Page 10 of Queen of Ever (Curse of Fate and Fae #2)

Chapter 10

Tarian

B y the time we arrived at Dreadhold, half the battered and beleaguered court was already there. Clusters of High Fae courtiers milled about in the gardens, muttering and hissing to one another, eyes darting about like they were watching for a threat. I didn’t care about the wary gazes that clung to me as I headed for the entrance to the castle, though I had the strange sense that I was being discussed. But I had other things to worry about. Things like my mother’s advisors gaining access to Arun’s office and going through his papers and correspondence. The heaviness in my chest drew breath, gained substance, as I thought of someone else touching my personal guard’s, my friend’s , desk, opening drawers and taking possession of the intelligence he had devoted his life to gathering for me, discovering his network of informants and the information he had collected on the Unseelie Queen’s council and advisors. On Imogen.

I paused on the threshold, turning to Vesryn. ‘Make sure Briyala is alive. Then find Madam Hetia. Ask her to watch Arun’s office. Anyone who tries to get in can go through me.’

Ves raised a brow. ‘Would you like fries with your order, Your Majesty?’

‘ Please Vesryn.’

He rolled his eyes, then performed an exaggerated flourish of a bow, his hands flicking out by his sides. ‘Ever an obedient lapdog for you, cousin.’ But he had a sly gleam in his eye when he straightened. ‘One day you’ll have to repay me all these favours.’

The mention of favours reminded me of Ruisin, and I suddenly wondered if my visit to him was somehow connected to the explosion. As though by going to him, I had reminded him he had some kind of vendetta against the Unseelie Queen. The idea sat uncomfortably on me as I walked on in search of the staircase to the upper levels. There would be a call for discovering how the attack at the palace had happened and who was behind it, but one thing at a time.

A not-too-distant scream echoed down the stairwell and I paused, hand on the banister, recognising the shrill notes of extreme pain. Pivoted as I turned back down the stairs to follow the sound. Hoped it wasn’t someone in my household.

The scream cut off as I approached The White Room, a chamber I never entered. One of my grandmother’s many eccentric renovations, though less eccentric than the carnivorous garden. Just a huge, empty room dressed all in ivory to house a collection of portraits of our family line, many of which were larger-than-life renderings of herself, often engaged in acts of violence. There was one depicting her and my mother together, one of the few images I’d ever seen of my mother before she’d been queen. That was the one that caught my eye as I entered the room, maybe because the woman in the painting was so different from the flesh-and blood version standing in the centre of the room. The painting Moriana was softer, smiling slightly in a way I’d never seen on her real face. Sometimes I wondered if it had been an invention of the painter, or if it had been a real expression she’d occasionally worn a long time ago.

The current Moriana seemed to no longer be possessed of that unruffled calm she’d presented me with directly after the attack. Now she was all sharp edges and glittering rage, mouth twisted in a scowl, eyes glinting below brows drawn tight. Some of her council and advisors littered the room, clinging to the edges as though trying to stay out of her line of sight.

‘Explain to me again how some lowly imp crept into my court under the eyes of my entire retinue of palace security and detonated an ironthorn seed,’ she demanded, her voice the dominant sound in the vast room.

The soldier she was addressing, to his credit, seemed to be trying to hang onto his composure, even from his position at her feet. No whimpering, despite the screams of moments ago. He was pulling himself out of his slump on the floor, straight-spined too. Which was a pity as far as outcomes for him went. She’d get bored sooner if he broke faster. The stubborn grip on his pride would just make torture more engaging for her as she pushed to see how long it would take for him to crumble.

‘I don’t know, ma’am,’ he said, his face grave as he looked up at her, voice hardly betraying his recent suffering.

She bent towards him. ‘Do you think not knowing is a good enough excuse for your incompetence?’

‘No, ma’am,’ he replied. ‘We have failed you.’

‘You have. And I have no use for guards who cannot guard.’ She straightened again, casting her gaze around the room, roving over all those shadowed witnesses who seemed to shrink as she beheld them. ‘Nor do I have use for advisors and councillors who don’t know the first damn thing about a plot to attack me in my own palace.’ The words echoed through the chamber, louder at the end as her anger flared hotter.

