Chapter 4
My eyes instantly found Drustan. He stood beside a granite table, posture straight and hands folded at the small of his back. His long hair was a shining copper that rivaled the gleam of the torches, and his scarlet-and-gold tunic stood out starkly against the backdrop of gray stone.
“Princess Kenna,” he said. “Thank you for joining us.”
It felt like a fist was squeezing my heart. His voice was distant and polite, as if we were mere acquaintances. As if he wasn’t the first person I’d ever lain with, as if I hadn’t given myself wholly to him and his cause…as if he hadn’t watched without protest as I was sent to my death.
I despised myself for that ache. Drustan had always made his priorities clear: the revolution first, everything else after.
It was my fault for being na?ve. I’d imagined myself the heroine of a grand love story, while to Drustan I was nothing but a side character in the legend of his own rise to power.
Drustan was waiting for my response, but it was hard to make my tongue work. I felt small and foolish and oddly lonely now that Kallen had slipped away to stand at the wall. I cleared my throat and forced myself to speak. “Drustan.”
His lips thinned. He’d clearly been expecting more of an acknowledgment than that.
A low chuckle came from the table. Prince Hector lounged in a brocade-upholstered chair, looking like a slash of night against the gold fabric.
His eyes were the same blue as Kallen’s but narrower, making him look perpetually skeptical, and his lips had a sideways tilt, halfway to a sneer.
His posture was relaxed, but something in his bearing and the sharpness of his stare made me uneasy.
He had always struck me as restless, full of barely contained energy, like an animal pacing the boundaries of its cage.
“Hector,” I said, dipping my chin slightly. He would have to earn my respect, too.
Hector’s brows rose fractionally.
A third faerie sat opposite Hector. Lady Gweneira of Light House was delicate-boned and lovely, with oak-brown hair cut as short as a young boy’s. Her brown eyes had a catlike quality. “Princess Kenna,” she said. “How interesting to meet you.”
“Gweneira is Roland and Lothar’s cousin,” Drustan told me. “She aided me in planning the revolution.”
“Yes, I know.” I nodded at Gweneira. “It’s interesting to meet you, too.” If she wouldn’t say it was a pleasure, I wouldn’t, either.
Drustan was smiling now, but that didn’t mean anything. He put that smile on the way other people picked up weapons. “Oh, you know? Is that something you overheard while spying on me?”
Did he expect me to be sorry for eavesdropping? “Yes.” I covered my discomfort by studying the room. The bare walls glittered with fragments of mica, and an empty fireplace was recessed into the back wall. There were no furnishings other than the table and chairs.
Drustan approached me, and my body tensed. He stopped within arm’s reach and leaned in, lowering his voice. “I regret we can’t speak privately first. Are you…Is your house well?”
My skin felt hot under the pressure of his gaze. Something burned in his eyes that didn’t match that polite tone. “Well enough,” I said, taking a step back. “Will Oriana be here?”
“Is it to be like that, then?” he asked so quietly the words were barely a breath.
“Kallen told me you invited her,” I said, ignoring the question. “I’m curious if you expect her to actually show up.” Despite my outward show of confidence, my stomach felt knotted.
“Unlikely,” Hector said at the same time Drustan said, “She’ll be here.”
“Do you speak for Earth House now?” Hector asked sharply.
Drustan’s lips lifted into another of his easy, charming smiles, and he left to take up his position beside the table again.
It was as if the interlude between us had never happened.
“No,” Drustan said, “but unlike you, I understand what motivates others.” His eyes touched on me lightly, as if illustrating his point.
What did he mean by that? Paranoia twisted up my spine, and I was regretting wearing red. Drustan’s tunic was a brighter shade than my dress, but it still looked uncomfortably like I’d dressed to match him. Had he chosen the color to imply an alliance between us?
Damn the Fae and their double meanings and hidden agendas. The meeting had barely begun, and my head was already hurting trying to unravel the undertones.
Hector was smiling, too, but it was a hard slash of a grin, more akin to showing teeth. “Not everyone plays by your rules, Drustan.”
“You and your feral dog were late to this alliance. You don’t know a thing about my rules.”
For a moment I didn’t understand what dog Drustan was talking about, but when Kallen let out a soft chuckle, realization hit.
He looked mildly amused at the insult, but anger moved swiftly through me.
