by Chloe Hart
“Kel.” Mary’s voice sounded strained, as though she were struggling with a great weight. “You know you can’t say these things to me. Nothing will ever happen between us, and Jessica deserves better than this. She deserves—”
“I deserve a man who loves me.”
Jessica left her hiding place, and came striding around the corner and into the light.
The prince and the vampire were locked in a tableau like something out of a fairy tale. Kel was kneeling at Mary’s feet, his head bowed and his hands gripping the material of her tunic. Mary was looking down at his blond head with anguish in every line of her face. Her hands were curled into fists, as though she longed to touch him.
At the sound of Jessica’s voice, Kel sprang to his feet and Mary gasped. They both stared at her, frozen.
“I deserve a man who loves me,” Jessica said again, looking at them calmly. “Kel, I’m afraid I can’t marry you after all. I was willing to marry without love when I thought neither of us was capable of that emotion, but as it is…” she took a deep breath. “No. We’ll have to find another way to keep peace between our realms.”
“What a lovely thought,” came a new voice. “But somehow, I don’t think my mother’s going to leave that up to you.”
Jessica’s head jerked up to see a richly dressed Fae man standing a few yards away, with three well-armed guards behind him.
She’d recognized the voice as belonging to Kel’s brother. Edrik. He looked like Kel, but his expression had none of Kel’s impassivity. Emotion was making the muscles in his face twitch.
After only a moment, she realized what that emotion was.
Hatred.
Chapter Eleven
Jessica’s first introduction to Queen Navril took place with her hands tied and a guard with a sword standing behind her.
Her hands were tied because she’d fought, even though Kel had called out to her to surrender. But that wasn’t a word she felt like adding to her vocabulary. When the guards had approached her she’d struck out with feet and fists. She’d been reaching for the knife in her ankle sheath when Edrik himself slammed a knee into her abdomen, which had slowed her down enough that the guards had been able to restrain her.
The cords they’d used to tie her wrists behind her back were tight. As she and Mary and Kel were marched down the corridor past the prisoners’ cells—Jessica tried to see inside, but the barred openings in the door were small and the guards kept them moving—she tried without success to work her hands to loosen the bonds.
When she and Kel were jostled together as they were forced up a spiral staircase, he whispered to her, “Even if you get your hands free, you can’t use the portal stone down here. The dungeons are warded against them. You’ll have to wait until you’re upstairs.”
He was separated from her before she could tell him that she had no intention of using the stone and leaving him and Mary behind in danger. Did he really think so little of her?
Not that it was likely to be an issue any time soon, she thought wryly, feeling the cords cutting into the skin of her wrists.
At the top of the staircase they emerged into what looked like a high-ceilinged corridor. When she felt the cold wind against her cheek, she realized it was actually a covered bridge. The arches between the stone columns were open to the mountain air. Jessica breathed it in gratefully after the fetid odor of the dungeons.
Then she glanced through one of the archways, over the side, and her heart seized in a quick spasm. The bridge spanned the gap between one mountain crag to another, over a drop into the jagged rocks far below.
“Other prisoners have sought that way out,” a voice whispered in her ear, and she turned her head to see Edrik staring at her. He was smiling at her with those strange, hate-filled eyes, and the sight was more chilling than the view from the bridge. He leaned closer to her as they walked. “But I don’t think your death will be so easy.”
“Don’t speak to her,” Kel said, his voice like ice.
Edrik turned his gaze on his brother. Kel had not been restrained, and the guards didn’t point their weapons directly at him, but it was clear that he wasn’t walking free.
“Concerned for your bride-to-be? What does your vampire whore think of that?”
Something flashed into Kel’s eyes that was almost as ugly as the look in his brother’s, but before he could respond, their party came to a halt before an immense wooden door, guarded by two Fae wearing crimson and silver.
There was a murmured discussion between one of them and one of Edrik’s men. Then the bar was drawn back from the doors and they opened, slowly, into a hall of incredible magnificence.
Jessica’s eyes were dazzled by the jeweled mosaics on the walls and by the sunlight that shone into the hall through the enormous windows, casting prisms of light when they struck the gemstones. Because of this, it took her a minute to see the people at the far end of the room.
Once she spotted them, though, it was impossible to look anywhere else.
Queen Navril sat at the head of a marble table with about two dozen other Fae, both men and women.
The wooden doors closed behind them, and their small group stood in silence as the queen regarded them. After a moment she stood, which of course brought everyone else at the table hastily to their feet.
She was a redhead, and her white face, pale brows, and elaborate gown made Jessica think of Queen Elizabeth the First.
She took in the group before her as if she were in no particular hurry, her eyes going from Mary, to Kel, to Jessica, and to Edrik with no discernible change in her cool expression.
After a minute she turned to the others at the table.
“Leave us,” was all she said.
Without a word, they left their places and scurried out, using a smaller doorway at the other end of the room.
Then the queen approached them, slowly, her gaze flickering over Jessica and then moving to Edrik’s guards. She stopped a few yards away from them, and after a moment called her own guards, who stood inside the massive wooden doorway, with a single gesture of her hand.
