Merry Gentry 05 - Mistral's Kiss (5 page)

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“Once we, the sidhe, their gods, were painted with symbols that were our sign of blessing from the Goddess and the God. But as our power faded, so did the marks upon our bodies.” Doyle said it all in his thick-as-molasses voice.

Rhys picked up the story. “Once, if our followers painted their bodies to mimic us, they gained some of the protection, the magic, that we had. It was a sign of devotion, yes, but once long, long ago, it literally could call us to their aid.” He looked at the faint blue fish on his arm. “I have not held this mark for nearly four thousand years.”

“It is faint and incomplete,” the queen said from the far wall.

“Yes.” Rhys nodded and looked at her. “But it is a beginning.”

Nicca’s voice came soft, and I’d almost forgotten him, standing so still to one side. His wings began to gleam in the dark, as if their veins had begun to pulse with light instead of blood. He fanned those huge wings. They had been only a birthmark on the back of his body until a few days ago, when they had sprung from his back, real and true at last. They began to glow as if the individual colors were stained glass gleaming in sunlight that we could not see.

He held out his right hand, and showed us a mark on the outer part of the wrist, almost on the hand itself. The light was too uncertain for me to be sure of what it was, but Doyle said, “A butterfly.”

“I have never held a mark of favor from the Goddess,” Nicca said in his soft voice.

The queen lowered her blade completely, so that it went back to being invisible in the full black skirt of her robe. “What of the rest of you?”

“You’ll be able to feel it, if you think about it,” Rhys said to the others.

Frost called a ball of light that was a dim silver-grey. It held above his head much as Galen’s greenish light had. Frost began unbuttoning his shirt. He rarely went nude if he could avoid it, so I knew before he bared the perfect curve of his right shoulder that there would be something there.

He turned his arm so he could see it. The queen said, “Show us.”

He let her see first, then turned in a slow half circle to us. It was as pale and blue as Rhys’s had been, a small dead tree, leafless, naked, and the ground underneath it seemed to hint at a snowbank. Like Rhys’s salmon it was dim, and not drawn in completely, as if someone had begun the job but not finished.

“Killing Frost has never held a sign of favor,” the queen said, and her voice was strangely unhappy.

“No,” Frost said, “I have not. I was not fully sidhe when last the sidhe held such favors.” He shrugged back into his shirt and began to button it into place. He wasn’t just dressed, he was armed. Most of the others held a sword and dagger, but only Doyle and Frost had guns. Rhys had left his gun behind with his clothes in the bedroom.

I noticed a bulge here and there under Frost’s shirt, which meant he held more weapons than could be easily seen. He liked being armed, but this many weapons meant something had made him nervous. The assassination attempts, maybe, or maybe something else. His handsome face was closed to me, hidden behind the arrogance that he used as a mask. Perhaps he was just hiding his thoughts and feelings from the queen, but then again…Frost tended to be moody.

Rhys said, “Let Abeloec and Merry finish what they began. Let us all finish it.”

Queen Andais took in a deep breath, so that even across the dimly lit chamber I could see the rise and fall of the V of white flesh in her robe. “Very well, finish it. Then come to me, for we have much to discuss.” She held out her hand to Mistral. “Come, my captain, let us leave them to their pleasures.”

Mistral did not question. He stood and took her pale hand.

“We need him,” Rhys said.

“No,” Andais said, “no, I have given Meredith my green men. She does not need the whole world.”

“Does grass grow without wind and rain?” Doyle asked.

“No,” she said, and her voice was unfriendly again, as if she would like to be angry but couldn’t afford to be right now. Andais was a creature of her temper; she always indulged it. This much self-restraint from her was rare.

“To make spring, you need many things, my queen,” said Doyle. “Without warmth and water, plants wither and die.” They stared at each other, the queen and her Darkness. It was the queen who looked away first.

“Mistral may stay.” She released his hand, then looked across the cavern at me. “But let this be understood between us, niece. He is not yours. He is mine. He is yours only for this space of time. Is that clear to all of you?”

We all nodded.

“And you, Mistral,” the queen said. “Do you understand?”

