Queen of Hearts (The Risen King) (2 page)

“
Just wait until you have to actually go to court, Aiofe.” Zela jumped on Maureen's subtle teasing and ran with it. “Heavy, poofy dresses and massive cloaks that trail five feet behind you and shoes so tall you fear your ankles will break.”

Maureen nodded. “And the hair. Don't forget the hair.”

“Oh, yes. I'll have to have my girl teach Lilia how to style it properly. Headdresses three feet tall, braids so tiny and detailed that they take four hours to complete. It's  absolutely wonderful. You're going to love it.”

Both women giggled as Aiofe rolled her eyes and pushed herself away from the table. Lilia had drawn the curtains back before she left and the bedroom was exposed to the main room. Aiofe walked into it and peered out the window. The men were down in the training yard below, beating each other with dull swords and other various weapons. Aiofe propped her elbows on the window sill and folded her hands beneath her chin.

Arthur and Lancelot were shirtless in the warm morning sun. Sweat streamed down their chiseled frames as they thrust and parried, each trying to gain the upper hand on the other. The sound of the swords clanging together echoed off the walls as a small smile grew on Aiofe's face. The blond man swung his sword in a wide arc, spinning expertly away from the blow of the other. He ducked under Lancelot's blade and sidestepped so he was at his opponent's side. With a sweep of his leg, he hooked Lancelot's knee in his and dropped the other knight to the ground. He brought his sword up and swung it around until the rounded point was sitting at the base of Lancelot's throat. Laughter twinkled up to Aiofe as Arthur helped is friend to his feet.

“
He's quite handsome.”

Aiofe spun away from the window. Heat crept up her face and only stopped when it reached the tops of her ears. Her grandmother was right behind her, with Zela leaning against the bed post. The faery princess had her arms crossed and a smirk on her red lips.

The red-head cleared her throat  and willed her blushing away. “Yes, he is.” Her smile started to return until images from the previous night flooded back to her. She slapped her hands to her mouth. “Oh, no. Oh, crap.”

Zela pushed herself away from the bed. “What? What's wrong?”

Aiofe flopped down on the bed and threw an arm over her eyes. “I threw myself at him! Like a teenager!“ She groaned and rolled over so she could bury her face in the covers.

Zela raised an eyebrow at Maureen, who was caught between worry and laughter. “How do you mean?” the old hunter asked as she settled on the bed next to her granddaughter.

The young woman moaned and pulled the covers around her head. “You know,” she said, her voice muffled by the blankets. She refused to elaborate with her grandma in the room.

Zela sat down on the other side of her. “And how did he respond?” Her voice was wary and worried.

Aiofe groaned again. “He wouldn't do it. He said... I don't know. Something about how I'm not a whore, how...” She let her voice trail off and raised an eye toward her grandma. “Nevermind. Forget it.” She pushed herself off the bed and stomped out of the bedroom into the other room.

Zela scooted over to Maureen with a smile on her face. She put her arm around the old woman and leaned close so she could whisper in her ear without Aiofe hearing. “I think we have a true gentleman on our hands.”

Maureen smiled and patted her arm. “Yes, I think we do indeed.”

*~*~*

TWO

*~*~*

The first thing he heard was the sound of water. It splashed and gurgled somewhere nearby. He focused on it and took a deep breath. His body ached, but it was a dull, distant pain, far removed from his current state of being, a niggling reminder of something forgotten. He pushed the pain away and listened to the water again. It was constant, uninterrupted, ever present.

The next thing he heard was a soft thud. It came from somewhere off to his left, though he couldn't pinpoint the exact direction. Something told him it was a door, but he couldn't explain why he knew that. He just did. Faint footsteps crossed a stone floor, coming closer and closer until they were standing at his side. He willed his eyes to open, to look at the unexpected visitor, but they would not. The fingers on his hand twitched as he tried to pull himself from the comfort of sleep.

“
Kane?” The voice was familiar and soft. It called to him, trying to pull him from his peaceful rest. He clung to it and let it ring in his ears, desperate to match it with a face just beyond his reach. Blond hair, that was all he could picture. A big halo of blond hair and eyes the color of a raging sea. Fingers twined into his and squeezed. He tried to squeeze back, but he lacked the strength.

“
Here, give me that.” The voice spoke again, a bit closer this time. The bed moved slightly and something cool pressed against his lips. Liquid slipped into the small crack between them and dribbled onto his tongue. It was sweet and tart at the same time, and deliciously wet. He had not realized how dry his mouth was. The liquid poured into his throat and threatened to gag him. Purely on reflex, he swallowed. That simple action set off a chain reaction. His lips began working and actively pulled the liquid into his mouth. His tongue shoved it back toward his throat. His hands attempted to rise off the bed, to grab the cup and cling to it, but they stopped barely an inch from the mattress. The motion jerked him and he fell backward onto the pillow, coughing as he choked on the liquid.

“
Easy, now. Easy, child. You don't want to choke.”

A wet cloth pressed to his forehead and pushed him back onto the bed. With tremendous effort, he forced his eyes open a bare fraction. The ceiling above came into view, decorated by intricate swirls and images that danced together in the stone. They were images he had seen for much of his life, images that were as familiar to him as the voice.

“Kane?” the voice asked again.

He rolled his head to the side. The pain that radiated through his body was terrible, but he continued to turn his neck until he could see the face of the woman beside him.

“Mother,” he whispered. His own voice was barely audible and it ripped from his throat like a thousand shards of ice tearing at his delicate flesh.

Titania sat beside him on the intricately carved chair that used to sit at his desk. Her tanned hand held his, but she did not smile as she had when he was a boy and grew sick. No, this time, she stared at him with hard eyes, the eyes of a queen, not a mother.