Kallen and Drustan had fought back-to-back the previous night.
Whatever the complicated politics here, he deserved more respect than that.
“Feral dog,” I repeated. “Is this how a potential king treats his allies? If so, we are off to a very telling start.”
Drustan looked startled at being told off. Kallen’s attention flicked to me, but I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. Except he raised a brow, and then I could. I had called him the king’s dog not that long ago, hadn’t I?
My face felt hot at the memory. Maybe I was inconsistent, but so was Drustan, and if he expected loyalty from this group, he needed to do better than that.
“Hector did not consult me before inviting Kallen to the meeting,” Drustan told me. “I do not appreciate being caught unawares.”
“You invited Gweneira without consulting me,” Hector pointed out.
“Because she was essential to this victory,” Drustan shot back.
“She is not a house head.”
“Neither is your brother. And what has he accomplished, other than murdering everyone who looked at Osric the wrong way?”
Hector worked his jaw. “Kallen was cultivating external allies to aid in overthrowing the king. With Elsmere’s aid, we would have struck at Samhain—”
“But you didn’t,” Drustan interrupted. A crackle of flame danced in his irises, and when he clenched his hands on the back of a chair, the air above his knuckles wavered with heat.
“Gweneira was instrumental in recruiting members of Light House to our cause. I will not apologize for inviting her because of your wounded pride.” His mouth twisted.
“I’m surprised Kenna hasn’t commented yet again on how a potential king treats his allies, but perhaps she reserves her judgments for me. ”
I found myself wishing for wine despite the relatively early hour. It would make this meeting far more tolerable, and it would give me something to do with my hands, which were currently clutching my skirts.
“She’s Roland’s cousin,” Hector told Drustan. “Surely even she understands my concern.”
“Are you going to address me directly?” Gweneira asked. Her voice was low and melodic, making me think of the sound of a wooden flute. “Because if you were to ask my opinion of Roland, I’m sure it would match yours.”
Suspicion tightened Hector’s expression, but he didn’t reply.
Tension filled the room. Shadows coiled around the legs of Hector’s chair, and the air surrounding Drustan remained blurred with heat.
Kallen was stroking the hilt of his sheathed sword as if imagining using it.
Every person here was dangerous, and I wanted nothing more than to fade back while they snarled at one another, but my position was precarious.
Any respect I had been afforded because of my new title would be lost if I didn’t assert myself.
“What is your opinion of Roland, Lady Gweneira?” I asked her.
“Thank you for asking,” she said, inclining her head.
“My opinion of Roland is that he was a brute and an insult to the traditional ethics of Light House. He craved power but lacked the imagination to seize more of it, and it’s a shame he wasn’t cut into a thousand pieces centuries ago.
His death was not slow enough for my taste, and I would dance over his grave every morning if it wouldn’t take up too much of my valuable time. ”
I blinked at the vicious words, which were spoken with perfect serenity.
Hector scoffed. “So why didn’t you cut him into a thousand pieces?”
“There is a benefit to predictable evil, particularly when Osric was such a force of chaos. And Roland was so certain of his grip on power that he never considered betrayal might come from within his own house.”
I looked at Gweneira more closely, trying to take the measure of this new ally.
The Noble Fae tended to be composed, but she was nearly preternaturally still, the way Kallen often was.
Her simple white dress draped in perfect folds to the floor, as if it had been carved from marble.
She wore no jewelry, only a belt adorned with a golden ornament shaped like a sparrow.
Light faeries were fond of bird imagery, since the animals traveled closest to the sun.
The pouch hanging from her belt presumably contained light-focusing crystals—as placid as she looked, she could burn a hole through anyone in this room.
Kallen abruptly turned towards the door. “Someone’s approaching.”
How did he know? But then I remembered the darkness he’d cast outside and how he’d once told me he would know if anyone “disturbed his shadows.”
Drustan gave Hector a smug look. “Oriana.”
We waited for the coded knock, and my shoulders barely relaxed when it came.
I wasn’t looking forward to seeing the Earth princess after she’d abandoned Lara.
But when the door opened, it revealed a tall, thin asrai with a pale blue face and long, gray-blue hair.
Surprise straightened my spine as I recognized Alodie, the head servant of Earth House.
She curtsied and held out a folded piece of paper. “Princess Oriana sends this in her stead.”