“I hated him,” Aubrey said. He shook his head. “We’re all adjusting to his death, I think, because it still feels dangerous to admit that. Your father had been a good friend of mine, and I, like so many others, had been half in love with your mother.”
She smiled. “Really? I guess she might have been beautiful. I don’t know, I don’t remember that very well. What I remember is she was so funny and loving, and lively, and she made the room light up whenever she came into it.”
“Yes,” Aubrey said. “She was all of that. She would be so proud of you.”
Niniane’s eyebrows shot up. She was so shocked at his words, tears sprang to her eyes. “My goodness,” she said. She laughed a little and wiped her nose. “Do you really think so?”
“I do,” Aubrey said. “Not only did you survive against all the odds and turn into a beautiful woman, but you also learned skills and made connections, and you became someone she would have been thrilled to see take the throne.”
“I don’t know about that, but it means a lot to me that you said it.”
She caught sight of Tiago out of the corner of her eye. He was smiling at her.
She said to him, “Thank you.”
“For what?” said Tiago. He sprawled in his chair, his long legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles, his elbows rested on the chair’s arms, his fingers steepled.
“You’ve been nothing but supportive today in all the right ways,” she said.
“It’s a complicated day,” he said. “I’m trying to help.” His words were neutral, but his Power stroked her cheek with a smoky tenderness.
“That means a lot to me,” she said. She straightened her aching back and turned her attention to Aubrey, who had followed their exchange with close attention. She told Aubrey, “I have an agenda for this talk. First, I promised I would tell you why I know Dragos and the Wyr were not behind the second attack. Second, you need to know—Tiago is coming with me to Adriyel to stay.”
The Chancellor’s expression flared. “That’s unacceptable.”
“Is it now?” Tiago said. He tilted his head and regarded the Dark Fae male with a lazy predatory gaze. “Tough shit.”
Tiago made an interesting discovery that day, as he guarded Niniane through two very different groups of people. She sure did an awful lot of talking. She spoke to every last person—yeah, there’s no way that would always be possible—but somehow none of what she said ended up being blah-fucking-blah. She spoke to people with real warmth about matters that directly affected them, and they responded to her.
To him there was always something interesting to what she did, whether it was what she actually said, or how she wrinkled her nose and widened her eyes when she was feeling mischievous, or whenever she might get a particularly evil glint in her eyes. Sometimes he just watched her cute little ass as she walked, and he lost himself in remembrance of what had happened, in fantasy for the lovemaking to come.
He came to realize that all of her shoes were fuck-me shoes. Those little pretty froufrou strappy things she slipped on her feet could be categorized as weapons of mass destruction, because they obliterated the male mind. They elongated and defined those delicate, slender legs of hers. He would swear they caused her to walk in such a way that her hips swayed with a sexy little wriggle that had every male focusing on her like they were German pointers and she was the game they had just flushed out of the foliage.
She would be good on the throne, he decided with a sense of pride. She needed seasoning and confidence, and she had wavered once or twice at certain junctures, but all the raw materials were there, along with the not-inconsiderable added bonus that people fell in love with her wherever she went.
So he was content to stroll behind the little faerie and learn more about her. He catalogued potential threats, memorized faces, and noticed weaknesses in the layout of the property, such as the places where he would launch an attack or how he might break into the house. There wasn’t a lot on that end; the place was well constructed and defended. But there were a few things he would change.
He also made a note of personalities and problems. He had been used to command for a very long time. Most people had tells, a twitch or nervous habit, or a manner of speaking, or a scent they gave off. Scents were interesting tags or identifiers, because they were an involuntary response to stimuli. It was an extremely rare entity that had no tells whatsoever. Often Carling or Dragos could manage it. Certainly the Elven High Lord could pull it off, but the Elven Lord’s consort was more intriguing to Tiago, for she could pull it off with much more frequency than anybody else he had met.
