A Shiver of Light

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE TRIPLETS WERE in the nursery with Doyle, Frost, and a handful of other guards watching over them while the nurses and doctors did last-minute things in preparation for going home. Galen, Rhys, and I were in the room trying to figure out how we were going to get everything else home. Flowers and other gifts had come from friends, but most of it was from strangers. The fact that Princess Meredith had had her babies had made the news, and America was thrilled to have their faerie princess have triplets! I appreciated the thought, but we were a little overwhelmed by their generosity.

“We’ll need a van just to cart all the flowers and presents home,” Rhys said. He stood in the middle of the room with his hands on hips, surveying all the bouquets, balloons, stuffed animals, potted plants, and gift baskets of food that filled most of the room. We’d started turning away some of the well-meaning gifts, because we needed to leave room for us and the medical personnel to use the room. The hospital had been much happier with the florist shop invasion than with the plants that were still growing in the room. The blooming apple tree curled above all of it. The treetop was pushed against the ceiling as if still trying to grow taller, as if it had come up against the sky and been surprised to find it solid and unforgiving. The nurses had asked if the tree was permanent, and I’d given the only answer I had: I didn’t know.

They were even less happy with the wild roses around the bed because they had thorns. Two nurses and a doctor had pricked themselves on the thorny vines.

“We’ve already given away a lot of it to other patients,” Galen said.

“Most of the stuffed toys should go to the children’s ward,” I said. I turned too fast to motion at the toys and had to stop and try a less dramatic turn. I felt good, but if I moved a certain way I could feel the stitches and the abuse my body had suffered to get our little trio on the outside. I was just happy to be in real clothes again. The sundress was designer maternity, one of the many gifts we’d had over the months that came with the words, “Just tell people what you’re wearing and it’s free.” Since we were supporting a small army of fey on not-large-enough salaries, we’d taken most of the gifts. The ones that didn’t come with contracts to sign, those we’d let our entertainment lawyers to look over.

We’d been offered a reality show. Did we want cameras following us around everywhere? No. Did we need the money? Yes. Which was why the entertainment lawyers were going over the contracts, but we had to decide today. The producers wanted it to begin with the babies coming home, so that meant that the film crew needed to either come to the hospital to start filming, or film us as we brought the babies into the house. We needed the money, but what would my relatives do on camera?

As if he’d read my mind, Rhys said, “I think the reality show is a bad idea, have I said that yet?”

“You mentioned it,” I said, still staring at the stuffed animals, some of which were nearly three feet tall. What would newborn babies do with such a thing? We’d leave them for older children who would love them and needed them more than our tiny ones. Bryluen, Gwenwyfar, and Alastair weren’t able to reach for things yet, let alone manage a forest of giant toys. The world was big enough to them right now without that.

“I agree with Rhys, but I know that Merry feels it’s wrong to expect Maeve to keep supporting all of us.”

“It’s an old tradition that when the ruler visited his nobles they were expected to entertain him, or her, and all their traveling court,” Rhys said. He picked up one of the potted plants and shook his head. I think he was thinking what I was thinking: We couldn’t possibly take all the plants home. It would be a full-time job just to water them all. Though some of the tiny winged demi-fey had picked a few of them to cuddle into; those we’d bring home.

“I’ve read that Henry the Eighth used that tradition to bankrupt rivals, or nobles he was trying to control,” I said.

“People make jokes about fat Henry, but he was a very good politician and understood the power of being king.”

“He abused that power,” I said.

“He did, but they all did. It’s hard to resist absolute power, Merry.”

“Is that from personal experience?” Galen asked.

Rhys looked at him, and then down at the piles of gifts. “Being a deity with worshippers does tend to make a person a little high-handed, but I learned my lesson.”

“What lesson is that?” I asked, and came up to wrap my arm through his so that I could rest my cheek against his shoulder.

He turned his head enough to smile at me, and said, “That just because people call you a god doesn’t make you one.”

A tiny and very female voice said, “You were the great god Cromm Cruach, and your followers healed all hurts.”

We looked at one of the winged demi-fey; it was Penny, Royal’s twin sister. She’d been fluttering among the flowers but now rose so she’d be head height for us. She had her brother’s short black curls, pale skin, and black almond-shaped eyes, but her face was even more delicate, her body a little smaller. She was wearing a gauzy red-and-black dress that looked very nice with her wings.

Rhys looked at her, face not happy. “That makes you very old indeed, little one, much older than I thought.”

