Meredith Gentry 6 - A Lick of Frost

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  I frowned at Hugh but it hurt, so I stopped. I said, "I don't understand."

  There was movement near the far door, hidden by the crowd of people and dogs. The crowd moved to either side, revealing a huge black dog. Not as huge as some of the Irish hounds, but… The black dog trotted toward me, his nails clicking on the marble.

  I almost whispered his name but stopped in time. I held a hand out toward him. He laid his great furred head in my hand, then there was an instant of warm mist and prickling magic. Doyle stood before me, nude and perfect. He wore the only metal that seemed to have survived the transformation, the silver earrings that peeked from the fall of his ankle-length hair. Even the tie for his hair was gone.

  He was unarmed and alone inside the Seelie mound. The danger he had exposed himself to made my stomach clench tightly. In that moment I feared for him more than for myself.

  He took me in his arms, and I clung to him. Clung to the feel of his skin, the strength of him. I moved my head too quickly, and a wave of nausea blurred my vision. He seemed to sense it because he moved me to lay more prone in his arms. He knelt in the white-and-gold corridor, his darkness repeated in the mirrors as he held me.

  There was a glitter on his cheeks, and I saw the Darkness cry for only the second time ever.

  CHAPTER 27

  I KNELT ON THE MARBLE IN DOYLE'S ARMS, MY HEAD RESTING ON his chest. Just his touch seemed to ease some of my pain.

  "How?" I asked.

  He seemed to understand exactly what I wanted to know, as he often did. "This is not the first time I have come here in this guise. Many of the fey hounds began as black dogs. I am just one who has not chosen a master. I am quite the favorite among those who have not been blessed with a dog. They offer me choice tidbits and call me sweet names."

  "He is skittish, and will not let them lay hands on him," Lady Elasaid said.

  "He plays the dog to perfection," Hugh said.

  Doyle looked up at them. "It is not play. It is a true form for me."

  There was silence for a second, then Hugh asked, "Is the Darkness truly the father of one of your children?"

  "Yes," I said. I held him as tightly as I could without moving my head too much. "It is too dangerous for you to be here. If you are discovered…"

  He kissed my forehead as gently as a feather's touch. "I would brave much more than this for you, my princess."

  My fingers dug into his arm and back. "I could not bear to lose you and Frost. I could not bear it."

  "We have heard rumor of the Killing Frost, but we thought it only rumor," Hugh said.

  "Is he truly dead?" Lady Elasaid asked.

  "He is the white stag in truth," Doyle said.

  Hugh knelt beside us, smiling. "He is not dead then, Princess. In three years, or seven, or a hundred and seven he will return to his true self."

  "What good is a hundred years to a mortal lover, Sir Hugh? His child will never know him while I still live."

  Hugh's eyes flared as if someone had struck the embers of his power. There was a moment of fire in his eyes, like looking into two small fireplaces. He blinked and his eyes were only the colors of fire. "I have no words of comfort then, but the black dog's presence is one of the things we nobles have done to keep your aunt from starting true war with us. He will remain close to your side."

  I grabbed Hugh's sleeve. "He is weaponless in this form. If discovered, can you protect him?"

  "I am the captain of your guard, Merry. I protect you," Doyle said.

  I leaned harder against the solidness of him, my hand on the other man's sleeve. "You are one half of a breeding royal pair. You are king to my queen. If you die, the chance of other children dies with you."

  "She is right, Darkness," Hugh said. "It has been too long since there was life in the royal bloodline."

  "I am not of the bloodline," Doyle said. His deep voice seemed to echo off the mirrors.

  "We know the princess has made Maeve Reed, once the goddess Conchenn, with child by her human husband. We also hear rumors that one of your male guards has made a female guard pregnant," Hugh said.

  "Truth," I said.

  "If you could make one of us who is of the pure Seelie line pregnant, then all the king's support would fall away from him. I am sure of that," Hugh said.