Take the bug, for instance. He was pretty sure that nervous little man had a drug addiction of some sort. He had a scent that was too chemical but with no underlying layers to indicate he was taking something for an illness. Tiago was pretty laissezfaire about drug addictions—whatever a person chose to do was their own business—except when it came to people in positions of some importance or authority. An addiction meant impaired judgment and a weakness to exploit. Someone could be bribed or blackmailed, or hell, they might just fuck up. The bug smelled of fear. He was afraid he was going to get caught and removed from his position. He was right.
Another person of interest to Tiago was the guard captain, whose attitude toward Niniane held a veiled antagonism. Tiago had roused to urge her silently to step back toward him, while he assessed the man. Tiago continued to watch the captain without seeming to for several minutes after Niniane had moved away, watching the man’s expressions and how he interacted with the people around him. If he were to make a guess, it looked like the captain had a problem with women in authority. It didn’t appear that his veiled antagonism was directed at Niniane in particular. It was nothing personal—and the man was going to have to go, just as fast as Tiago could have a word with Arethusa to make it happen.
Naida, now. There was an interesting chick. Tiago was entertained by how a tea service and a tray of munchies could turn into some kind of subtle push for power or position. The kind of maneuvering for position he was used to tended to involve heavy artillery, a fight to get to high ground and his troops laying down covering fire. He watched and waited as his faerie assessed the situation, mulled it over and then sent the other woman away. Naida’s posture and expression had been quite correct and compliant, but she couldn’t hide her flare of scent aggression that filled the air as she walked out of the room. Naida couldn’t be fired like the other two, but he thought he could learn a lot by keeping an eye on her.
The Chancellor was a different matter altogether. His face, scent and posture spoke of alarm, not aggression. Tiago took a plate, filled it and handed it to Niniane, who accepted it after a hesitation and a flare of surprise in her gorgeous eyes. He took another plate—there were three, he noticed, which was perfect, although not exactly what Naida had originally intended—and he piled that one higher then relaxed back in his chair and watched the Chancellor with cold killer’s eyes. Tiago decided he enjoyed armchair warfare. It was so comfortable, and there were pastries.
Aubrey’s face tightened as he suppressed some kind of strong emotion. It was a complicated scent Tiago couldn’t yet decipher. The Chancellor turned to Niniane. “I apologize for my outburst, your highness,” he said. “You said you had an agenda.”
The guy was smooth, Tiago would grant him that. Maybe it was sincere and maybe it wasn’t. Time would tell.
He could almost see his faerie give a mental oh-screw-it shrug. She slipped off her shoes, tucked her feet underneath her and selected one of the pastries Tiago had given her. The one she selected had chocolate in it, and the box of chocolates he had given her had already disappeared. He made a mental note.
Niniane took a bite of the pastry and set it on her plate, her face thoughtful. Tiago shifted his plate to cover the growing bulge in his crotch as he watched her lick powdered sugar off her fingers. Thinking and licking just became his two new favorite things to watch her do. What was going on behind that sweet pixie face of h
ers? Was she thinking through A and B to reach C or D, or was she jumping out of the logical alphabet again? He couldn’t wait to see her when she was really conniving.
When she spoke next, it was to tell the Chancellor about her line of thinking about the Wyr, seasoned as it was by the intimacy of long familiarity, along with the conversation she’d had with Aryal. “So you see, it is nonsensical to believe the Wyr were behind the attack,” she said.
“I see,” Aubrey said. “Thank you for taking the time to explain it to me. When you explain everything that way, it does seem obvious that Dragos and the Wyr government were not involved, except in an accidental way as Tiago defended you.”
Tiago enjoyed his snack while he watched and listened. Aubrey mentioned nothing of Arethusa’s conversation with Tiago and Rune at the morgue. Arethusa must have decided to play her cards very close to her chest. Interesting. Apparently Arethusa didn’t trust anybody at the moment. Given her familiarity with the other Dark Fae, what did that say about her, or them? Tiago let the puzzle pieces in his head connect, break apart and re-form into different scenarios.
