The Shadow Queen (10 page)

“Could you have hurt him?” Saetan asked. “Are you strong enough that you could have stopped him?”

She folded her right hand into a loose fist. When she opened her hand . . .

Her fingers no longer had human nails. These were cat claws, the kind that could do serious damage with even a glancing blow.

“I see,” Saetan said softly. A physical wound, even a permanently crippling one, would have been less destructive for Daemon. She had known that—and her choice of weapon would have shocked any man back into the present.

“Well.” Jaenelle closed her right hand, then fluffed her hair with her normal fingers. “I’m heading out to Dharo. Aaron should be here by now.”

“Oh?” He kept his voice carefully neutral, but he wondered if Jaenelle was being honest about her own emotional state. He understood her summoning him in the early-morning hours so that he would be here when Daemon most needed him, but summoning Aaron could indicate a need to escape.

“Oh.” Those sapphire eyes looked through him—and understood everything he didn’t say. “The purpose of the visit has changed, but the arrangements were made several days ago. I’m not hurt, Papa. I promise you. I’m . . . shaky. I won’t deny that. But I’m not hurt.”

He nodded.

She laid her hand on his. “Will you stay over today? Be here for him? I think you can do more to help him heal right now than I can.”

“Yes, I’ll stay.”

Her fingers curled around his. “Daemon can’t go back to Terreille. In memory of a friend, he’ll try to do what’s right, but he can’t go back to Terreille.”

“He has no defense against the memories anymore, does he?”

“No. His mind and his sanity are intact. He may feel broken right now, but that’s a surface feeling, an emotion. Last night didn’t actually break him. I did descend into the abyss during one of the times he fell asleep, and I made a thorough assessment of his mind, so I’m sure of that. But he’s going to be fragile for a while. If it’s needed, Lucivar can go to Dena Nehele.”

“If Lucivar goes to Dena Nehele, he’ll walk in ready to fight.”

Jaenelle huffed. “That’s not new. Lucivar walks into
every
place ready to fight.”

Saetan laughed softly. Hard to deny the truth about his Eyrien son’s temper. “All right.” Raising her hand, he kissed her knuckles, then let her go. “You head out to Dharo. . . .”

“And you’ll look after our guest?” Jaenelle asked knowingly.

“That I will. But first I’m going to read my boy a story. I had thought of reading him
Unicorn to the Rescue!
or
Sceltie Saves the Day
—”

Jaenelle’s silvery, velvet-coated laugh eased his heart and vanished his concern about this child.

“—but I don’t think he’d appreciate the humor of being read a story appropriate for his nephew,” he finished. “At least, not today.”

“No, I don’t think he would. Not today.”

When their laughter faded, Jaenelle called in a small wooden frame Black Widows used to hold their tangled webs. “That room needs to be cleaned and aired before Daemon can go back in. I think Helene will find this useful. Marian and I have been working on a way to cleanse a bedroom after a Warlord Prince goes through a rut. The vial is opened with a basic housekeeping spell. Once it’s triggered, the web will absorb the psychic scents in the room, while the oil in the vial absorbs the physical odors. The whole thing takes a couple of hours. When it’s done, the spider silk of the web will look thick and greasy. Same with the oil. We haven’t figured out how to cleanse the frame or vial after it’s been used, so the whole thing should be put in a shield and burned with witchfire, then buried so the ash doesn’t drift on the Wind.”

He had to marvel that no one else had ever thought of this. Of course, there probably hadn’t been that many friendships between Black Widows and hearth witches, and until Marian and Jaenelle started working together to create specific spells, no one, to his knowledge, had thought to combine those two kinds of Craft.

“Yes,” he said. “I’m sure Helene will find this useful.” Setting it aside a moment, he asked about something that had troubled him in Daemon’s story. “Witch-child, you must have known Daemon wasn’t in the best frame of mind. Why did you wear something that . . . ?” If she weren’t his daughter and his Queen, he wouldn’t have any trouble in phrasing the question.

“Why did I wear an invitation?” she asked.

He nodded.

She fluffed her golden hair. The look she gave him was a little amused and embarrassed. “It’s been said that when a man is feeling a bit broody about something, sometimes he wants sex as a comfort but doesn’t feel secure enough to ask for it.”

