Drawing her close, he kissed her again, like a lover not a friend, and then held her to him for a long time in silence. She closed her eyes again, listening to the dull, thudding beat of his heart, wishing this moment could be distilled and kept for posterity, so she could drink from it whenever she was in need of a dose of sheer bliss.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen next, Arkady,” he said, his lips buried in her hair. “I don’t know why I became immortal. I don’t know if it was random chance or there is some grand, yet-to-be-revealed purpose in it. I don’t know if I can help the Cabal, or even if I still want to.” He took her by the arms then, and pushed her away a little so he could see her face. “The only thing I know for certain is that I’m not going to let you go.”
“You won’t have to, Declan,” she said, kissing him soundly to seal her promise. “Because you’re right. We have a chance for a fresh start, and however strange, however unexpected, I’m not going to pass up the opportunity. I’ll stay with you for as long as you want me.”
“I’ll want you until the end of time, Arkady.”
“That sounds grand, Declan. But I don’t have that option.”
“Then let’s settle for being happy now,” he said, hugging her close. “And let eternity take care of itself.”
PART IV
When the tide of misfortune moves over you,
even jelly will break your teeth.
—Persian proverb
Chapter 55
As far as he was able, Stellan avoided taking his meals in the dining room with the rest of the royal family. Were it not for his promise to Nyah to keep her safe, he’d have eaten every meal in his room and had no social contact with the Caelish royal family at all.
Queen Jilna was an attractive woman in her mid-thirties, but her looks were fading fast. She seemed in awe of the handsome young man who’d offered her his hand when everyone feared her daughter was dead and she might be required to produce another heir. Her new husband—the man who’d tried to marry little Nyah before fixing his attention on her mother—Lord Tyrone of Torfail, was a heart-stoppingly beautiful young man who looked to be no older than twenty-five. Jilna, of course, had no idea he was thousands of years older than that.
The Tarot named him Tryan the Devil, according to Declan Hawkes, although at first Stellan thought the Tide Lord sadly maligned by history. It wasn’t until he’d been in the palace for a while that he began to understand the man’s cruel nature, and discovered how aptly he’d been named.
Jilna appeared besotted with him, which disturbed Stellan greatly. Although only her consort rather than her king, Tryan was all but ruling Caelum in her name. She deferred to his every wish, referred every decision to him. Stellan couldn’t decide if it was because she was in love, she’d been drugged or was under some magical compulsion. The few times he’d seen the Caelish spymaster, Ricard Li, and been able to question him about the queen’s behaviour, the older man had shrugged helplessly. Jilna’s erratic behaviour was part of the reason he’d helped Nyah flee Caelum in the first place.
Of course, the problem with Tryan was more than that he had effectively stolen the Caelish throne. Tryan came with relatives and they were even more worrisome.
Syrolee, who was calling herself the Grand Duchess of Torfail, had taken over the palace. The only resistance she’d encountered was from her son, who clearly resented her trying to usurp the place he’d carved for himself, and from Nyah, whose position as heir to the throne gave her a certain amount of protection. Stellan winced every time he heard Nyah sniping at her, fairly certain that there would come a time when the Tide was high enough that Syrolee no longer felt the need to restrain herself around the Caelish heir. Or worse, she decided they no longer needed a Caelish heir.
Engarhod, the so-called Emperor of the Five Realms, appeared to be little more than a bored drunkard. That in itself fascinated Stellan, because it was his understanding that—thanks to their immortal powers of healing—it was very difficult to get an immortal drunk. It was a testament, therefore, to the majestic quantities of alcohol the man consumed that he managed to remain in that state most of the time. Stellan watched him consume fortified wine by the jugful, uninterested in anything else going on around him. As far as Stellan could tell, Syrolee could be angling to rule the world, for all he cared, and he wouldn’t have lifted a finger to help her. Or stop her, either.