He tried to sit up again, to gain some distance from the awful stare, but he met resistance once more. He jerked his arm and heard the soft clink of metal. His nostrils flared and he clenched his teeth together. “What have you done to me?”

She sat back and crossed her legs. She was wearing a pale yellow pantsuit that shimmered and cast a warm glow on her tanned skin. She raised a hand and beckoned to someone in the corner, out of Kane's view. He recognized the man who came forward, dressed in armor and carrying a highly decorated sword at his side. It was Fjorn, the captain of the queen's prison guard. He stood beside her and raised his head as he looked down his nose at Kane.

“Kane, Prince of the Southern Land, you are under suspicion of treason and murder. You will be placed under house arrest, with round the clock supervision, until such time as your guilt or innocence can be determined.” Fjorn pulled off his glove, revealing three fingers. The other two had been lost during a war between the North and South nearly seven centuries ago. He circled Kane's wrist and squeezed tightly for four seconds. When he pulled away, a thick red line shimmered on Kane's arm, stretching the whole way around his wrist. It pulsed in the pale light, a glaring sight against his golden skin.

The prince's nostrils flared. “You're banding me? Like a common criminal?” He jerked his arm again, but the chain on his wrist held him firmly to the bed.

“You
are
a common criminal.” His mother spoke in a very matter-of-fact tone. She would not let any emotion bleed into her voice with company present. She nodded toward the red line. “This will keep you from leaving the castle or going where you don't belong until I can figure out what to do with you.”

Kane snarled at her. “Why not just kill me now? Why the charade? Get it over with. We both know how this ends.”

Titania's own nostrils flared. She swatted a hand in the direction of the captain. The man bowed and left, letting the door thud firmly behind him. When he was gone, the queen leaned forward over the bed so that her face was a bare inch from her son's. “I should kill you. I should make you suffer greatly for what you've done. I should flay the skin from your bones in front of the entire court.” She gripped his chin with her hand and dug her fingernails into his cheeks. “You killed my husband, your own father. You betrayed your family, your people. You chose to side with our greatest enemy and may very well have cost us the throne.”

Blood trickled down Kane's cheeks as Titania yanked her hand away from his face. She turned and walked away from the bed, toward the fountain that sprang from the wall. She stared into the cool water for several silent minutes. Kane dared not speak.

“I should do all those things. You deserve them. No one would fault me for it.” She turned from the fountain and looked at him with sad eyes. “But you are still my blood. No matter what you have done, you are still my son, and I am still your mother.” She walked across the room and settled onto the edge of the chair again. She pressed her finger to the red band on his wrist. It flared brightly and the colors danced and shimmered, but it remained firmly in place.

Kane clenched his teeth together as he stared at his mother's face. Tears dripped from her eyes. Whether they were unchecked or unnoticed, he wasn't sure. Her lips were pressed tightly together. She seemed to have aged centuries in just those few minutes, with the weight of all the horrors she had witnessed recently destroying her from the inside out. His heart jerked in his chest, reminding him once again what emotion other than anger felt like.

“Zela told me what happened,” Titania said, not raising her eyes from Kane's wrist. “She told me what you did.”

Kane was silent. He waited, content to let her lead the conversation. He was at her mercy. And that was right where he wanted to be. He realized, with a bit of a shock, that he was happy to finally be caught. He had been running from his family for far too long. He had been on the wrong side of the fence, fighting against them, conspiring with the enemy, when what he really wanted was to be back home.

“You saved them, Kane. For that, I thank you.” Titania pulled away from him and rose. She walked to the door, refusing to look at him anymore.

“
Wait,” he called. He raised his hand toward her and the chain jangled on his wrist. “How is my daughter? Aiofe?”

The queen paused with her hand on the door. She did not turn to face him. “She is safe. Her grandparents are with her, along with the knights. And Zela is there as well.”

Kane clenched his jaw. “Are you going to make her fight Leanansidhe? Are you going to risk your own granddaughter in this war?”

Titania raised her head and turned toward her son. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I am. She is a skilled hunter, just like her mother was. She knows the risks, and she is willing to take them. She will make a valuable addition to our army.”

He pushed himself up onto his elbows, straining against the restrictive chains. The anger that always sat just under his heart was pushed aside by fear. “Please, don't send her out there. Don't risk the one thing I have left.”

“
I have no choice,” she said as she stared at him with those blue eyes. “You made sure of that.”

With that, Titania turned and walked out the door. When she was gone, a small faery about half Kane's size skittered in through the opened door and shut it behind her. She kept her head down and refused to look at his face. After setting a tray on his dresser, she buzzed about the room, cleaning up a mess that he had not noticed before. She pulled the chamberpot from underneath him without a word and cleaned him up.

“What's your name?” he asked as she straightened the covers over him.

She twitched visibly, but did not answer. Once, she looked up at him, but her eyes slid over his face, unwilling to rest on his for even the briefest of moments. She scampered to the door and peaked outside. A faint conversation that Kane could not understand took place and in a moment, the captain of the prison guard came back into the room.

“Fjorn,” Kane said with a  nod of his head.

The man ignored him. Instead he waved his hand near the chains on Kane's wrists and chest. They loosened just enough to allow Kane to sit up. It taxed his strength, but he was able to rise enough to prop himself against the pillows behind him. The small faery removed the tray from the dresser and placed it on a short table that rested over Kane's lap. She hovered in the corner while Kane ate. When he was finished, she took the tray from him and darted out the door as quick as she could.

Before Kane could say anything, Fjorn waved his hand toward the chains again. They tightened up, pulling Kane back to the bed.

“
Is this really necessary?” Kane growled at the captain and shot him a glare. Fjorn returned the glare, but refused to spare any words for the prince. After the chains were tight, he walked over to the corner, once again outside of Kane's peripheral vision, and resumed his post.