‘Y-your Majesty,’ stammered one of the High Council. Taldore. His was an old line of Unseelie nobility, a relative of mine actually, not that the expression on the queen’s face as she turned her attention to him suggested as much. Though, I was her son and look what she did to me. Perhaps rage and ire were marks of affection in our family. ‘What happened today was unprecedented, unpre—’

Moriana flung out her hand, and his sentence ended in a scream. He dropped almost instantly, hitting the stone with a thud, where he writhed in agony for a few moments, his shrieks splitting the air and scraping against my ears. I shuddered, averting my eyes until the screaming receded and Moriana’s footsteps could be heard clicking across the room towards her newest victim.

‘How clever or wise can you be called if the only things you can predict are those that have precedent ?’ she hissed. ‘And now you wish me to follow your counsel in how I respond to this request from the Seelie King? When you have so dramatically proved your counsel is worth nothing? ’

Immediately, my attention left the cowering Taldore. My sympathy wasn’t much good to him, and I was about to do better than pity him, anyway. I crossed the room. ‘What request?’ I asked, loud and clear. A provocation, but it was a sure-fire way to get a response.

By the time Moriana had turned on me, all that rage had smoothed away.

‘There you are, darling. You’ve been missing a while,’ she purred, as though I’d just nipped off for a nap and hadn’t been near mortally injured when she’d last seen me. I wondered what she would have done if Ves hadn’t scooped me out of the rubble. Perhaps she would have been disappointed; in death, I’d be out of her reach. No more puppet to dangle where she liked. ‘It seems there was an attack on Seelie lands almost the same moment as these imbeciles let that little lesser slip into my palace. The Seelie King has called a conclave to discuss the threat.’

I was careful not to react visibly, but it wasn’t easy to swallow down the sudden, bright burst of hope that threatened to write itself all over my features. It took a moment for the rest of what she’d said to sink in. There’d been an attack on Seelie lands. It robbed me of a theory I’d been nursing which laid the blame for the attack at Solas’ feet. It had been a long shot—breaking the treaty and initiating a war would lead to ceding sovereignty. If the consequences for such a move were any less dire, Moriana herself would have started a war a long time ago. Splitting the realm into Seelie and Unseelie had only ensured the disgruntled discontent of both of Oberon’s sons—and now their successors—which was why he bound them by treaty in the first place. It had been necessary to stop either of them from trying to take the rest of what they saw as their thwarted birthright by force.

‘Then we should agree,’ I said.

The queen’s eyes narrowed. ‘ We ?’

‘Because no one would expect you to go yourself is what he means, my queen.’ Ves’ voice interrupted me from behind. Moriana’s smile softened as he swept into view. ‘Don’t for one moment consider putting yourself in such danger.’

‘B-but we’re obligated to send a delegation,’ Taldore stuttered. ‘To refuse would declare us at odds with the Seelie Kingdom. It would be all but claiming responsibility for the attack on their lands.’

‘That doesn’t mean our illustrious queen should go herself,’ Ves said without even glancing at the trembling Taldore.

‘I don’t think Solas would appreciate the slight of my councillors attending in my stead,’ Moriana replied.

‘Then send your heir.’ Ves kept his focus fixed on the queen, affecting a casual manner as he made the suggestion. Usually, I’d wonder at his motive, but right then I didn’t care if he was motivated by interests that conflicted with mine. Because if Solas was calling a conclave, there was a good chance he’d bring Imogen to neutral ground with him. Not a certainty. But it was a much better chance at seeing her than I’d have if I stayed at Dreadhold.

But now I had to sell the idea to the queen without letting on how much I wanted her to agree.

‘A tolerable suggestion. What do you say to this plan Tarian?’ Moriana asked with a wry arch of a brow. ‘Do you think you could play at diplomacy a few days? Perhaps you could make amends for some of those weaknesses you’ve so recently exhibited to me.’ She was watching me closely. There was no way her thoughts hadn’t followed the same path as mine. I couldn’t tell if she meant to raise my hopes only to crush them, or if she really was considering sending me. Perhaps she wanted to test me. Perhaps she wanted to torment me. There seemed to be no way forwards than to act as neutral and apathetic as possible.

‘Since you’ve seen fit to establish your court here, I suppose it’s no difference to me if I’m forced into company there instead of here.’

‘Your enthusiasm for your role never fails to inspire, darling,’ she drawled, but she seemed satisfied enough. ‘You shall go in my place and try not to embarrass me to any great degree.’