The thought of Jaenelle’s coven exchanging confidences about their husbands and/or lovers made him want to run and hide, but he just sat there and nodded.

“I thought Daemon was feeling moody about Jared, about remembering a friend who was gone, but I hadn’t realized it was more than that until it was too late. Anyway, I was reading a story, and the clothes the woman was wearing had caught the man’s interest, so . . .” Jaenelle shrugged. “I knew if Daemon wasn’t interested, he wouldn’t notice the clothes and would be oblivious to the invitation.”

“I beg your pardon?” Saetan blinked, sure he’d misheard. “Daemon wouldn’t notice what you were wearing?
Daemon?
”

“Yes, Daemon.”

“Witch-child . . .” He shook his head. “Maybe he pretends not to see, but he does notice.”

“Before Surreal went back to Ebon Rih, we went shopping in Amdarh, and she picked out some things that she swore would make Daemon’s tongue hit his toes and have his eyes roll back in his head.”

“What a lovely picture,” Saetan muttered.

“So I was trying the outfit on later that evening and wondering if I really had the nerve to wear it when Daemon walked into the bedroom. I don’t remember what he’d been working on that day, but he looked exhausted. Before I could say anything, he stared at me for a moment, then told me I wasn’t dressed warmly enough for the weather since a bad winter storm had hit a couple of hours before. He bundled me up in
his
winter robe, stuffed my feet in two pairs of socks—a pair of his over a pair of mine—made us both a hot drink, tucked us into bed, and promptly fell asleep.”

Saetan pressed his lips together to hide his smile. Daemon’s robe. Daemon’s socks. The clues had been there, but neither Jaenelle nor Daemon had recognized the significance.

“That’s not the only time it’s happened,” Jaenelle said. “It’s a comfort.”

“How so?”

So much understanding in those sapphire eyes. “I don’t ever want him to feel like sex is a duty. The fact that he’s sometimes blind to an invitation means he doesn’t feel obliged to perform.”

“Did you wear that outfit on another night?”

She hesitated a long time. “Yes.”

“And did you get the response Surreal said you would?”

“Not exactly.”

But judging by the sudden color flaming her cheeks, she had definitely gotten a response.

He stood up, kissed her forehead, picked up the frame with the web, and walked to the door. Then he turned back. “Are you sure there are no other injuries, witch-child?”

“I’m sure.”

That assurance helped, especially when he walked out of Jaenelle’s sitting room and found Beale, Helene, and Jazen standing in the doorway of the Consort’s bedroom, a look of shock on their faces.

“Problem?” he asked softly. When they turned toward him, he raised a finger to his lips. “Prince Sadi is in my suite. It would be best not to disturb him.”

Helene looked from him to the bedroom and back again. “Was anyone hurt?” she asked in a hushed voice.

They stepped aside for him, and when he stood in that doorway, he understood the question.

Nothing outwardly wrong with the room. Nothing broken or damaged. Even the bed didn’t look unduly messy.

But the psychic scents in the room, combined with the muskiness of sex, made his own body tighten. Rage and fear filled the room, along with a hatred so deep it caught in the back of the throat like a bitter mist. If he’d walked into that room without already knowing both people were safe and unharmed, he would have been tearing the Hall apart to find Daemon and Jaenelle, certain one or both would be desperately hurt.

And there was something under all those other scents that he recognized, that he—and Daemon—would have to deal with.

But not yet. Not until his boy was feeling steady again.

He turned his back on the room and gave Helene the frame that held the cleansing web, and explained what it would do.

“Please give my thanks to the Ladies,” Helene said. “This will help to clean the room.” She looked at Beale and Jazen. “The fewer women in the room right now, the better.”

“I’ll help with the cleaning,” Jazen said. “And I’ll make sure the clothes don’t need to be aired.”

“I’ll send up Holt to assist,” Beale said.

Helene turned to Saetan. “We’ll have the room done in a few hours.”

“Good,” Saetan replied. “Jazen, leave a complete change of clothes in my sitting room for the Prince.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Beale? Is there something else that needs my attention?”

“Prince Aaron is down in the breakfast room, waiting for Lady Angelline,” Beale said. “The Prince’s guest is pacing in the formal receiving room, muttering to himself.”

“Inform Prince Theran that someone will be available in an hour if he wants to discuss anything.”