“My geas is lifted for this space of time with the princess alone.”

“Clearly put, as always,” she said. She turned her back as if she would walk through the wall, then turned and looked over her shoulder. “I will finish what I was doing when I noticed your absence, Mistral.”

He dropped to his knees. “My queen, please do not do this…”

She turned back with a smile that was almost pleasant—except for the look in her eyes, which even from here was frightening. “You mean, do not leave you with the princess?”

“No, my queen, you know that is not what I mean.”

“Do I?” she said, danger in her voice. She glided over the dead brush and placed the point of Mortal Dread under his chin. “You didn’t come to ask the advice of my Darkness. You came to bid the princess to intercede for Nerys’s clan.”

Mistral’s shoulders moved as if he’d breathed deeply, or swallowed hard.

“Answer me, Mistral,” she said, a whine of rage like a razor’s edge in her voice.

“Nerys gave her life on your word that you would not kill her people. You—”

He stopped talking abruptly, as if she’d nudged the point close enough that he couldn’t speak without cutting himself.

“Aunt Andais,” I said, “what have you done to Nerys’s people?”

“They tried to kill you and me last night, or have you forgotten?”

“I remember, but I also remember that Nerys asked you to take her life, so that you might spare her house. You gave your word that you would let them live if she died in their place.”

“I have not harmed a single one,” she said, and she looked entirely too pleased with herself.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“I merely offered the men a chance to serve their queen as a member of my royal guard. I need my Ravens at full strength.”

“Joining your guard means giving up all family loyalties and becoming celibate. Why would they agree to either of those things?” I asked.

She took the blade away from Mistral’s throat. “You were so eager to tattle on me. Tell her now.”

“May I rise, my queen?” he asked.

“Rise, cartwheel—I care not—just tell her.”

Mistral rose cautiously, and when she made no move toward him, he began to ease across the room toward us. His throat was dark in the flickering lights. She’d bled him. Any sidhe could heal such a small cut, but because Mortal Dread had done the damage, he would heal mortal slow; human slow.

Mistral’s eyes were wide, frightened, but he moved easily across the dead ground, as if he weren’t worried that she would do something to him as he walked away from her. I know that my shoulder blades would have been aching with the fear of the blow. Only when he was out of reach of her sword did some of the panic leave his eyes. Even then, they were that shade of tornado green. Anxiety.

“Far enough,” she said. “Meredith can hear you from there.”

He stopped obediently, but he swallowed hard, as if he didn’t like that she’d stopped him before he got back to us. I didn’t blame him. The queen had magic that could destroy from this distance. She’d probably made him stop just so he would worry. She might intend him no more harm, but she wanted him to be afraid. She liked for people to be afraid of her.

“She has put metal chains of binding on all of the house of Nerys, so they can do no magic,” said Mistral.

“I can’t argue with that,” I said. “They attacked us at court, all of them. They should lose their magic for a time.”

“She has given the men the chance to become her Ravens. The women she has offered to the prince’s guard, his Cranes.”

“Cel is in seclusion, locked away. He needs no guard,” I said.

“Most of the women would not agree to it, anyway,” Mistral said. “But the queen had to be seen giving them all a choice.”

“A choice between becoming guards and what?” I asked. I was almost afraid of the answer. She’d been carrying Mortal Dread. I prayed that she hadn’t executed them. She would be forsworn before the entire court. And I needed Andais on the throne until she confirmed me as her heir.

“The queen has bid Ezekiel and his helpers to wall them up alive,” said Mistral.

I blinked at him. I couldn’t quite follow it all. My first thought was to protest that the queen was forsworn; then I realized she wasn’t. “They’re immortal, so they won’t die,” I said, softly.

“They will know terrible hunger and thirst, and they will wish to die,”

Mistral said, “but no, they are immortal, and they will not die.”

I looked past him to my aunt. “Tricksy you,” I said. “Very damn clever.”

She gave a little bow from the neck. “So glad you appreciate the delicate reasoning of it.”

“Oh, I do,” and I meant it. “You’ve broken no oath. In fact, technically, you’re doing exactly what Nerys gave her life for. Her clan, her house, her bloodline will live.”