“Now to move on to your second point,” said Aubrey. The male looked at Tiago directly. “Please understand, this is not meant to be personal in any way. I have great admiration for everything you’ve accomplished. But no one will accept one of Dragos’s sentinels, let alone his warlord, on permanent deployment in the Dark Fae demesne. It would be considered an act of aggression and cause for war. The Dark Fae are unsettled enough by Urien’s death. While he had grown unpopular, he also ruled with a strong hand that gave many a sense of security they no longer have at the moment.”
“That’s why I quit,” said Tiago. He popped another pastry into his mouth.
The other male sat forward, his gaze sharp. “Excuse me?”
“I said I quit,” Tiago told him. “I am an independent agent. I no longer work for Dragos in any capacity.”
Aubrey’s astonished gaze shot to Niniane, who nodded. She said, “He’s coming with me.”
“I see,” said Aubrey, but Tiago was sure he didn’t yet. The man might be smart and well-placed in the Dark Fae government, but he was not as quick on the uptake on a few things like his wife was. His wife had taken one look at Tiago and Niniane and had gotten it. “Your highness, even if people believed that Tiago really has quit, they’re not—”
“Aubrey,” Niniane interrupted. Her voice, like her face, was calm, her eyes clear. “I’m not asking for permission or what people’s opinion will be on this issue. Either Tiago is coming with me, or I’m not going. The last thing on my agenda for this talk is to see if we can come to an understanding with you on this. I want you to back me up. I want you to be my supporter. I want to talk to you, confide in you, and ask your opinions about things. I have to start developing relationships with someone, and to start trusting somewhere. Frankly, if we can’t get you to accept this, I don’t see any reason in crossing over. We might as well stay here and the Dark Fae can find some other person to try to put on the throne. You’re some second or third cousin by marriage. Maybe that would be you.”
“Please.” Aubrey put up both hands, his face and scent flaring with deeper alarm. “Don’t say another word like that. My family connection is distant, and in any case, you are the real heir.”
“Then back me up,” Niniane said. “If you support this, other people may grumble at first, and they may not like it, but eventually they will accept it. Tiago is my—”
“Chief of security,” Tiago said.
She turned to him, surprised. “Is that what you are?”
Now that he had verbalized it, he tested it out in his head. There was no point in freaking out the faeries any further with talk of Wyr mating. What happened between him and Niniane was none of their business, and Niniane needed him to protect her, which was going to be a much more sophisticated and complex job than simply watching her back as her bodyguard. He said, “Yes.”
She regarded him, her expression concerned. “That will be a difficult position to be in as a foreigner.”
“I like a challenge,” he told her. “And it’s where I need to be, and it’s where you need me to be.” He added telepathically, And I’ll be hellacious good at it.
Her gaze searched his. He gave her a nod.
She looked at Aubrey, who stared into the middle distance while he wore a deep frown. “If you truly believe that I am the real heir, then you also have to recognize that change is here to stay for the Dark Fae,” she said. “I don’t think any of you have fully accepted that yet. Some of Urien’s old supporters are going to have a problem too, but there’s no use in trying to resist it. This is Urien’s legacy every bit as much as the laws he passed or the way he tried to cloister Adriyel from the outside world. Because of what he did, I had to escape and go somewhere else to survive.”
Aubrey looked at her with pain in his eyes. “If I had known you were alive, I would never have stopped searching for you.”
Her face softened. It was clear she believed him. There was so much sincerity in his voice, even Tiago almost believed him. She said in a gentle voice, “I appreciate you saying that more than you can know, but that’s all water under the bridge now. The point I’m trying to make is, because of what happened, I became someone I wouldn’t have otherwise become. I’m young for a faerie and I’m trendy, and the Dark Fae aren’t used to that in a ruler. I like American pop culture, cheese pizza, reading romance novels, and shopping in Milan. Also, thanks to Dragos, I have independent relationships with every Elder demesne in the continental United States. Now I can compromise on a lot of things. I can take advice and bring change in carefully and gently, but I will not compromise on this. I trust Tiago with my life in a way I can’t trust anyone else right now, not even you.”