“Very good, High Lord.”

There was a look in Beale’s eyes that told him plainly enough that the butler wasn’t going to inform Theran about
who
would be available for that discussion.

What was it about the Dena Nehele Warlord Prince that raised the hackles of Kaeleer males?

Still wondering about that, he walked back into his bedroom and found Daemon tucked in his bed. The body belonged to a full-grown man, but the eyes that watched him, so full of despair, belonged to a boy.

He sat on the side of the bed. “She’s all right,” he said softly. “In better shape than you are, actually.”

“There were bruises,” Daemon whispered. “On her wrists. I saw them.”

Saetan nodded. “Yes, there are. And there are a few love bites, which I didn’t see. And her leg muscles are sore, but you and Nighthawk are being given equal blame for those.”

“Oh.”

The smallest twitch of lips; a hint of amusement in the golden eyes; the tight muscles in the shoulders beginning to relax one breath at a time.

He knew the signs, had watched this son struggle to repair himself once before when he’d believed Jaenelle had been lost forever.

“Now,” he said, “you and Nighthawk may be equally to blame for the sore muscles, but you’re the only one with hands, so I suggest that you be the one who offers to give Jaenelle a back rub this evening.”

An unspoken question hung in the air. He waited.

Finally Daemon gave him the tiniest nod. The Steward of the Dark Court wouldn’t tell the Consort to take care of the Queen if there was any doubt about the Consort’s welcome.

Having done as much as could be done for the moment, Saetan called in a book, opened it to the table of contents, and pointed to the titles of two stories. “Which one would you like to hear?”

“Both?”

The answer made his heart ache—and also gave him hope that Jaenelle was right and Daemon was emotionally battered right now but not truly broken.

Daemon didn’t remember giving the same answer so many times as a boy that it had become a ritual between them. But he did. And because he remembered, he called in his half-moon glasses, took his time settling them on his nose
just so,
and completed the ritual with the same words he’d always said. “Yes, I think we can read both this time.”

CHAPTER 6

KAELEER

A
gitated and feeling reckless, Theran rapped on the study door and walked in before he was invited.

“Hell’s fire, Sadi. Are you serious about these conditions you’ve set?”

The man sitting behind the blackwood desk wasn’t Daemon Sadi. It was the pissy old cock from the Keep. The assistant historian /librarian—who no longer looked like a somewhat benign clerk whose Red Jewels and caste could, mostly, be ignored.

Now he saw the resemblance between Sadi and the Hayllian Warlord Prince, who set a piece of paper on the desk and removed the half-moon glasses, whose gold eyes never left Theran’s face.

Fear shuddered through Theran when he noticed the Warlord Prince’s right hand, with its long, black-tinted nails and the Black-Jeweled ring.

“You managed to hone my temper before I walked into that sitting room at the Keep, so we never did finish the introductions. I’m Saetan Daemon SaDiablo, the former Warlord Prince of Dhemlan—and still the High Lord of Hell.”

Theran’s legs buckled. He hit the edge of the chair in front of the desk and grabbed the arms to push himself back in the seat.

“I—” What was he supposed to say to the High Lord? Apologize for not being more courteous when he’d been at the Keep?

“I’m assuming by the way you entered the room that you want to discuss the terms Prince Sadi set for having a Kaeleer Queen rule Dena Nehele.”

“Sadi . . .”

“Is indisposed this morning. You may discuss this with me.”

May the Darkness have mercy.
All he wanted right now was to get out of this room.

“The terms are . . .” Sadi had accepted the position of Warlord Prince of Dhemlan a few months after his father resigned. Theran remembered hearing that last night at dinner. How was he supposed to voice his objections to the terms without sounding like he was criticizing the son? Because this was one father he did
not
want to offend.

“Unreasonable? Insulting? Barbed?” Saetan offered with a hint of a sharp smile. “Everything has a price, Prince Grayhaven. The man who wrote up these terms has a good understanding of Terreille. A better understanding than you do, since yours, I suspect, is confined to your own Territory. Prince Sadi also has a fine understanding of how the males in Kaeleer, especially the Warlord Princes, respond to any threat to a female, let alone a Queen. You may feel hobbled by these terms, but they were thought through carefully and are designed to protect your people as well as the Queen who comes to rule.”