Rhoswen didn’t respond, but she did not disagree, either. She took her hand away from the pouch, a tacit acceptance of Lyssa’s wishes with respect to it.

  But as she did, she gazed back down at the roses floating past her in the water. “The old man . . . you are right, that I felt his grief and understood it. But you are wrong if you think I don’t understand our similarities. Humans are not so different from Fae, for al that they need their structure. Their structure only hides how truly capricious they are. They vacil ate between hate and love, joy and despair, not like a pendulum clock, which is predictable, but like the chaos of shrapnel exploding from a bomb. Much as we do.”

  She looked at Lyssa now with bright, harsh eyes. “I hate you . . . yet I do not, as wel . What I feel toward you . . . it has no order. But I do know . . . I have a desire to see you again, sister. If you would consider coming for a few days in February . . . winters are long here. Your company, the company of your son, my nephew, might be welcome.” Now she straightened, speaking as one royal to another. “I swear to you, my oath, that as a child he wil never come to any harm here, no matter the tenor of our own relationship.”

  “I wil think on it.”

  Rhoswen gave her a tight-lipped smile as Lyssa repeated her own haughty words. The Fae queen rose, a dismissal, but she gave Jacob an openly appraising look. “I like you better as human, former vampire. On future visits, I might very wel exercise a queen’s prerogative to have you share my bed again.”

  Jacob cleared his throat, sketched a respectful bow. “I’m ever at the disposal of my lady’s wil , your Majesty.”

  “Then I shal just have to see what I can do to compel that wil .”

  “You better be capable of making Hel freeze over,” Lyssa said politely.

  Rhoswen gave her that humorless smile, but it held no more than a shadow of her earlier malice.

  “My scribes wil prepare the correspondence and we wil review it tomorrow, so I anticipate you wil be able to return home shortly after that. Our dawn wil align with your dusk for the next several days. Wait until then to protect your fair vampire skin, sister.

  Particularly since it needs some time to heal as it is.” As she turned away, bringing the audience to an end, Lyssa rose. “I’d like to ask you a question, sister. About the dol and the child’s tea set.” Rhoswen stopped, but she didn’t turn back, speaking instead to the sheets of water silently sliding down the wal before her. “He gave it to me, shortly after you were conceived. I have no idea how he knew his child would have dark hair and green eyes, but he was a powerful magic user, gifted with visions of different things. Sadly, his own fate was not one of them. However, perhaps he knew enough, because when he gave me the dol , he told me if I became sad, afraid or lonely, I could talk to her. She would listen, and that would help.”

  “Did it?”

  “Not always. Sometimes I needed her to talk back.” Rhoswen looked over her shoulder, gave her a tight smile. “Return to your room with your servant and have the staff care for you as needed. I have some further business to handle here. Captain, please remain.”

  Understanding that the dol admission was a difficult one, that the whole discussion had been draining for them both, Lyssa was wil ing to overlook being

  summarily

  dismissed.

  Acknowledging

  Rhoswen with a nod, she moved toward the doorway with Jacob. Cayden could have been made of stone, his face expressionless.

  As they slid out, the double doors closed behind them. Jacob hesitated. My lady, he defied her on my advice. He’s already been whipped. I don’t want to leave him in peril.

  “I don’t think that’s her intent,” Lyssa said. “And though your advice may have prompted him, Captain Cayden is very much his own man.” At Jacob’s look, she sighed, jerked her head to the left. “Come this way. I’l show you something I learned, wandering about while you were sleeping your days away.

  Unnecessarily I might add.”

  “You didn’t know about the sun any more than I did.”

  Do I have to do all of my servant’s thinking for him? She caught his hand, breaking into a near-silent trot to take him where she intended to go.

  A winding stairwel led to a narrow fissure, through which they squeezed into the upper gal ery of the main hal . Using her cloaking abilities, Lyssa made sure they blended into the shadows at the rear of it.