They came to stand before her as she spoke to Edrik. “Did you order that Princess Jessica’s hands be bound?”
Jessica glanced at Edrik out of the corner of her eye and saw that he had flushed to the roots of his hair. “Yes, Mother, but you don’t know what she was—”
“It was by your order that these men laid hands upon royalty?”
His tongue darted out to wet his lips. “Yes.”
“You, too, are royalty. I cannot inflict punishment on your person as I might desire. Let it, therefore, be inflicted on your servants.”
She looked at Edrik’s guards. “They shall not be killed, for my justice is tempered with mercy. But let their eyes be gouged out that they may no longer look upon their betters. And let their sword hands be cut off that they might not be used against their betters.” A very faint smile twisted the corners of her mouth. “They may keep their ears and their tongues.”
A frisson of horror trickled down Jessica’s spine at the coolness with which the queen delivered her sentence. The guards were behind her, so she couldn’t see their reactions. But a moment later, Navril’s guards had taken Edrik’s men away.
“Kel, of your courtesy, remove the cords from Princess Jessica’s hands.”
Kel did so immediately, moving behind her and using a knife to cut her bonds. He came around to stand before her, saying formally, “The royal house of Andon offers you apologies for your treatment here, Your Highness.” Then he let his eyes move deliberately to the tiny bump behind her shirt where the portal stone was. Now, he mouthed, before moving to stand beside her again.
“Mother!” Edrik cried out. “Kel signaled to her. Told her to do something. I tell you they’re in collusion, they’re plotting against you, they—”
“I will not ask you again to keep silent. Do not say another word unless it is in answer to a question. And do not make the mistake of thinking me a fool
. It is obvious that Kel was reminding his fiancé that she could use the portal stone he gave her to return to her world. But I think that if she were going to do so, she would have done it the second her hands were free.”
Now her eyes were on Jessica. They were the palest blue she had ever seen.
“But in case I am wrong about that, you are free to use the stone now. Is that your wish?”
“No, Your Highness.”
“Think carefully, Princess, for you have two choices. You may use the stone now, and return to Earth. But if you do not, you must give the stone to me, and stay here until I permit you to go. Choose.”
Jessica didn’t hesitate. She reached for the chain around her neck, undid the clasp, and handed it to Navril.
She heard Kel’s swift intake of breath, but she didn’t take her eyes off the queen.
“Thank you,” Navril said softly. “And do not be worried, child—I am not angry with you for coming to this realm uninvited. If I were a young woman in your position, I, too, would have wished to know more about my new home before my marriage.” She looped the portal stone around her jeweled belt and smiled at Jessica. “And now, if you don’t mind, I would like to hear what made my younger son take such precipitate and ill-advised action against you. I do not wish to hear it from him, as his voice sets my teeth on edge.”
It was really a rather clever move on the queen’s part. If she lied, Edrik would call her on it. If she stayed silent, Edrik could still be called upon to relate what had happened.
So she had to speak the truth. But could she do it in a way that drew the queen’s ire on herself, and away from Mary? Or was Mary doomed no matter what she did?
“I’m afraid that your son was extremely distraught on his brother’s account. Perhaps that is what caused him to act so hastily. You see, I told Kel that I can’t marry him after all. Because I love someone else.”
“You love someone else? Who?” The queen asked sharply.
“A man named Hawk.”
She used the name deliberately. She wanted Mary to know that she was no threat to her love for Kel, or his for her—and that she was on Mary’s side. How else could she convey all that in their current circumstances?
But as she spoke the words out loud, she realized something. Something she wasn’t prepared for.
What she had said was the truth.
She wasn’t given any time to process this astonishing revelation. Navril stared at her with those pale blue eyes under their pale blonde brows, and began to speak in a low, almost hypnotic voice.
“Child. Child. You’re so young, so innocent. But you are your mother’s daughter, and I know that in the end your decisions will lead you to survival and not destruction. You are your mother’s daughter, and I know that if the choice were to kill or be killed, you would kill.”
Navril stepped closer. “There are some realizations that should come slowly, through the experience of years and decades and even centuries. But we don’t have years or decades or centuries now. So let me give you something, Jessica—a piece of knowledge that’s already woven into your DNA. A piece of knowledge that will guide the course of your life.”
Those pale blue eyes stared at her without blinking. “You can’t have both love and power. You have to choose between them.”
A moment of stark silence. And then, Edrik’s voice. “Mother!”
Navril whipped around to face her younger son. “I told you to keep silent.”
“But it is my right to speak! You can’t deny me the right of kimru.”
The queen frowned, while Jessica racked her brain. She’d heard the word before, during half-forgotten history lessons. It was one of the ancient customs the Earth Fae no longer followed.
“You claim a life here?”
That was it—a demand for execution, for violating Fae law.
“The life of this vampire. Mary Blakestone. She has broken one of our most ancient laws, by seducing and corrupting the royal person of my brother. Everyone here knows that if a demon attempts to lure a Fae into an unclean coupling, that demon’s life is forfeit.”
Navril’s eyes went to Mary, who was standing behind Jessica.