This, Stellan supposed, was the curse of immortality. Engarhod had come to the same conclusion as Cayal. Only he wasn’t trying to kill himself, content to drown his sorrows in wine.
Engarhod’s two sons were a rather different matter. Rance and Krydence hadn’t been at the palace for as long as the others, and were still enjoying themselves, as far as Stellan could tell. They used their tenuous link to the throne to demand all manner of considerations, which Jilna did nothing to prevent. After meeting them briefly the day he’d arrived, Stellan decided they were thugs, and nothing they had done since then had changed his mind.
The most interesting immortal of them all, Stellan decided, was Elyssa. She was very much as Cayal had described her—a face lacking form or character on a body sculpted to perfection by immortality. She seemed to know people disliked her, just as she knew most people who pretended to like her did so because they sought to use her influence with her brother. There were rumours about young men being invited to her rooms and never being seen again, but Stellan had never witnessed her flirting with any man, so he wasn’t sure the rumours could be trusted.
She seemed a bookish young woman, intent on studying . . . something. Stellan didn’t know what it was, but she spent a lot of time reading through old texts and arranging meetings with various academics both from Caelum and abroad. A few days after he arrived, he’d even run into Andre Fawk, Arkady’s old colleague from the University of Lebec, on his way to meet with Lady Alysa. Virtually destitute since Jaxyn had assumed control of the duchy and decided he wasn’t going to support the university any longer, Fawk was apparently working on something for Elyssa, although Stellan had no idea what.
It intrigued him, though, particularly when he realised that after Elyssa had disappeared from the palace for a few days a couple of weeks ago, Warlock had vanished. When he inquired about the canine’s whereabouts, he learned Elyssa had left him watching over Fawk at some archaeological dig she’d decided to fund as part of her research into . . . well, whatever it was she was researching.
The news not only fascinated him, but it also reminded him of his promise to help Warlock’s family escape. And that raised its own set of problems, because, in the normal course of events, Stellan had no right or reason to go anywhere near the Crasii kennels in the palace.
He needed help, and the only true ally he had in this place was Princess Nyah.
So here he was at breakfast, ignoring the guffawing laughter going between Krydence and Rance—the result of a particularly foul joke the brothers were sharing. He paid no attention to Engarhod either, who’d already consumed a full jug of wine, or Syrolee, who was talking to Tryan, urging him to do something in a low, irritated voice, which her son seemed to be ignoring also.
Stellan filled his plate from the buffet and took a seat beside Nyah at the other end of the long table, as far away as she could get from her immortal stepfather.
“Good morning, your highness.”
“Your grace.”
“May I join you?”
“Please,” she said with feeling.
Stellan smiled sympathetically as he shook out his napkin. “Going to be one of those days, is it?”
“It looks that way,” the little princess said through a mouthful of toast. “I’m thinking of running away again,” she added in a low voice.
“Do you think it will help?” he asked, not certain she was serious.
The princess scowled at her mother who was sitting at the other end of the table, chewing mindlessly, apparently oblivious to everything going on around her. “Staying here doesn’t seem t
o be doing much good.”
“Would you like to do me a favour, then?”
Nyah brightened at the prospect. “What do you want me to do?”
“I need to visit someone in the Crasii pens.”
She looked at him oddly. “You have friends down there?”
“I owe someone a favour.”
“I suppose,” she said. “What do you need me to do?”
“Come with me. I’ve no reason to be in the pens and won’t be admitted without one. You, on the other hand, will raise no suspicion at all if you want to take me down and show me the new puppies.”
“Tabitha’s new puppies?” she asked, her eyes alight.
“That’s who I want to visit.”
Nyah nodded enthusiastically and jumped to her feet. “Come on, then! Let’s go.”
“Nyah, dear . . . where are you going?” Jilna asked in a voice that seemed vague and only mildly interested in the answer.
“We have new puppies in the Crasii pens,” she told her mother with a bright smile. “I’m taking Stellan down to show him.”