  She warned Jacob to absolute silence, knowing if Rhoswen’s attention strayed, they would be found out. After their conversation, Lyssa didn’t think the queen would censure them for curiosity, but that curiosity would remain unfulfil ed if they were noted there.

  Rhoswen had sat back down on the edge of the fountain and now she beckoned. “Come stand before me, Captain.”

  Cayden

  complied,

  maintaining

  that

  stolid

  expression. Leaning forward, Rhoswen took hold of one gauntleted hand. She pul ed the heavy glove off, then did the same to the other. His eyes darkened, his mouth tightening as she unbelted his tunic, setting aside his dagger and it scabbard. When she pul ed the garment over his head, since he was tal er, he had to help. The mail was heavy, so she stepped behind him, lifting it away from his sore back, tugging to tel him she wanted him to help her remove that as wel . She dropped it to the floor with a heavy clink.

  “My lady?”

  “Be stil .” Now he was clothed in a thin undertunic and hose. Lyssa couldn’t deny Jacob the anger that flashed through him at the sight of the dried blood pasting the thin shirt to his back in several raw patches.

  Unsheathing Cayden’s knife, Rhoswen cut the undershirt he wore, taking a strip from it. She wet it in the fountain then moved behind him again. He shuddered as she squeezed the moisture out of the cloth, dampening those stiff patches and loosening the fabric. His jaw flexed.

  “My lady does not need to do that. I can—”

  “Your queen wil do as she wishes, and you wil remain silent, unless I command you to speak. Kneel for me here, where I can sit on the fountain and attend to you.”

  When he did, she sat back down behind him, her feet placed on either side of his calf. Gently disengaging the cloth from his skin, she removed it, so now he was bare except for his hose, for she cut the rest of the shirt off him, using additional pieces to clean out the wounds. An attendant came in, bearing a tray of salve, evidence that Rhoswen had some telepathic ability to communicate with her staff as Lyssa did. The queen bid the attendant leave the items and go, then began to apply them with her own hands on his broad back. In addition to the wicked scar on his face, Cayden had plenty other battle scars visible under the lashes. Several near fatal blows, making Lyssa remember Rhoswen’s reference to the conflicts in the Fae world.

  Rhoswen didn’t speak as she cosseted her guard captain, but he became progressively more discomfited by this unprecedented behavior. His hands closed into loose fists. She’d set aside the balm, but was stil rubbing it in slow circles over the hard muscles in his back. Now she leaned forward and placed her lips on the nape of his neck. She stayed there, her mouth not moving, just touching his flesh. She curled her hands over his substantial biceps, holding him in place. Though he couldn’t see her face, her tears had weight. Tiny diamonds of ice pattered against his skin, and hit the tile with a pling of noise.

  “My lady,” he murmured, his voice broken.

  “Sit on the fountain edge,” she said, easing her hold.

  He did so, but when she slid off of it, going to her knees before him, he clasped her arms immediately, tried to bring her to a standing position. She resisted, moving so she was between his feet, her hands on his knees. He couldn’t rise from his seat on the fountain without pushing her away or fal ing into the fountain himself.

  “Lady Lyssa was correct,” she said. “You have ever been loyal to me, and though I have punished your disobedience, your actions were driven by what was best for the Fae. Best for me.”

  “I won’t tolerate you on your knees to me, my lady,” he said, struggling to rise. “This is—”

  “An apology, Captain Cayden. A heartfelt apology.” He stopped, caught by the sincerity in her blue eyes. “Cayden, we have known one another for so very long. We’ve fought together, lost together. I know you love me wel . Perhaps too wel . If it has become too difficult to serve me, I wil give you leave to serve anywhere else in the Seelie or Unseelie world, with nothing but the greatest of praise for you.

  Tabor would welcome you. Your father was Seelie.

  You have as much acceptance there as you do here.”

  “And who would care for you, my lady? Watch over you?”

