Page 22 of By Mistake

Oresti nearly choked on his soup. "Since when are you only half -human? What in the world did I miss while you were off with your father?"

"A lot," Greivs said with a small smile. "We'll discuss me later. Why is there a demon at your table, Lord Bothwell?"

"You don't need to call me that," Andrus said with a sigh. "These two will be delighted to tell you everything." He motioned for them to proceed, and with the promised shameless delight, Oresti and Shimari did so.

By the time they were finished, Greivs looked torn between horror and amusement. "You are quite the individual, Lord Both—Andrus."

"So tell us your story, Greivs."

"Apparently my mother was not my birth mother," Greivs said. "The woman who birthed me…my father could only say she came from Ravenwood. He only knew she wasn't human."

Shimari scoffed. "Dryad. It's all over you. Humans and your pathetic senses. I can't believe no one taught you your heritage."

"There was no one to teach it. I was raised human all my life, and I guess no one else noticed, or if they did, decided for whatever reason that it wasn't worth bringing up.

Anyway, my mother got pregnant, fled out of fear to a human woman she called friend, and died giving birth to me.

That woman raised me as her own, and her work as a healer brought her here.

My father's peers weren't happy that he had a lover, especially a non-human one, and I guess made her life quite miserable. "

"Miserable enough she ran away to protect you, even leaving your father behind. A story told a thousand times, but no less tragic for the frequency," Oresti said with a sigh.

"I commiserate with worrying what unhappy peers will do to an interloper taking what belongs to them," Andrus said with a sigh. "After all the nonsense caused by your father—"

"The king," Oresti interjected dryly.

"—I can only imagine how many people will be more than happy to help Farthing kill me. Can't wait."

"Nobody will be getting past me," Shimari said. "I look forward to the violence. Delicious, delightful violence." He touched the tip of his tongue to his top lip, eyes glowing red briefly.

Andrus only rolled his eyes, which was possibly the most hilarious reaction Oresti had ever seen when a zero class demon was involved. When his chuckle got him a warning look, he held up his hands in defeat. "You're remarkably blasé about Shimari lusting for violence."

"I'm going to make him start with you if you don't quit laughing at me," Andrus said without any heat, and dropped his napkin on the table before pushing his chair away and standing. "If you will excuse me, I have about five thousand pieces of correspondence to sort through."

"I'll help you," Greivs said. "I could use something distracting, and I know better than Oresti what should be accepted, rejected, and so forth."

Oresti laughed. "I'd be offended, but it's true.

" He stood and followed Andrus from the room—then caught him up against the wall, caging him in with his arms, and bent to nuzzle his cheek, flutter soft kisses along his jaw before taking his mouth in a long, leisurely kiss that left him desperately aching to sweep Andrus into his arms and spirit him off to bed for several hours.

Andrus deserved better than that, though. After a lifetime of neglect, and the way Oresti had hurt him by keeping his secret far too long, he deserved a courtship fit for a prince. Conveniently, Oresti knew exactly how that should look.

Drawing back, he ran his thumbs over Andrus's kiss swollen lips. "You're so pretty."

"You're so vexing ."

Oresti smirked. "You know very well insults only encourage me."

Andrus sighed, but there was no hiding his smile. "Don't you have some sneaking around to be doing?"

"Alas, you are correct. Have fun with your correspondence."

"I'd rather be sneaking around," Andrus muttered.

Grinning, stepping well out of smacking range, Oresti replied, "If your sneaking is anything like your summoning, it's for the best you're staying here." He laughed and retreated even further as Andrus puffed up and made to come after him.

Upstairs, chased by Andrus's sputtering threats, he found a satchel filled with nondescript clothes and the various tools he liked to have when doing this sort of work. He washed up and changed quickly, then returned downstairs to find the others gathered in the study once more.

Sweeping his eyes over the room, he said, "I'll have to buy you books for a courting gift. What kind would you like?"

"I don't want gifts!"

"Tell me, or I'll just buy out an entire bookstore, Andi."

Andrus's face went adorably red then. "Don't call me that."

Oresti's mouth curved. "You like it, though."

"Did I say that?"

"Your face says it all, darling, like always."

"Get out," Andrus hissed.

Instead, Oresti crossed the room, leaned over the desk, and kissed him quick and sharp. "Stay out of trouble while I'm gone." He looked at Shimari. "You stay out of trouble too."

Shimari scoffed. "We'll see who causes trouble before the night is out, your Highness."

"In a half hour or so, make it look like everyone has gone to bed for the night. See you all in a few hours." Saluting them playfully, nodding to Greivs, Oresti departed.

He slipped out the kitchen door, then cut through another three back gardens before finally stepping out to the street itself—and then down a narrow alley between two houses across the street before trespassing across gardens again.

Then he simply waited. If he was right and the watcher wasn't supposed to be in the house he was using, he'd be leaving soon to make his report.

Sure enough, just minutes after the others would have made it look as though they'd gone to bed, the back door to the kitchen slowly swung open and a shadowy figure crept out and across the garden to the back gate.

Never noticing Oresti, crouched in the dark just paces away.

When he'd gone, gate closed behind him, Oresti followed, scaling the fence to avoid the creaky hinges of the gate.