Aubrey rubbed his forehead and looked under his hand from her to Tiago. After a moment he said to Tiago, “I will withdraw my support at the first hint that you are really working for the Wyr.”
“I would expect nothing else,” Tiago said.
Aubrey pressed. “She is the last direct descendant of the Lorelle line, and the only thing left of her father. You must always act with Niniane’s best interests at heart, and do everything in your power to keep her safe.”
“That,” Tiago told him with perfect honesty, “is not going to be a problem.”
Aubrey said to Niniane, “Very well then. I will support you.”
Niniane’s face lit up. She slipped out of the armchair and went to Aubrey to put her arms around his neck and hug him. Tiago tensed, hating her close contact to the other male but suffering through the moment, recognizing it as important to the other two, perhaps even necessary. Still, he watched Aubrey with jealous attention, noting the exact placement of the other male’s hands and arms as Aubrey hugged Niniane back. He could only relax when the Dark Fae male and Niniane separated.
She turned to Tiago and searched his gaze. I don’t want to spring too much on him at once. Do you think I should tell him I intend to bring to trial the people who supported Urien on the night of the coup?
Tiago studied the Chancellor’s face thoughtfully. Change, tempered with patience. It was a good strategy. Not yet. Remember your own advice and bring in change carefully. Prosecuting people for treason and murder can come after your coronation and we’ve had a chance to establish a secure power base. For now—he smiled at her and said with deep satisfaction—well done.
FIFTEEN
Later that evening, Niniane climbed the staircase behind Naida, her movements slow with exhaustion. She had toured the gardens and the rest of the main areas of the house. She had made a cursory inspection of the accounts that maintained the property. Everything appeared to be in order. She and Aubrey had had a preliminary discussion of Dark Fae finances, which were not as robust as she would have liked, but after her talk with Carling she wasn’t surprised.
He also gave her an overview on the status of her inheritance of Urien’s personal fortune. The sum Urien had mana
ged to amass was staggering. She reminded herself that her family’s fortune would have been subsumed into his. She also met separately with Kellen and Arethusa to inform them that Tiago would be coming to Adriyel as her chief of security. Kellen had been outraged, Arethusa noncommittal.
Dinner had been rife with undercurrents and tensions. Carling had come to join the party at the table. The Vampyre had sipped red wine, listened to the conversation and said little. The meal itself had been exquisite, or at least the three bites Niniane managed to choke down had been. She made sure to step into the kitchens to praise the chef and her staff personally. The kitchen staff had been transported with surprise and delight.
Now Tiago climbed the staircase beside her, his powerful body moving with relaxed fluidity, his hands clasped behind his back and his expression impassive as it had been for most of the day. He looked like the aloof Wyr sentinel she had met in Cuelebre Tower. After consuming the huge plate of pastries, he had proceeded to eat a mountainous dinner. He appeared to be impervious to glares, dislike, snubs and innuendoes. She had felt quite an irrational desire to smack him several times over the head with her napkin.
Naida said over her shoulder, “Earlier your bags had been taken to the master suite, but Aubrey and I wondered if you might enjoy a more feminine touch in your rooms. There’s a suite that has a lovely view of the back gardens. I hope you don’t mind that I took the liberty of requesting that your things be moved back there?”
She sighed. She was too tired to tell if there were undercurrents in Naida’s voice. No doubt Aubrey had thought to make the change after her reaction to Urien’s study. She was just relieved she didn’t have to step into Urien’s bedroom. She’d had it up to her eyeballs with confronting all things Urien, his handwriting, his decor decisions, his approach to foreign policy and his outrageous expense accounts. Apparently he’d had a fondness for Elven wine and Vieux Cognac aged from the French Revolution, which everyone at dinner had been all too pleased to sample. It was probably the only thing they had agreed upon. If she had to look at his bed right now she might gak up all three bites of her dinner on what was no doubt a tasteful and very expensive carpet.
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