  Cupping his face, she touched his mouth with her thumb. “Though I am quite capable of caring for myself, I’m sure you already have at least five men trained to take your position if ever you fel .” Her eyes lifted to his, an intriguing mixture of cool reproach and urgent heat at once. “If that ever happened, I would utterly destroy whoever dared take you from me. Then I would grieve deeply.” Withdrawing her hand, she sat back on her heels and then graceful y rose, stepping back from him.

  Her face became that dispassionate mask, but one that stil managed to convey the strong emotions moving behind it.

  “I have abused your service, over and over. I release you from it, and give you the right to ask for retribution from your queen, for the injury she has done to you.”

  Lyssa glanced at Jacob. From the formality of her tone, and Cayden’s stunned expression, it was an offer of unprecedented significance. She lifted her chin. “That means if you want me flogged as you were flogged—”

  Surging up from the fountain then, he closed the distance between them in two steps. He didn’t touch her, but the effort not to do so was obviously overwhelming. “No one shal ever touch your fair skin, my lady. I would tear off the arm of the first man who lifted a whip.”

  “But you accept my right to do it to you.” She trailed her fingers over his shoulder, touching the edge of an unhealed lash mark. The touch elicited a flicker in his gaze that wasn’t pain. “You should be less accepting, Captain Cayden.”

  Now something trembled in her expression, something that made Jacob remember the armory, when Rhoswen had faced the unexplored but undeniable part of her.

  “Perhaps I wasn’t thinking of having someone do it. Perhaps I was thinking of you. You are a very direct man, one who handles things personal y. You might not even wish to use a whip. Perhaps you’d like to use your own hand.”

  She’d recognized her captain’s nature in much the way she had hers. Jacob wondered how long she’d known, and if it had tormented her as he was sure the elusive glimpses of her own nature had tempted Cayden. Now the captain swal owed audibly. While it was hard to tel when the woman was playing a strategic game, Jacob thought Rhoswen might be more nervous than she was revealing.

  She is, Jacob. She’s trembling. He’s close enough to feel it.

  “My lady.” Cayden cupped her face now, drew her against his bare chest, wrapping an arm corded with battle-hardened muscle around her. “I wil never leave your service. If you took away my rank and cast me out, I would sit at your castle gates, sleeping by the moat like a vagabond to be close to you.

  Whenever you had need of my protection and strength, I would be there. I serve you, in al things.” Another Sir Vagabond. Lyssa was amused but touched as wel , Jacob could tel .

  Cayden lifted her chin, looked into her blue eyes.

  There was strength in the grip, command, even as he spoke careful y. “However, if one of the things you need from your servant in private is to force your surrender, to give yourself permission to feel, to laugh, to cry . . . to heal and forget . . . then I am more than equal to that task.”

  The soldier was now trembling as wel , both daring

  far more than they’d ever dared. Lyssa looked at Jacob. We’ve eavesdropped long enough. He is safe from her wrath, for now. But I want exact details about what happened between you two that resulted in this.

  How she connected it to Jacob, he didn’t know, but he’d long ago stopped underestimating his Mistress. Of course, he wasn’t sure if she was talking about his confrontation with Cayden or the night with Rhoswen. He hoped the former, though by even having the thought, her dangerous curiosity latched on to it like an arrow pointing where he didn’t want her to go. He winced. Having been a vampire for a mil ennium meant she’d picked right back up on how to use al the perks of being one. She could open his mind like a tuna can.

  But that was his queen. He didn’t want her any other way.

  She slept deeply. She needed more blood. Since she would only take so much from Jacob, and refused a human donor like Sel ya, claiming she preferred to wait to seek more nourishment until she returned home, he sent a note to Keldwyn via Sel ya, asking for a favor. Whether or not the enigmatic Fae Lord would accommodate him remained to be seen.

  Close to dawn, he left Lyssa nested in the covers to sit in the window seat. He sensed it would be a while before they returned to the Fae world.

  Surprisingly, Jacob found the idea bugged him. He remembered the dancing in the forest, the sirens and angels. The Hunt. He recal ed when they’d chased the hart, being with Tabor and his comrades.