Tryan looked up from his conversation with Syrolee. “I’m sure Lord Stellan has better things to do than play with Crasii puppies, Nyah. Let him eat his breakfast.”
Stellan smiled at the immortal and shrugged. “It’s all right, my lord. I don’t mind accompanying her. Nyah really shouldn’t be down in a place like that on her own, and she’s quite desperate to see the pups.”
Syrolee treated him to a suspicious glare. “You’re very good with children, aren’t you, my lord?”
“I like them a great deal,” he agreed with a small bow to the Grand Duchess of Torfail.
“Not as much as he likes young men,” Rance added, elbowing his brother and sniggering as he said it. The two men fell about laughing at the joke. Stellan ignored them, and with all the dignity he could muster, he turned, took Nyah’s hand and walked from the dining room.
Nyah squeezed his hand encouragingly as soon as they were out of earshot. “I hate those two.”
“You can be sure they won’t be on the guest list for my next ball,” Stellan agreed.
“I wish we could kill them.”
He smiled down at her. “I believe there’s rather a lot of people who are trying to find a way to do that.”
“Do you think they’ll succeed?”
“I don’t know, Nyah,” he told her as they turned toward the stairs. “The only thing I’m certain of is that we can’t do anything about them ourselves, so we need to help the people we can, and not lose sleep over the ones we can’t.”
Nyah smiled up at him. “Shalimar would have said that’s a very philosophical outlook.”
“Shalimar was a very wise man.”
With Nyah demanding to see the new pups, nobody questioned Stellan’s right to be in the pens. They were led through the dungeon-like kennels by a female Crasii with a black and white coat, her tail drooping unhappily as she walked. Stellan had no idea if it was because she didn’t like them visiting or was just unhappy in general. Remembering the homely, village-like setting his own Crasii had enjoyed, Stellan wondered if it was the latter. He couldn’t imagine anybody, Crasii or human, being happy to live down here in these dark cells.
“Tabitha and the pups are in there,” the female told them, pointing to a cell at the end of the corridor; then she added as an afterthought, “your highness.”
Nyah waited until she’d turned and was headed back up the torchlit corridor before she hurried forward and stepped into the cell. Stellan followed her, squinting a little in the darkness. The pups in question were sleeping on a pile of furs, just inside the door, watched over by their dam—and presumably Warlock’s mate—Tabitha Belle.
The female looked up as they entered. She ignored Nyah, however, and jumped to her feet. “Your grace!”
Stellan hadn’t expected to be recognised quite so readily by some canine he’d never met before, but then he looked a little closer and his jaw went slack with shock. “Boots?”
“Shhh!” she hissed, pushing past him to look outside the cell and make sure they couldn’t be overheard. When she’d satisfied herself they were truly alone, she turned back to him. “Around here, I’m Tabitha Belle.”
Stellan was gob-smacked. “But . . . Tides, are you Warlock’s mate?”
“Who’s Warlock?” Nyah asked, on her knees looking at the sleeping puppies. “Can I pick one up?”
“I’d prefer you didn’t wake them,” Boots said, before turning back to look at him. “How is it you know Warlock?”
Her stance was defensive, her tail high, her teeth almost bared. She was frightened, he realised. “I met him in Lebec,” he said. “He asked me to check on you. I’m not here to harm you or your pups, Boots.”
Boots seemed to relax a little. “You came to see him at the Watch-house.”
Stellan nodded. “He knew my wife. She spoke very highly of him. An opinion I’m assuming you share, given you’re here with him.”
Boots shook her head. “I like him, your grace. Sometimes, when I can’t help myself, I really like him. But I wish I’d never met him.”
Stellan glanced down at the pups. Nyah was leaning over them, willing them to wake, but she wasn’t touching them. “I’m sure you don’t mean that. You’d not have these little treasures, otherwise.”
Unaccountably, Boots’s eyes filled with tears. “Tides, that’s the cruellest twist of all.”