“My son is correct, although it has been many, many years since this law was enforced. I have had occasion to speak to Kel before regarding his preference for you. But it seems that my advice went unheeded. What say you to this accusation, slave?”
Mary’s voice, when she spoke, was clear and strong. “I have never attempted to lure Kel into doing anything. I have always respected his position, and I have never forgotten my own.”
“She speaks the truth,” Kel said, his voice cold.
There was a short pause. “I hope you continue to speak the truth. Bear in mind that if I question your veracity, I will call in a spellcaster to perform a truth spell. With that knowledge, I ask you this, Mary. Do you love my son?”
Silence. Jessica felt her heart throb in agonized sympathy for Mary. Kel was about to learn the truth of her feelings in the worst circumstances imaginable.
When Mary spoke again, her voice was no longer clear and strong. It was barely more than a whisper.
“Yes. I love him.”
Next to her, Kel whipped his head around to look at the woman he loved.
“Mary,” he breathed, and Jessica’s heart clenched with pity and fear.
There was no way this could end well.
She kept her own eyes on the queen. A slight flaring of Navril’s nostrils was the only outward sign of her displeasure—at least until she spoke.
“Apparently I’ve given birth to two fools,” she said drily. She glanced at Jessica. “In the circumstances, I can hardly blame you for your disinclination to marry my son. Not, I hope, because of whatever he fancies he feels for this vampire, for that will surely fade—but because of his weakness and poor judgment.”
Her gaze shifted to Kel. “Unfortunately for you, I have little time or patience for this right now. The work I have taken in hand leaves little room for the fumbling of idiots. What I require now from my family is strength and acuity. Edrik’s judgment is clouded by his irrational jealousy of you, and yours is clouded by this woman. I have been overly indulgent in the past, but that ends now.”
She took a step back and spoke to Mary. There was no emotion at all in her voice. “By the law of the Fae, I condemn you to death. Sentence will be carried out tomorrow morning, three hours after dawn.”
Kel cried out, but before he could say anything Jessica stepped forward and spoke directly to the queen.
“In our world, the ancient tradition of kimru allows for a champion to challenge the accuser. If the champion is killed, sentence is carried out. If the accuser is killed, the accused is pardoned.”
Navril raised one pale brow. “In our world, as well. But no one involved in the accusation may act as champion. So Prince Kel cannot—”
“Not Prince Kel. I meant myself.”
The queen blinked. “What?”
“I will be Mary’s champion.”
An electric pause. “What is the vampire to you?” The queen asked sharply.
This would be the tricky part. “Nothing. It means little to me whether she lives or dies. Your son Edrik, on the other hand, does mean something to me. He dishonored and humiliated me, and for that I would welcome the opportunity to kill him.”
A tiny smile hovered around the queen’s mouth. “As I thought,” she said softly. “Your mother’s daughter, and a worthy wife for my son. But you would not wish your married life to begin with a rival under the same roof?”
Since the queen had chosen to ignore the fact that Jessica had declared her intention not to marry Kel, she might as well ignore it, too. “She wouldn’t be living under this roof. If I am victorious, I will send her back to Earth.”
Navril pondered this. Jessica had created a win-win situation for her, at least as far as Mary went. Whatever the outcome of a duel between her and Edrik might be, Mary would no longer be a thorn in her sid
e.
And she couldn’t deny Jessica the right to challenge Edrik. The right of challenge was inviolable. “It’s not our custom to free slaves,” Navril said after a moment. “But it is not the custom of Fae to champion them, either. If you do so, you may do with her what you will.”
She took a step closer to Jessica again. “One thing you must know before you make a formal challenge,” she said. “My son is a fool, and woefully subject to his emotions, but he is a deadly fighter. Your royal mother would be pained to hear of your death—to say nothing of my own disappointment if that is the outcome. You are the wife I want for my son and the mother I want for my grandchildren. It would be a pity if your desire for revenge leads to your death.”
A deadly fighter? She glanced at Edrik, and found it hard to believe. Not that it mattered. This was the only chance she had to save Mary’s life and send her back to her brother.
She stepped in front of Edrik so that a foot of space separated them.
Before she could speak, Mary was at her side, clutching at her sleeve. “You can’t do this. You can’t. You—”
Jessica jerked her arm away from Mary’s with pretended disgust. “Don’t touch me, vampire. I’m not doing this for you. Stand aside from your betters.” She glanced back at Navril, as though they were allies, and Navril immediately called over her guards. “Take the vampire female back to the dungeons, and lock her in a cell.”
Mary went quietly, without another word—trapped into silence by Jessica’s ploy. Kel, at least, had had the good sense to remain quiet. Now she was free to turn back to Edrik.
“By the law and custom of our kind I challenge you. I am champion to the vampire Mary and will prove her innocence with my body, in armed combat. Do you accept the challenge?”
Edrik was trembling, and after a moment she realized that the look in his eyes was eagerness.
“With pleasure,” he said, and the look he gave her as he raked his gaze from her head to her toes could have been lascivious if it hadn’t been so hate-filled.