  His lady’s arms around his waist as she pressed against him. Here the fairy tales and legends were real.

  He understood Rhoswen’s fear of too much interaction between their worlds. The human world, except in its more remote corners, had been irrevocably altered with time, fields and deer tracks replaced by concrete and traffic. Even in its most remote corners, concert T-shirts and soda cans showed up. The Fae world drew on Nature and the elements as a vampire nourished himself on blood. It would not be altered by the wrong kind of change; the magic that was its heart could be destroyed by it.

  Nevertheless, Rhoswen’s realization that there were unacceptable risks in stagnation had made her take a brave step, more indicative of the type of queen Keldwyn’s words and Cayden’s loyalty had suggested of her from the beginning.

  Of course, Jacob expected Rhoswen’s response to that would be there was a fine line between a queen’s courage and her foolishness. His lips twitched. It was something his own lady might say, in her usual dry tone.

  As dawn arrived, Lyssa began to stir. With her vampire blood holding sway, their impending leave-taking seemed to be aligning her to the dusk of their own world. When she was at her peak, she’d sleep lightly, and come out of sleep so alert, it was like she didn’t sleep at al . He knew that, not only because he’d seen it before, but because that had been his experience.

  Moving to the mirror, he looked at himself, something he’d been unable to do as a vampire. No change of course. Even as a servant, with an average three-hundred-year lifespan, he wouldn’t age. When a servant reached the end of his days, the systems started shutting down, like an appliance that had reached the age beyond which it couldn’t operate, no matter how shiny it appeared on the outside.

  Three hundred years wasn’t long enough with her.

  No amount of time would be. But if she wanted to turn him in the future, he already knew he wouldn’t be wil ing to let her risk the loss of her powers again.

  Beyond that, just as she’d felt that being more vampire than Fae was her true self, being her servant was his. Of course, he’d as much as said he was that, no matter his form.

  Wel , there would be a few centuries to think about that, God wil ing.

  “I dreamed Kane was crying.”

  Moving away from the mirror, he came to her side, slid a hip next to her. Her black hair was soft around her face, her green eyes half open. “If he’s crying, then it’s because Mason is tel ing him about women.

  How fal ing in love with one makes you insane.” Sliding her arms around his neck, she drew him down to her. “I think he’s crying because Jessica is tel ing him he wil turn into a pigheaded package of inevitable testosterone poisoning.”

  “You’ve never mentioned having a problem with my testosterone, or its packaging.”

  Her eyes sparkled as she caressed him through the hose beneath his tunic. “I didn’t say it was a problem. Just inevitable.” Then she sighed, and drew him down to lie next to her. When she put her head on his chest, he stroked her hair.

  “I see the unicorns are out tonight.” Her lips curved against his skin. “It wil be awhile before I’l be able to say something like that again, won’t I? Unless I ask a couple of them to come and live with us, gambol about the estate with the dogs. I wonder what Bran would make of them.”

  “Are you sorry we’re leaving?” He pressed a kiss into her hair.

  “Yes and no. I want to go home. I want to be with Kane. But before I can settle into that, there’s Council to deal with. That damn letter.” It had been on his mind as wel . But when he would have offered comfort, she tilted her head back.

  Suddenly, he wasn’t seeing the Lyssa who’d first read that letter in their Atlanta kitchen with uncertainty and resigned acceptance. He was looking at the vampire queen he’d met over a year ago, the one to whom he’d pledged his eternal life.

  The one who’d fought to get them both back through that desert portal.

  “I’m done with running, hiding, prevaricating and diplomacy. Rhoswen can give us our letter to introduce the Fae end of things, but it’s time to remind the Council that the privilege of rule can be revoked. Before we left, I said I want something different for Kane. I’m going to make sure he has it.” Reaching up, she drew Jacob’s mouth to hers. In the heat of the kiss, which quickly moved from lazy seduction to outright demand, Jacob felt her core deep strength, something that had nothing to do with how much blood she needed or how pale she was.