“I had no wings then, because our Princess Merry had not worked her wild magic and made us able to fly. We wingless ones among the demi-fey went even more unnoticed than the rest; at least they were color and beauty, but those of us who had not been so blessed only watched from the grass and the roots of things. It gives a perspective that I might not have had if I’d been on the wing back then.”

“What perspective is that?” Rhys asked.

“To know that everyone starts on the ground. Trees, flowers, people, even the mighty sidhe must stand upon the dirt in order to move forward.”

“If you have a point, make it,” he said.

“You have no illusions about what and who you are now; you can make a life that is real, not some fantasy, but something true and good, just as a tree that puts down deep roots can withstand storms, but one with shallow roots is knocked over by the first strong wind. You have become deep-rooted, Rhys, and that is not a bad thing.”

He smiled then, nodding and squeezing my arm where I touched him. “Thank you, Penny, I think I understand. Once I built myself on power that was given to me by the Goddess and Her Consort, but I forgot that it wasn’t my power, so when we lost the grace of the Gods, I was lost, but whatever I am now it’s real and it’s me, and no one can take that from me.”

“Yes,” she said, hovering near Rhys’s face, her wings beating so quickly that the edge of his curls blew softly in the wind of her flight.

“Did I seem like I needed a pep talk to you?” Rhys asked.

“There is often an air of melancholy about you.”

I glanced from the tiny fey to Rhys and wondered, would I have thought that? Was that true? He joked a lot and made light comments, but … behind all of it, Penny was right. I found it interesting that she had paid that much attention to him. I thought of several motives for a female to pay that much attention to a man—did Penny have a crush on Rhys? Or was she just that wise and observant of all of us, of everything? If the first was true, then I doubted Rhys would realize it, and if the second was true, then hearing her thoughts on other things might be interesting.

“Penny, do you think we should do the reality show?” I asked.

She dipped down, which was a flying demi-fey’s way of stumbling. I’d surprised her.

“It is not my place to say.”

“I’ve asked your opinion,” I said.

She cocked her head to one side, then moved in the air so she was more in front of my face than Rhys’s. “Why ask my opinion, my lady?”

“It will affect you, as it will affect everyone who lives with us, so I am interested in what you think.”

She gave me a very serious, searching look. I saw the intelligence in that tiny face that I hadn’t seen before; she was as bright as her brother, but maybe a better thinker, deeper anyway.

“Very well. The queen is always very careful to look good in front of the human media, so if you did the reality show, then cameras might keep us all safe from her.”

“The queen is insane, she can’t help herself,” Galen said.

Penny looked at him, then back to me. “If that were true, then she would have lost her control at a press conference decades ago, but she never has; if she can control herself to that degree then she is not truly insane, she is simply cruel. Never mistake someone who cannot control their murderous impulses from someone who simply has no one to tell them, ‘Stop, behave yourself.’ I find that most cruel people, no matter how awful their actions, once faced with punishment, or someone stronger, behave. Mean is not crazy, it is merely mean.”

I thought about what Penny had said, really thought about it. “She’s right. My aunt has never lost control of herself in front of the media. If she were truly serial killer crazy, she’d have lost it at least once, but she never has, not that I remember.” I looked at Rhys and then at Galen.

They looked at each other, and then back at me. “Well, I’ll be damned,” Rhys said.

“Penny is right, isn’t she?” Galen asked.

I nodded. “I think she is.”

“The king also has never lost control in front of the media.”

“He attacked our human lawyers and us once before he kidnapped me,” I said.

“But there was no media to record it, Princess Merry. It is still a matter of witnesses, but no video or pictures.”

“I think that the king was honestly insane during that attack,” Rhys said. “His guard had to physically jump him, bury him under their bodies to keep him from continuing the attack.”

I shivered and cuddled into Rhys. Taranis had almost killed Doyle in that attack, and my Darkness was not an easy kill.

“If that is true, then a television show may not protect us from the king.”

One of the other demi-fey flew upward on tiny white wings with little black spots on them. She was even tinier than Penny’s Barbie doll size, as if she were trying harder to ape the butterfly she resembled. It was a Cabbage White, an American butterfly, which meant she’d likely been born here.

Her voice was high and musical, as if a trilling bird’s song could be words. “My sister is still in the Seelie Court. She told me that the king was enraged that you had slipped his seduction magic. He’d never had a woman except for the queen of the Unseelie Court escape from his spells.”

“Which is why he came for me later,” I said, softly.

The little faerie flew closer and laid a hand no bigger than the nail of my little finger on my hand. “But even then his magic did not work; he had to hit you with brute force like any human. He knows now that his magic does not work on you.”