  Lady Elasaid knelt on the other side of us. "Most of his supporters are convinced that only the mongrels are breedable. They have decided that they would rather die as a race than pollute their blood. If you could prove them wrong on this, they would follow you."

  "Some," Hugh said, "but not all. Some hate too deeply."

  She nodded. "As you say, Hugh." There was something intriguing about the way she said it, the way she lowered her eyes.

  "You want you and Hugh to be the experiment," I said.

  She blinked at me. "Experiment?"

  Hugh took her hand in his. "Yes, we would like very much to have a child of our own."

  "When I am healed and safe, and my people are safe, then I would be happy to try a spell for you," I said.

  Some tension went out of them, and they smiled at me, as if I'd told them that tomorrow was Yule and their most long-for present was under the tree. I wanted to warn them that until the ring and the Goddess had told me they were breedable, I could guarantee nothing.

  Doyle's arms tightened around me. He was right; now was not the time to undermine our allies' confidence in us. We needed them to get us out of here. I needed a hospital or a healer who could lay hands. And I never, ever wanted to go back to Taranis's bed.

  I shivered, and fought to not move my head when I did it.

  "Are you cold?" Doyle asked.

  "Nothing that a blanket can help."

  "I will slay him for you."

  "No, no, you will live for me. Vengeance is cold comfort on a winter's night. I want you warm and alive beside me more than I want my honor avenged." I moved as carefully as I could until I could see his face. "As your princess, and future queen, I order you to forget vengeance for this. I am the injured party, not you. If I say it's not as important to me as the feel of you in my arms, you must honor that."

  He stared down at me with those black eyes. His hair was a wild mass of thick blackness with the hint of silver rings peeking like stars from the blackness of his hair. He looked like the Doyle who came to my bedroom, not the braided and buttoned-up Doyle who guarded me. But the expression on his face was all about the guard, and something else. Something I hadn't expected to see, though I should have. There was a man's feelings for his love, who had been violated by another man. It was, dare I say, a very human emotion.

  "Please, Doyle, please, let us tell the media what he has done. Let us bring him down using the human law he sought to use against us."

  "It has a certain poetic justice," Hugh said.

  Doyle stared down at me for a breath, then gave one small nod. "As my queen wishes, so shall it be."

  It felt as if the world took a breath, as if it had been waiting for him to say those words to me. I had no idea why those words now were so important, but I knew the sensation of reality changing. Those words, spoken here, had changed something large. Some event had stopped, or begun, because of this moment. I felt it, knew it, but not what it meant, or what the end would be.

  "So mote it be," the healer said.

  The other nobles echoed her. "So mote it be, so mote it be." Down the corridor, and just like that I understood. They had acknowledged me queen. Once you only needed so many nobles and the blessing of the gods to rule in faerie. Once, even longer ago, you had only needed the blessing. Now I had both.

  "I would carry you to the ends of the earth and beyond," Doyle said, "but I must trust my most precious burden to others." He reached out as if he would touch the spreading bruise where Taranis had struck me, then he bent over and laid his mouth against mine. His hair slid over me like a warm cloak to help hide me.

  He whispered, "More than life, more than honor, I love thee."

  What do you s
ay when a man whose entire existence had been his honor offers to give it up for you? You say the only thing you can. "More than any crown or throne or title, I love thee," I said. "More than any power in faerie, I love thee."

  The scent of roses and deep forest was suddenly present, as if we'd stepped into a forest glade where wild roses had managed to grow.

  "I smell flowers again," the blond guard said.

  "The Goddess moves around this one," a woman said.

  "Let us take her to the humans and see if they can do what we cannot," Lady Elasaid said. "Get her far away from here." She turned tricolored eyes shiny with unshed tears away as Hugh helped her stand.

  Doyle stood up, carefully, holding me close, and trying not to move my head. He succeeded. I clung to him, not wanting him to let me go, even as I knew we had to separate.

  Doyle and Hugh looked at each other. "Know that you carry the future of all of faerie in your arms, Sir Hugh."

  "If I did not believe that, I would not be here now, Darkness."