“What do you mean,” Nyah asked, looking up at her with a frown. “They’re gorgeous.”
“And they are Crasii, your highness.”
“Well, of course they are,” Nyah said, rolling her eyes. “How long before they wake, do you think?”
Boots didn’t answer the little princess. Her gaze was fixed on Stellan, who at first didn’t understand why this Crasii was so upset at having three perfectly healthy Crasii pups. And then it occurred to him. Boots and Warlock weren’t just Crasii; they were Scards.
“Tides, Boots, I’m so sorry.”
“Can you help us?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know . . .”
She was quietly desperate as she said, “I have to get them away from here, your grace. I have to get them somewhere safe. Somewhere there are no suzerain.”
“What are their names?” he asked, unable to think of anything more profound to say.
“Despair, Torment and Misery,” Boots told him, glancing at her babies. “Elyssa named them.”
She turned her tormented gaze on Stellan. The irony of the situation didn’t escape him. Once he could have given Boots anything she desired, and she’d run away, only to find herself here, reliant on him once more.
And now, when he was all but helpless to aid her, she needed him the most.
Stellan nodded and gripped her shoulder encouragingly. “I’ve no notion of how I can, but I will help you, Boots. And your pups. And Warlock too if I’m able. I give you my word.”
Impulsively, Boots hugged him. “Thank you, your grace.”
He patted her awkwardly and smiled, hoping it made him look confident, wondering when he was going to learn to stop making promises to people that he didn’t know how he was going to keep.
Chapter 56
“End it now.”
For the third time in the past few days, Declan woke with Arkady in his arms, only this time he didn’t question his good fortune. He opened his eyes, blinking in the unexpected sunlight streaming through the window, wondering what had woken him. Arkady was sound asleep, her back to him, snuggled into the hollow of his body as he lay on his side next to her. Her breathing was deep and even, and when he pushed himself up on his elbow, he noticed the faintest hint of a smile playing around her lips.
Blinking, Declan looked toward the door. Cayal was standing there, leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed, watching them sleep. There was no telling how long he’d been there, but Declan was fairly certain now what had woken him.
“What did you say?” he asked softly, gentl
y moving away from Arkady as he spoke to avoid waking her.
“The Fyrennese had a saying once—the old ones, the ones Brynden comes from. End it now. It’s what you should do at the moment of ultimate ecstasy.”
Declan looked around for his trousers, wondering where Arkady had tossed them the night before.
“Why?” he asked, spying them across the room.
“Because once you’ve reached the peak, it’s all downhill from there, old son. So you might as well end it now and save yourself a long and disappointing life.” Cayal watched him cross the room to retrieve his clothes, and then added with a sour smile, “Ooops . . . you can’t die, can you? Guess you’ll need to brace yourself for the long, disappointing part.”
“Do you want something?” Declan asked, determined not to rise to the provocation. He picked his trousers up off the floor, turned his back to Cayal and pulled them on.
“You.”
“For what?”
“Time’s a-wasting, Rodent, while you live out your little fantasy with the girl of your dreams. We’ve only got a few days before the dreaded Merchant Marines come back. We’ve got work to do.”
“What kind of work?”
“You need to learn a few things or I’ll have to perform all the heroics.”
Declan turned to stare at the Immortal Prince, wondering if he was trying to needle him again, or if Cayal was serious.
Cayal smiled. “Finish getting dressed. I’ll meet you outside.” Then he glanced at Arkady’s sleeping form and sighed. “Tides, but she’s gorgeous. Of course, there’ll be prettier ones you’ll meet in the future. Forever’s useful like that. Prettier, smarter, better in bed . . .”
“Who are you trying to convince, Cayal, me or yourself?”
To Declan’s surprise, his question seemed to hit a nerve in the immortal. Cayal pushed off the doorframe, the snide smile replaced by genuine irritation. “Don’t keep me waiting, Rodent.”
The Palace of Impossible Dreams Page 40