the first time, he looked at her and wondered that she loved him. She, Kyriay, Queen of the Fairy. Knowing even so that she did, with as much passion and intensity as he loved her.

There were times when he’d wake and lay there for a time watching her sleep, curled in against him.

She was an amazement to him, but now, looking at her, she stunned him.

Kyri looked up to see them all staring at her, but her eyes were locked on Morgan.

His clear blue eyes said everything.

She smiled, letting out a breath.

This was a thing of his folk more than hers, but he, Morgan, mattered.

Oryan had, of course, seen her dressed this way once before, the first time she’d presented herself to him – Morgan had been in the South that day, something to do with bandits, he thought – but it had been a long time since that day, it seemed. Oryan had grown accustomed to seeing her in the thin things her people wore.

Clearing his throat abruptly, Oryan said, “Well, that should impress him.”

Kyri looked at him and shook her head. “While I cannot mind looking pretty, I don’t see how this makes me more a Queen than I am.”

As his own clothes were much simpler of late, Oryan could understand. It had never been raiment that made him King, nor had a crown, however elaborate, made his brother one.

“Such things impress our people more,” he said, almost apologetically.

Morgan moved forward, impatient for it to be over, to have Kyri back and safe.

Casting caution to the winds, Morgan pulled her into his arms.

Let them think what they would
. He loved her.

“Stay high, Kyri,” he said, cupping her cheek, looking intently into her eyes. “Promise me, stay high until you’re close.”

Neither of them had hidden their relationship. Nor had they advertised it, knowing that if their enemies got wind of it, it would give them one more weapon to use against them if either were ever caught.

Kyri looked into his eyes. The concern there in them warmed her.

“I’ll be careful.”

“I want you back,” Morgan said quietly, intently, his blue eyes sharp on hers.

No, he needed her back
. The thought of losing her was nearly unbearable.

As surely, Kyri looked back at him, raising a hand to trace his cheek with her fingers. “I’ll come back. I promise.”

To say she wasn’t afraid would be a lie, but she would have both her bow and sword with her – that last hung now from a handsome white leather scabbard at her hip.

She took a breath and nodded.

No one missed the exchange.

John of Orland’s eyebrows shot up, startled, but Philip nodded as if he’d guessed as much.

All of the Fair knew. She was Kyri.

“Kyriay,” Oryan said, stepping forward, offering his hands. “Your Highness.”

She smiled and laughed.

In all the time Oryan had known her, he’d only called her that once and he didn’t know now as he hadn’t known then that he was repeating himself.

Now, however, wasn’t the time to discuss such things.

“Oryan,” she said instead, “I am always Kyri to you.”

Her fingers touched his lightly and then he leaned forward to brush a kiss across her cheek.

The gesture touched her deeply.

“Be careful,” Oryan said, his brown eyes showing much more concern than he’d voiced. “I would have you back as well. Perhaps not as much so as Morgan…but I still wouldn’t care to lose you, Kyriay, my friend. I’ve come to value you, personally as my friend and as an advisor I wouldn’t care to do without.”

“Oryan,” she said softly, hearing all he didn’t say. Her heart wrenched. “As you are my friend as well, and as close to my heart as any of mine.”