  Doyle lifted me away from his body, and Hugh's arms slid under me. My hands trailed over Doyle's bare flesh, so warm, so real, so… mine.

  Hugh settled me as gently as he could in the curve of his arms, and the strength of his body. It wasn't his power as a warrior that I doubted, not really. It was simply that his arms were not the ones I wanted.

  "I will be close by, my Merry," Doyle said.

  "I know," I said.

  Then he was the black dog again. He came to nudge my foot with the fur of his head. I touched him with my fingers, and the eyes were still Doyle's eyes.

  "Let us go," Hugh said.

  The rest formed a group around us. They closed in front as they opened the door, so that if there was an attack waiting, it would hit them first and not me. They were risking their lives, their honor, their future. They were immortal, which meant they had a lot of future to risk.

  I prayed, "Mother, help them, keep them safe. Do not let them pay a hard price for what we are about to do."

  The scent of roses was fresh, and so real that I thought I felt a petal brush my cheek. Then I felt another. I opened my eyes to find that it was raining rose petals.

  There were gasps of joy and wonder from the nobles of the Seelie Court. The dogs capered and danced in the fall of petals. The petals looked very pink against the blackness of Doyle's fur.

  Lady Elasaid said, "Once the queen of our court walked everywhere in a shower of flowers." Her voice was soft with wonder.

  "Thank you, Goddess," Hugh said. Tears glittered on his face as he looked at me, tears that sparkled like water reflecting fire. He whispered, "Thank you, my queen."

  He walked forward with me in his arms, tears of fire glittering on his face. We walked into the next room with pink rose petals floating down from nowhere like sweet rain.

  CHAPTER 28

  WE MOVED THROUGH ROOMS OF MARBLE AND GOLD. ROOMS with cold pink walls with veins of silver and pillars of gold. Rooms of white marble with veins of pink and lavender and pillars of silver. Rooms of gold and silver marble with pillars of ivory. We moved always in a circle of falling petals, pink petals pale as dawn's first blush, dark as day's last salmon blaze, and a color deep enough to be purple. They fell around us, and I realized that the petals were the only living thing we passed. There was nothing organic in this place of marble and metal. It was a palace, but it was not a home for beings who had begun life as nature spirits. We were meant to be a people of warmth, life, and love, and there was none of that here.

  I don't know what the other nobles would have done if we hadn't moved in the circle of that flowered blessing. They matched the rooms, dressed in stiff clothing of gold and silver and subdued color. They stared, open-mouthed. Some began to follow us, like a parade that grows from sheer joy and wonder.

  It was when I heard the first laugh that I realized that there was more to the nobles being won over than simply seeing the fall of petals. The touch of the flowers seemed to make them happy. They came to us with smiles, and voices of protest, of "Where is the king? What have you done?" When the voices died out, they simply followed us, smiling.

  Hugh whispered, "I remembered loving Queen Roisin. I never realized that that love was partially glamour."

  I almost told him that I wasn't doing this, but with that thought the scent of roses suddenly grew stronger. I'd learned that it usually meant either yes or don't. I guessed that I should not tell Hugh that I wasn't creating the flowers on purpose, and with that thought the scent of roses dimmed, I took it to mean that I'd done what she wished. I was content with that.

  Doyle had had to drop back so that he was not right next to me. I understood that it was so no one would see and perhaps make a connection, but I had to fight both my feelings and the head injury not to look around for the big black dog. Hugh's huge shaggy hounds helped, both by partially blocking my view and by brushing me with their muzzles, touching my bare feet and hands. One was almost solid white, the other almost as solidly red with only small white markings. Every time they touched me, I felt a little better.

  The petals rested on their great heads, then fell to the ground as they moved and snuffled at me. It was almost as if the dogs were more real to me than the nobles in their beautiful clothes. The dogs had been created from the magic that I had raised with Sholto. They had come from the same magic that had finally gotten me with child. The dogs had come from the same night and the same magic. A magic of making and remaking.

