Chapter 24 #2
The concern in this woman’s voice bore no resemblance to the teasing lilt from everyone else who had approached us.
She was different. I thought of what Enrique had told me before, months ago.
There were dissenters in the court, he’d said; not everyone was loyal to the Queen.
We had potential allies. Was this one of them?
‘My—’ I looked to the dancers. Raleigh was still missing. ‘I don’t know what to do.’ And then, ‘Do you know Raleigh?’
She smiled with no hint of condescension. ‘We all know Raleigh. This song may go on a while. Come,’ she said, extending her hand. ‘Why don’t you walk with me?’
I glanced at her hand, then stepped backwards. ‘I shouldn’t.’
‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘You’re quite safe with me.’
I dipped into a curtsey. ‘With all due respect, miss, I’ve heard enough to know I’m not safe with anyone at this court.’
‘Shh.’ The woman pressed her fingers to my lips, glancing around.
‘You cannot say such things here. You never know who might be listening.’ She caught the eye of someone over my shoulder and gave an unaffected wave.
‘Please,’ she said. ‘I would speak with you alone. Raleigh trusted me before. He will know where to find us.’
Others in the ballroom were openly watching me now.
Those not dancing had their heads dipped in conversation, but their faces were turned to me.
I kept catching flashes of watchful stares from the dance floor, the perfect synchronicity falling out in favour of gawking at the lonely human.
There was still no sign of Raleigh, no one to help me make this choice.
If I didn’t go with her, who would find me next?
No one else had shown a fraction of her concern, nor a hint of her desire to resist.
I wasn’t fool enough to think I would be safe with her, but I much preferred my chances with one vampire than an entire ballroom of them. ‘Raleigh will find us?’
‘Everyone has seen us together now.’ She slipped her arm around mine. ‘He will know.’
I relented. Arm in arm, she led me from the ballroom, into the veins of the palace.
It felt different with her at my side. No one gawked as we passed, their gazes instead politely sliding off us.
We rounded a corner, and I spotted Waltz approaching from the other direction.
I braced myself, waiting for a jab about how quickly I’d abandoned my fiancé, but it never came. To my horror, he bowed.
Something shifted. My vision grew sharper, the shape of Raleigh’s glamour hardening in my mind as another sought to push against it. There was a strange woman on my arm guiding me through the vampire queen’s lair. And I was an idiot.
It was too late to turn back. She had me quite literally in her grip. Stupid, I was so stupid. For all the warnings Raleigh had given me, all it had taken were a few sweet words and I’d made the same mistakes he had.
I kept my breath steady as we passed Waltz. ‘Forgive me my ignorance,’ I said as cordially as Raleigh might have done, ‘but I come from a small farming town, and Raleigh is no enforcer of etiquette. Is Your Majesty the right mode of address?’
Her laughter was like birdsong. ‘You knew?’
‘My apologies for not realising sooner.’
‘My dear, you mustn’t go to such formality,’ she said. ‘You’re already family.’
I tried not to cringe at the word. ‘How could I not beg deference to the woman who breathed eternal life into my soulmate, that we might meet so many centuries after his birth?’ Maybe that was overdoing it. ‘Your Majesty.’
She scoffed. ‘He’s trained you well, hasn’t he?’
We reached a set of double doors, manned on either side by uniformed figures – whether they were human or vampire, I couldn’t tell. They pushed the doors open in unison as we approached, revealing the heart of the court itself: the throne room.
I thought I had seen decadence before, but I’d seen nothing like this.
The ceiling was painted to look like the night sky, inset with diamonds for stars.
Above the throne there was a canopy of thick velvet, the fabric spilling to the ground as the sky bleeds into the ocean.
Behind it, the wall was lined with shimmering stained glass.
If the room was the night sky, then the throne was the moon.
It shimmered through the dim light, a gleaming white beacon inset with silvery cushions.
At first glance I would have guessed it to be marble, but the colour was too even, too white.
Ivory, perhaps. Father had some ornaments, but I’d never seen anything with pieces so large.
It was only when the Queen lovingly caressed its arm with her draped fingers that I realised what it truly was.
Elephant tusks were decadent, but the Queen of the undead demanded a greater sacrifice.
‘Oh, come now.’ She must have seen the realisation in my face. ‘You come from humble beginnings, do you not? You know it’s wasteful not to use all parts of the animal.’