“Did your sister hear him say that?” Rhys asked.

She nodded so hard that her pale blond curls bobbed.

“We think the king will not try magic again,” Penny said.

“We, you mean the demi-fey?” I said.

“I do,” she said.

The little one patted my finger, as I might have patted someone’s shoulder. “We are all sorry that he hurt you, Princess Merry.”

“That is much appreciated,” I said.

The little one flew up higher, her butterfly wings a blur of white as she hovered, but also showing agitation, nerves.

“Tell her, Pansy,” Penny said.

“Many speak in front of us as if we are dogs and can neither understand nor report to others,” Pansy said.

I nodded. “You are some of the best spies in all of faerie because of it.”

She smiled. “The king has decided that it was his magic you found objectionable, and he plans to try to woo you as a regular man might.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“It might mean that he would behave for the cameras as nicely as the queen,” Penny said.

“How long have you known this bit of information?” Rhys asked.

“Pansy only heard from her sister recently, and the gossip came up. Her sister did not realize the importance of it, or the use we might make of the information.”

I found the “we” interesting. Penny didn’t mean just demi-fey, but us, her, me, all of us fey living at the estate in Holmby Hills. It was rare for one type of fey to include themselves with others not of their kind. But then I’d accepted any fey who came into exile with us, or were already here in California in an exile older than my own. With a few exceptions, everyone was welcome.

There was a knock at the door, and the guard opened the door and peeked in, saying, “The ambassador is back.”

I sighed, and said, “Send him in.”

Peter Benz walked through the door smiling, his handsome face set in easy lines, his hand already out to shake. His dark blond hair was cut short and neat; his suit was tailored to his five-foot, eight-inch frame so he looked taller, and it showed off that he exercised and ate carefully enough that he was in shape. He was vain enough that he’d paid for his suit to fit, rather than hide his body. The last ambassador had been vain, too, and Taranis had played on that vanity for all he was worth.

I didn’t really want to play that game, but I wanted this ambassador to be one who worked for both courts, not just the Seelie, so I made myself smile and walk toward that extended hand.

His even white teeth spread in a Hollywood-worthy smile. Mr. Benz was an ambassador now, but he had the feel of someone who had much bigger goals for his future. Ambition wasn’t a bad thing; it could make a person very good at his job.

His handshake was firm, but not too firm. He also didn’t have an issue with my hand being small; so many men either engulfed my hand in theirs or barely touched my hand as if afraid they’d crush it.

“Princess Meredith, thank you for seeing me again.”

“Mr. Benz, you are the new ambassador to my people; why wouldn’t I receive you?”

He raised a well-groomed eyebrow at that, but turned with a smile to shake first Galen’s hand and then Rhys’s. The cloud of flying demi-fey he didn’t really look at; he treated them as if they were the insects they resembled. I would have said, How very human, but even among the sidhe, we forgot to count them, or many did.

I glanced at Penny and Pansy as they hovered in the air. They met my look with one of their own; they’d noticed his lack of notice, too. The demi-fey would be wonderful spies on human politicians. To my knowledge no one in faerie was doing that, but it was a thought, a potentially useful one. I filed it away for later, much later. We had a long way to go before spying on human politics was a priority for me.

“I know you must be eager to go home.”

I looked at him. “Define home,” I said.

He smiled again and made a little push-away gesture with his manicured hands. “You’ve made it very clear that Ms. Reed’s mansion is your home for now.”

“While my uncle is confined to faerie, I think I will not be safe there.”

The smile faded. “I am sorrier than I can say about all the problems you and King Taranis are having.”

“Did you know that once upon a time the king could hear any conversation that mentioned his name?” Rhys said.

Benz gave him a skeptical but pleasant look. “I was told that hadn’t been true in a very long time, Mr. Rhys.”

“No, but then he hadn’t been able to use his hand of light through a mirror being used as a magical Skype interview in centuries either.”

“We also believe he’s reacquired the ability to use the mirrors as a door that he can step through, or pull someone else through,” I said.

Again, that eyebrow rose. “Really?”

“Yes,” I said, “really.”

“No one saw him step through a mirror or pull someone else into one during the unfortunate events in your lawyers’ chambers,” Benz said.

“But we did see herbs touch the surface of the mirror, and they floated as if on water tension,” I said.

“When a mirror runs like water, or even semiliquid, it usually means that the person on the other side can step through,” Rhys said.

“Does it really?” This time Benz looked more interested than skeptical.