  There were guards at the doors at the end of the room where we stopped. This room was formed of red and orange marble with veins of white and gold glittering through the stone. The pillars were silver with gold vines carved to look as if they bloomed with golden flowers.

  As a child, I had thought the pillars one of the most lovely things in the world. Now I saw them for what they were, a stand-in for the real thing. The Unseelie Court even without the new magic had held the remnants of real roses. There had been a water garden in the inner courtyard with water lilies. Yes, it had also held a rock with chains fixed to it, so you could be tortured in a scenic setting, but there had been life in the court. It had been fading, but it hadn't faded completely when the Goddess began to move through me, through us.

  In all the Seelie Court there was no life. Even the great tree in the main chamber was formed of metal. It was a thing of great artifice, amazing artistic achievement, but such things were for mortals. The immortal weren't supposed to be known only for their art. They were supposed to be known for the reality that the art was based upon. There was nothing real here.

  The guards wore business suits. They looked more like secret service agents than Seelie nobles. Only their otherworldly beauty and eyes formed of rings of color showed them to be more than human.

  Hugh held me a little closer. His hounds moved in front of me. I realized that they were tall enough to partially block me from the sight of the guards.

  Lady Elasaid moved to the front of the group. She spoke in a ringing voice. "Let us pass."

  "The king's orders are clear, m'lady. No one else is allowed into the press conference without his express permission."

  "Do you not see the blessing of the Goddess before you?"

  "We are immuned to illusion by the king's own magic."

  "Do you see the fall of petals?" she asked.

  "We see the illusion of it, m'lady."

  I could not see what she did, but she said, "Touch them."

  "The king can make illusion touchable, too, m'lady Elasaid."

  I realized that they had seen lies so long that they no longer recognized truth. All was doubt for them.

  The blond guard had stepped a little in front of us, helping the dogs hide us from view. He turned to Hugh and whispered, "Shall I call?"

  Hugh gave a small nod.

  I expected the guard to take out a hand mirror or use the shiny surface of his blade, but he didn't. He reached into the leather pouch at his side and took out a very modern cell phone.

/>   I must have looked surprised because he said, "We have reception near this room. It's why we put the press in here."

  It was perfectly logical. He moved back, and others moved, gracefully, to help hide him from the view of the guards before the doors.

  He spoke quietly, "We are outside the doors with the injured princess. The guards will not let us pass."

  One of the guards near the door said, "Go back to your rooms. None of you have any business here."

  The blond guard said, "Yes, Yes. No." He folded the phone shut, placed it back in his leather bag, and took his post at our side. He whispered to Hugh, so quietly that even I couldn't hear it.

  The group of nobles and their hounds bunched up around me. If it came to an actual fight with swords and magic, they had left themselves no room to maneuver, Then I realized what they had done. They were shielding me. Shielding me with their tall, slender bodies. Shielding me with their immortal beauty. Me, who they had once despised, and they were risking all they were, all they had ever been, to keep me safe.

  They were not my friends. Most did not know me. Some had made it clear when I was a child that they did not like me. They found me too human, too mixed of blood to be sidhe. What had Taranis done to them to make them so desperate that they would defy him like this for me?

  There was a stirring in the front of the glittering throng around me, almost the way a field of flowers moves in a strong wind.

  I heard the guard near the door, his voice rough enough to recognize among all the sweeter voices. "You are not allowed farther into our sithen, sir, by order of the king."

  "Unless you want to fight us, we are coming through this door."

  I knew the voice. It was Major Walters, head of the special branch of the St. Louis Police Department that specialized in dealing with the fey. It had been an honorary title for years, until I came home. I didn't know how he'd gotten invited to a press conference, and I didn't care.

  A second male voice came. "We have a federal warrant to bring the princess into protective custody." It was Special Agent Raymond Gillett, who had been the only federal agent who had kept in touch with me after the investigation of my father's death had gone cold. When I was younger I had thought he cared what happened to me. Lately I realized it was more about not leaving such a high-profile case unsolved. I was still angry with him, but in that moment, his familiar voice was a good sound.