‘We’re not …’
‘It’s man’s greatest folly to think themselves higher than other animals. All mortal creatures are lesser beings, and this is no different from any other porcelain. It’s just a chair. See for yourself.’ She took me by the shoulders and pushed me down onto the cushions.
It was just a chair. And a coffin is just a chest. The Queen hovered over me, her hands still on my shoulders, her face dangerously close. If she decided to bite me, there would be nothing I could do. I would be hers.
‘Look at you.’ Her thumb trailed the curve of my cheek. ‘So young and full of life.’
I fought the urge to push her away, swallowing my fear.
‘Tell me, what did Raleigh promise you in exchange for lying to me?’
‘Have I lied to you?’ I asked sweetly.
‘Perhaps not,’ she said, her voice lilting in amusement.
She didn’t believe me, but I was still alive, which meant she couldn’t prove the lie yet.
She pressed me into the back of the throne, leaning her full weight against me.
Her hair smelt clean, like lavender. ‘Tell me how you feel about Raleigh.’
‘I love him,’ I said, ever the lovesick maiden.
‘Even though he killed your mother?’
I stiffened. How far did her knowledge extend? What more did she know? Had she heard of my deal with Raleigh? My engagement with Yann?
‘That’s what my father told me too,’ I said, digging deep into my maze of panic to find the right words.
‘But what Raleigh did was out of mercy. She would have died either way. I already forgave him. He’s worth too much to me to let the lies my father told me tarnish what we have. ’ That wasn’t a lie.
The Queen made a noise partway between disgust and boredom. ‘Love like this doesn’t last. Not for eternity. You know that, don’t you?’
‘Raleigh isn’t my first love’—truth made the story easier to spin— ‘but it was nothing like this. What Raleigh and I have … This isn’t the sort of love that fades.’
‘Unlike your last fiancé?’
‘If I’d loved Yann like I love Raleigh, we wouldn’t be here,’ I said, realising too late the sharpness of my words.
I thought she would reprimand me for my outburst, but her smile was almost expectant. ‘He couldn’t give you eternity. No human can. And that’s what you really want, isn’t it? You can tell me the truth, you know.’ Her lips brushed my ear. ‘Raleigh can’t hear us from here.’
‘What do you …’ The truth clicked into place.
She thought I was deceiving him so he would change me.
I wanted to laugh. It made our case so much stronger if she already believed Raleigh loved me.
As long as I could keep up my smitten lovesick act and avoid any outright lies, we would be on our way home before sunrise.
‘Did he tell you he would turn you into one of us?’
‘Only once we are married.’ I furrowed my brow, aware I was overacting, but I didn’t know how else to convince her.
‘It was his decision to wait, I assume?’ Her fingers trailed the length of my arm, goosebumps blooming in the wake of her knife-like nails.
‘Yes,’ I breathed, unsure where her logic was carrying her.
‘You don’t have to marry him.’ She began tracing figure eights over the vein on my wrist. ‘I could change you now. You wouldn’t have to age another day. Nor force yourself into a loveless match.’
‘That’s not what I—’ I snatched my hand away, but she caught it, smiling.
‘All I ask in return is that you join my court. You need not be parted from Raleigh, if you insist on pretending to be besotted with him. He’ll be right here with you.’
‘I appreciate the offer, Your Majesty, but Rostenburg is my home. You need not burden yourself with another mouth to feed.’
‘Burden? Are you always so cruel to yourself?’ Her fingers intertwined with mine so that she held my hand like a lover. ‘Why would you think I would want him any more than I want you? Raleigh is precious to me, true, but two beautiful things are better than one, are they not?’
She kissed my wrist. This time she didn’t let me tear my hand away.
I studied her expression, the curl of her lip, her hooded eyes.
Her expression was cold, amused. She had calculated every moment leading to this one.
She’d never intended to listen to me. She’d never even intended for me to leave this throne.
She was going to kill me.
‘You’ve gone tense,’ she murmured, stroking my arm.
‘Are you trying to punish Raleigh?’
‘For what, dear one?’
I swallowed. I wasn’t supposed to know about the deal. ‘For leaving court.’
‘Oh.’ A melodic sigh. ‘He never really left me.’
She peeled herself from me and suddenly I was free, alive. I flew from the throne as quickly as I could, stumbling down the steps in my haste to put as much distance between me and her dais of death as possible.
The Queen glanced back at me in cold amusement as she approached the stained glass behind us.