Expect #2
“They feel the traces of what’s in that blood could conceivably counteract truth serum.
I don’t know enough about this subject, but apparently, the authors of such things leave signatures.
And this particular signature is of an apothecary who we can trace to line-item payments from the castle for services rendered to Tatra.
He’s also, conveniently, disappeared. Went on ‘vacation’ the day after the troll attack, and he hasn’t returned.
He is not at the resort where he said he’d be, and he’s also not answering any comms.”
“That doesn’t sound convenient at all,” I bitched, and then it was me who took the ball from Hurley and threw it. After I did that, I asked, “What about Arnaud?”
Tanyn actually smiled.
“What?” I pressed.
“When it was granted, he made a big stink about appealing the warrant to take his sample. It was a rude awakening that he wasn’t in Sky’s Edge anymore.”
It was known everywhere that the judicial system in the Edge was a quagmire.
Appeals were rampant and the hearings for them granted for just about any reason a barrister could dream up.
It took ages to get anything through the magisterial system in Sky’s Edge.
Which was one of the reasons why it took years for them to grant the fact that Riland had illegally circumvented the Act of Succession to cut out Tanyn and finally declare Tanyn as rightful king.
This news made me smile. “I bet he didn’t like that much.”
“No. And before you ask, his blood had the same properties.”
Hurley was back, and Tanyn took his turn with the ball.
“What now?” I asked after Hurley ran after it.
“We need either to wait until the effects of it wear off, and we don’t know how long that will take, or we need to better understand it so we can find a chemist to formulate something to counteract it, which will undoubtedly take even longer.
It’s rare a drug will remain in the system for a long time, though not unheard of.
So Aleksei has, first, petitioned that Arnaud not be released until we’re sure this drug has exited his system, with an added request for permission to regularly take bloods and administer the serum again when that drug has cleared.
Arnaud’s attorneys were ready for this, because the petition was barely filed before they filed their own to demand refusal of it. ”
“That’s telling,” I murmured.
Hurley was back, so it was my turn with the ball.
“Aleksei’s concerned. They’re not as free and breezy with the serum as we are. It took some talking just to get the bloods.”
I knew that.
“It’s become an indication of guilt if you refuse to take it,” I remarked.
“And they’ve reminded Arnaud of this. He, and his attorneys, have dialed up the demands for release, as they say with the first administration of it, he proved his innocence.”
“So he’s making this messy.”
Even if that was the truth, Tanyn smiled again.
And he explained it, “I guess he threw a fuck of a tantrum when they tried to take his blood sample. They had to restrain him.”
That was amusing.
But there was something that was not.
“He’s in on it.”
“He’s in on it,” Tanyn agreed.
“None of that control drug in his blood?”
Tanyn shook his head.
Hurley came back.
Tanyn tossed the ball, then slid an arm around my shoulders, pulled me to his side, and kissed the top of my hair.
“It’s cold out here,” he murmured. “Are you bundled up enough?”
I stuck out one foot. “I’m wearing my fab new boots.”
That didn’t get a hair kiss.
He tucked his fist under my chin, tilted my head and gave me a proper one.
We only broke when we heard Aleece shout, “You two are so cute, you’re gonna make me hurl!”
Tanyn and I both twisted to look over our shoulders at Aleece, who was standing in an open door, Bain (as ever) looming behind her.
“You’re away?” I asked.
“On our way to the craft,” she called.
They were returning to the Fall because Aleece had an appearance she rightly argued she couldn’t bow out of at the last minute.
They were staying in the Fall because we’d all be headed down there on Friday, less than two days from now (though, Laura and Aleksei were headed down tomorrow, because it was their party and they had things to see to), so there was no reason for them to come back up when we were shortly going to be heading down.
“See you at the party,” I yelled.
“Later,” she yelled back.
Tanyn lifted a hand.
Aleece shot Bain an annoyed look as he pulled her out of the door.
That door closed.
Hurley whined.
And since it was my turn, I picked up the ball and threw it.
Thursday evening, since I got the bathroom first, I was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the bed petting Hurley’s belly, who was paws up beside me, and we were both waiting for our male to give us a show.
All right, it was just me waiting for the show, Hurley seemed pretty content (but he always was glad to have his daddy).