It seemed too great a risk to say anything else in case she changed her mind. I kept my mouth firmly shut, only acknowledging the reply with a curt nod. Finally, the queen skewered her advisor with her attention again. ‘There, Taldore. Are you satisfied?’

Taldore began to bumble about her majesty’s wisdom, which I took as a good opportunity to migrate towards Ves. ‘Briyala?’ I asked in a low murmur.

‘Alive.’

Exhaling a sigh, I allowed myself a moment of relief that I wouldn’t be carrying that particular burden of guilt. ‘And Arun’s office?’

‘I think your housekeeper intends to guard the door herself. She’s scary enough to at least give anyone a little hesitation.’

‘Thank you.’ I walked from the room, eager to put distance between myself and the queen as quickly as possible, and Ves followed me.

‘So now I’ve saved your life and bought you an escape from Dreadhold while it’s swimming with people you don’t want to be around,’ he said jovially. ‘What a wonderful ally I’m turning out to be. When you’re king, you’ll have to give me lots of very pretty titles and castles and serving girls to demonstrate your gratitude.’

‘Not so loud,’ I hissed, glancing around us. It skated too close to treason for me to be comfortable with, since my succession would have to come with either Moriana’s unnatural death or her removal from the throne. Not to mention a blatant disregard for the High Council’s declaration that I couldn’t wear the crown until I’d thrown off Dhrigada’s prophecy that the throne would fall with me. ‘And don’t get ahead of yourself. All that only barely begins to make up for taking Imogen to Beltane.’

‘Well, maybe it doesn’t make up for it yet,’ he said slyly, ‘but if good King Solas is as stupid and arrogant as we know him to be, I might just have bought you a ticket to seeing her again too. An opportunity to parade her around in front of you would surely be too delicious for him to pass up.’

‘Maybe,’ I muttered, mounting a staircase that would take me to Arun’s office, stomach already twisting at the thought of what I would have to do when I got there. Go through his desk. Destroy a lot of his correspondence. Sit in his empty chair and look around the empty room where I’d always gone for advice, knowing he had none left to give me.

‘But you’ll have to take me with you,’ Ves continued as we reached the floor I wanted and proceeded down a corridor that was still thankfully empty of courtiers. Soon, they’d be choking every moment of silence, every breath of empty space. ‘I can give you some lessons in charm and you’ll win her back in no time.’

‘If you were as charming as you think you are, she’d have run away with you instead of Solas,’ I replied as we reached Arun’s office, where Madam Hetia was sitting in a straight-backed chair right in front of the door, like she was some kind of threshold guardian. She rose to her feet when we approached, dusting at her skirts.

‘None have entered, sir, as you wished it,’ she said, puffing up with pride like a clucky hen and pulling her chair out of the way.

‘Thank you.’ I paused by her a moment, suddenly concerned what I’d be leaving her and the other servants to. Perhaps I wasn’t the most cheerful lord of the castle, but I was nothing to what they would suffer with Moriana in residence. ‘The queen intends to hold court here, and I’m not sure how long for, but there’s no need for you and the others to stay while she does. The palace staff will relocate here.’

Her jaw slackened while her brow pinched together. This was as much her home as it was mine. I didn’t like that I had to ask her to leave it. ‘But-but where else would we go?’

‘Go and join my cousin’s household,’ I said, flicking a hand at Vesryn, who blinked in exaggerated shock. ‘Just until they’re all gone again. It’ll be... safer.’

‘If that is your wish, master,’ she said, bowing her head.

‘Just make sure you take everyone with you. Don’t leave so much as a gardener behind. You know what they do to servants in the Unseelie Palace.’ Opening the door to Arun’s office, I left her to fill in the blanks herself. But the sight of the room halted me in my tracks for a moment, drowning me in a wash of grief. I was going to have to destroy so much of his correspondence, of his work.

Ves pranced into the stillness, making a beeline for a decanter and set of glasses on trolly by the window. ‘Thank the stars. I wasn’t sure if that old stiff was too strait-laced to keep liquor in his office.’ He poured himself a drink, looked around the room as he sipped it. ‘Where is Arun, anyway? Wouldn’t he usually be stuck to you like glue after what just happened?’

‘He died,’ I said bluntly, feeling the way the words scorched my throat on the way out. Died. ‘In the explosion.’

Vesryn lowered his glass, expression suddenly sombre. ‘Oh. Sorry.’

I nodded. Bit down on the grief. Began emptying out his desk.