He followed at a distance, but close enough that he wouldn't lose the man—presumably a man, he rarely encountered women doing this kind of work, for whatever reason—at corners and such.

Fortunately, they didn't walk very long, just over a few blocks to the not-quite-seedy parts of the city.

Unfortunately, all the man did was tuck an envelope under a bench after lighting up a cigarette and smoking for a few minutes.

When he'd finished his smoke, he snuffed out the end, tossed it on the ground, and headed off further into the night. Oresti let him. If they were using a drop instead of meeting in person, there was nothing more the man could tell him.

Shimari, I need you .

A moment later, with only the barest whisper of a pulse of magic, a large, sleek black cat appeared at his feet, tail flicking and swishing, eyes glowing ever so faintly green.

"Cute," Oresti said with a snort.

Shimari stretched with all the luxuriant indolence of a real cat, shaking himself and delicately licking one paw before flicking him a look.

Oresti explained the situation. "Can you tell if anyone or anything is lurking before I snatch the letter for a quick look?"

Shimari fluffed off, vanishing into the dark in a way that Oresti and the man he'd shadowed would never be able to manage. Oresti was good at slinking around, but Shimari made him look like a bumbling child.

After just a few minutes, the fluffy menace reappeared at his feet and gave a strong impression of all clear with an underscoring of pathetic, sloppy, lazy humans .

Huffing in amusement, Oresti slunk over to the bench and sat down to retrieve and read the letter.

"Just a bland report, nothing useful in it," he said with a sigh.

Shimari jumped up on the bench and then suddenly he was human-looking again, green eyes slowly bleeding into red. He took the letter and read it, then his eyes glowed softly as he looked for things beyond Oresti's senses.

When he was done, he looked up and leaned in—and bit hard at the edge of Oresti's jaw.

"Ow," Oresti said.

"Stop your whining." A single drop of blood fell from one of Shimari's fangs onto the tip of his finger and down onto one finely pointed claw.

He traced a portion of the writing with it, the letters shimmering red before fading back to normal.

The letter looked precisely as it had, and Oresti could only feel the magic that now lay within it because he knew to look for it.

"Clever."

"Basic nonsense," Shimari replied dismissively. "Are we done here, then? Your sweetheart is worried about you, whatever he says otherwise."

"All done."

Shimari took his hand and in the next breath they were back in Andrus's home, in the study where he'd left them. Greivs and Andrus worked together at the desk like old friends, which pleased Oresti more than he'd ever admit.

Giving him an amused look, Shimari took a seat in the sitting area, where a book and glass of wine lay on a side table. "You enjoy wine."

"It pleases when I've no need of real sustenance," Shimari replied, as good as saying he loved the stuff.

"You're home!" Andrus said, standing and moving around the desk. "How did it go?"

Riding the marvelous high of that 'home,' Oresti pulled him in close and kissed him, keeping loose hold of his hips as he related the rather unexciting adventure. "Thanks to Shimari, we will be able to trace where the letter ends up."

"The spell won't last long," Shimari said. "The price of making it virtually unnoticeable is that it won't last longer than about twelve hours."

Oresti shrugged one shoulder, reluctantly letting go of Andrus. "Should be all we need. How is it going with the correspondence?"

Andrus wrinkled his nose. "He has me going everywhere. Teas, stupid exclusive clubs, three soirees—"

"Five," Greivs interjected. "Over the next two months. The royal ball. Many things. You're going to need a proper secretary. Shimari won't be able to keep track of all your social engagements on top of everything else he does."

"I'll attend it tomorrow," Shimari said.

Andrus's fingers, soft and warm, touched around the wound Shimari had left. "You should treat that."

"I'll be fine," Oresti said, but let Andrus push him onto the sofa and dutifully pulled out a bottle of healing ointment.

"You look like a smug cat," Shimari said.

"Be quiet."

Greivs chuckled from the desk. "We should be returning soon. I bought you some time, but your father expects you for breakfast, and your sister wants to speak with you as well, and she'll be going to bed soon."

Oresti sighed. "Fine. I did want to bring some of my things here for the sake of convenience."

Andrus rolled his eyes. "I'm surprised only that you haven't already done so."

Grinning, Oresti stopped his fussing fingers, took back the ointment and put it away, then stood and swept Andrus into a last quick, burning kiss. "I'll see you tomorrow. Did you have that list of books you wanted me to buy you?"

"No, because you're not buying me a pile of books."

"If you think I won't follow through on the threat to buy an entire bookstore—"

"I compiled it," Shimari cut in. "If only to minimize all your ridiculous flirting."

Andrus rolled his eyes and retreated back behind his desk. Oresti sent Shimari a glare, but he only stared back, smug and unrepentant. "Give me the list."

Shimari pulled a slip of paper from the book he was reading and held it out. Oresti tucked it away in his jacket. "Ready to go, Greivs?"

"Of course. I'll return tomorrow, Andrus, to assist further with all of this and ensure your secretary is up to par on such matters."

"Can't be worse than me," Andrus said with a sigh. "Goodnight, both of you." He smiled shyly at Oresti. "Try to behave."

"Never," Oresti said with a wink before leading the way out.