I saw the lights extinguish in the closet, and Tanyn, his bare chest and his pajama bottoms finally gave me what I’d been waiting for.
Tanyn looked me over on his journey (yes, I was in another sexy nightgown, so he got his show too), and then asked the bizarre question, “Sex or sleep?”
Since he was up and at ’em early, morning sex had fallen off our schedule.
So this meant I had to make do with evening sex (oh, and the sex we had during the lunch we shared on Tuesday, and the sex we had prior to meeting the others for drinks last night).
So…
With this query…
Was he mad?
I was temporarily distracted from his insane question when he threw himself on the bed beside me and stretched out.
Damn.
He kept improving the show.
And I was there for it.
Hurley shifted his compact bulk so he was easily accessible for pets from us both.
He got them.
“Or talk,” Tanyn added to our late-night menu. Then said, “First.”
I smiled at his indication that whatever we did, sex was going to follow.
I then asked, “Is there something we need to talk about?”
“Mac is circling Gayle like a lion protecting his meal. Has she talked to him about Selediel?”
I made a face. “I haven’t asked. She’s busy at work. And dealing with Mac circling her like a lion protecting his meal. Though, I figure she’d tell me if she had.”
And about that Mac and Gayle thing?
It was easy to see something else had been triggered in that male.
The fact that Gayle was immune to him was driving him crazy.
It was mega.
“Mm,” he hummed, and suddenly, I clicked into his mood.
Sex was great.
Sex with Tanyn was so far beyond great, it was indescribable.
But he was busy, and most of the day, even if we were in the same building, I didn’t see him.
And even though I’d given up most of my duties at Tempera to Lua, I was busy.
The citadel was back on track for renos, that was one thing I had to turn my mind to.
So Zyra and I were getting serious about the final stages of that, to the point I’d taken some floor plans that one of the contractors had drafted and we were furnishing and decorating the rooms with a purpose.
Topping that, with Laura’s help, I was pulling strings with some designers in the Edge to outfit not only Manny and Zyra for the engagement party, but since Aleksei and Laura had invited Uly and Estra to come (Nayden was already going to go, due to his captaining my security detail), and they’d accepted, I was also doing the same for Estra (Nayden and Uly were going to wear their dress uniforms), even if I hadn’t met her properly yet (only spoke to her over comms).
Barret, Camaryn and I had met, gone over their reports, and it was true. Berg Castle was overstaffed. They admitted it. They also admitted the reason for it was that Tatra had ordered it so, because she liked plenty of beings around to fawn all over her.
But we agreed to titration rather than elimination.
If someone quit and their role could be taken over by someone else, they would not be replaced.
In the meantime, I got approval from the castle finance department, as well as Tanyn, for raises and a certain amount of backpay, which didn’t cover it, but it was still hefty.
To say the staff had more spring in their steps and were a lot more friendly was an understatement.
In the meantime, Barret reminded me that Berg Castle hosted a big New Year’s Ball. It was a tradition, much like the Midnight Masque in the Fall.
Tatra had, of course, started planning for it, but those plans had stagnated after she left.
Necessarily, we resurrected them.
And this did not suck. I loved planning parties. One of my favorite parts of my job was the showings.
What sucked even less was watching Barret’s trepidation melt away the longer we talked about it.
She was learning, and what she learned was good things.
In other words, I might not be working to get paid, but I still was working, I was busy, the day flew by before I knew it.
Even doing all of this in the same building, Tanyn had his life and his responsibilities, and I had mine. We weren’t in each other’s laps. We weren’t always up in each other’s space.
But he woke me to say good morning every morning, and we were together at the end of the day.
And that worked for me.
Along with our evenings of drinks and dinner with friends, chitchat, which moved to card games or beings wandering to their rooms, or last night, all of us going to the castle’s home theater and watching a vid.
It felt homey.
It felt like family.
Of course, Manny was showing signs of getting antsy to go home. But Tanyn wasn’t allowing that until the Red Wing barracks and launch pad were completed, something that would take weeks.
And Zyra was in her element, being with Tanyn, me and having company.
But it was nice to have a few days where nothing dramatic happened.
Life was life.