“That is not living,” Mistral said.

“Did you really think that the princess had enough influence with me to save them from their fate?” asked Andais.

“Once I would have gone to Essus, to ask his help with you,” Mistral said.

“So I sought the princess.”

“She is not my brother,” Andais snarled.

“No, she is not Essus,” Mistral said, “but she is his child. She is your blood.”

“And what does that mean, Mistral? That she can bargain for Nerys’s people? They have already been bargained for, by Nerys herself.”

“You are pixieing on the spirit of that bargain,” Rhys said.

“But not breaking it,” she said.

“No,” he said, and he looked so sad. “No, the sidhe never lie, and we always keep our word. Except our version of the truth can be more dangerous than any lie, and you’d better think through every word of any oath we give our word to, because we will find a way to make you regret you ever met us.” He sounded more angry than sad.

“Do you dare to criticize your queen?” she asked.

I touched Rhys’s arm, squeezed. He looked first at my hand, then at my face.

Whatever he saw there made him take a deep breath and shake his head.

“No one would dare to do that, Queen Andais.” His voice was resigned again.

“What would you give for a sign that life was returning to the gardens?”

Doyle asked.

“What do you mean by
sign
?” she asked, and her voice held all the suspicion of someone who knew us all too well.

“What would you give for some hint of life here in the gardens?” “A little wind is not a sign,” she said.

“But would the beginnings of life here in the gardens be worth nothing to you, my queen?”

“Of course it would be worth something.”

“It could mean that our power was returning,” Doyle said.

She motioned with the sword, silver gleaming dully in the light. “I know what it would mean, Darkness.”

“And a return of our power, what would that be worth to you, Queen?”

“I know where you are going, Darkness. Do not try to play such games with me. I invented these games.”

“Then I will not play. I will state plainly. If we can bring some hint of life to these underground worlds, then you will wait to punish, in any way, Nerys’s people. Or anyone else.”

A smile as cruel and cold as a winter morning curved her lips. “Good catch, Darkness, good catch.”

My throat was tight with the realization that if he’d forgotten the last phrase, others would have paid for her anger. Someone who would have mattered to Doyle, or me, or both, if she could have found them. Rhys was right: This was a dangerous game, this game of words.

“For what shall I wait?” she asked.

“For us to bring life to the dead gardens, of course,” he said.

“And if you do not bring life to the dead gardens, then what?”

“Then when we are all convinced that the princess and her men cannot bring life back to the gardens, you are free to do with Nerys’s people as you intended.”

“And if you do bring life to the gardens, what then?” she asked.

“If we bring even a hint of life back to the gardens, you will let Princess Meredith choose the punishment of those who tried to have her assassinated.”

She shook her head. “Clever, Darkness, but not clever enough. If you bring a hint of life back to the gardens, then I will allow Meredith to punish Nerys’s people.”

It was his turn to shake his head. “If the Princess Meredith and some of her men bring even a hint of life back to these gardens, then Meredith alone decides what punishment shall be meted out to Nerys’s people.”

She seemed to think about that for a moment or two, then nodded.

“Agreed.”

“You give your word, the word of the queen of the Unseelie Court?” he asked.

She nodded. “I do.”

“Witnessed,” Rhys said.

She waved her hand dismissively. “Fine, fine, you have your promise. But remember, I have to agree that there is at least a hint of life. It better be some evidence impressive enough that I can’t pixie out of it, Darkness, because you know I will, if I can.”

“I know,” he said.

She looked at me, then. It was not a friendly look. “Enjoy Mistral, Meredith.

Enjoy him and know that he comes back to me when this is done.”

“Thank you for loaning him to me,” I said, and kept my voice absolutely empty.

She made a face at me. “Don’t thank me, Meredith—not yet. You’ve only bedded him once.” She motioned at me with the sword. “Though I see that you have found what he considers pleasure: He likes to cause pain.”

“I would have thought that he would be your ideal lover then, Aunt Andais.”

“I like to cause pain, niece Meredith, not be on the receiving end.”