We both nodded. Galen was sort of ignoring us all as he continued to sort the things we were taking from those we were donating. Oddly, Galen was probably best suited to have charmed the ambassador; it was actual ability for him, a type of glamour magic, which was why we’d decided he would leave the talking to us. We didn’t want to be accused of trying to magically influence the new ambassador after what had happened to the last one.

Benz said, “I am learning so much about faerie and its magic. Thank you for being my teachers.”

“We are some of your teachers, but not all,” I said.

He gave a little self-deprecating head gesture, almost an aw-shucks head bob, like a bashful movement. I wondered if it was the last remnant of an old gesture. Had our so-secure Benz been shy once?

“That is true; I am to be ambassador to all the courts of faerie, not just your lovely part of it, Princess Meredith.”

“Have you spoken to all the courts of faerie, then?” I asked.

He nodded, flashing that brilliant smile that would probably look amazing on camera.

“How did you like King Kurag?” I asked.

He looked puzzled, the smile slipping. “King Kurag, you mean the goblin king?”

“Yes, Kurag, the goblin king.”

“I haven’t actually spoken to him.”

“What about Queen Niceven of the demi-fey?”

“Um, no, I have spoken with King … the king of the Seelie Court, and your aunt, the Queen of Air and Darkness.”

Leaving off Taranis’s name because we’d just said something about it was good, but leaving off both their names, just in case, meant he’d made the logical leap. If one sidhe ruler of faerie could hear when his name was spoken, then maybe the other one could, too. I liked him better for being a quick study. Quick and smart was good.

“You have spoken with King Sholto, because we were here for that talk,” I said.

He looked uncertain, but only for a second, and then his face was back to smiling and pleasant. “I spoke to him as your royal consort and father of your children, but not specifically as king in his own right.”

“Then you plan to be ambassador to the Unseelie and Seelie courts of the sidhe, and not really ambassador to all the courts of faerie,” I said.

He fought that puzzled look away and said, “My duties, as described by Washington, are to the sidhe, both Unseelie and Seelie.”

“So the other courts are to be ignored?”

“They are smaller courts within the two larger ones, or that’s what I was told; was I misinformed?”

I debated, and finally because we aren’t allowed to lie, I said, “Yes, and no.”

“Please enlighten me; what do you mean by that, Princess?”

“The goblins, sluagh, and Queen Niceven’s demi-fey are part of the Unseelie Court. The ruler of the Seelie Court’s demi-fey is no longer an official royal, but a duchess.”

His smile flashed back to full brightness. “Then I deal with the high king and high queen of faerie as I was told.”

I nodded. “It’s the way most people in and out of faerie do it.”

He cocked his head to one side and studied me for a moment. “And how else might a person deal with the rulers of faerie?”

“I deal with the kings and queens of faerie as leaders with rights and merits of their own.”

“Do you encourage me to deal directly with the goblins and the sluagh?”

I laughed a surprised burst of sound.

“Isn’t that what you’re hinting at, that you want me to treat them as equal to the sidhe courts?”

“Not equal to, but important, but Goddess, please do not try dealing with the goblins by yourself. I would not want to be responsible for the diplomatic disaster that might follow.”

He frowned, just a little, as if he were fighting not to frown harder. “I am very good at my job, Princess Meredith; I think I could avoid offending anyone.”

“It’s not your offending the goblins I’m concerned with, Mr. Benz. I’m more afraid that they might injure you if there was a cultural misunderstanding.”

“What kind of cultural misunderstanding?” he asked.

“The goblins revere only strength and power, Mr. Benz. A human without magic or the martial arts training of a Chuck Norris would find himself treated badly.”

“Maybe that’s why the humans stopped dealing with the goblins directly,” Rhys said.

I glanced at him. “You may be right.”

“I don’t understand,” Benz said.

“I would like you to appreciate more of faerie than just our two courts, but culturally we are the closest to human, and the safest for you, so perhaps you should just ignore me for now. If I ever feel safe to return to faerie, perhaps you can accompany me on a visit to some of the lesser courts.”

Rhys patted him on the shoulder. “We’d keep you safe.”

“Surely they wouldn’t harm a representative of the United States government.”

We all laughed then, even Galen, and the demi-fey’s laughter was like the sweet ringing of chimes, or tiny bells. The sound alone made Benz smile. The demi-fey have some of the most powerful glamour and illusion ability left in all of faerie. It made them so much more dangerous than they looked.

Benz frowned again, looking puzzled, and smoothed his hands down the front of his suit. It was almost as if he knew that something had just affected him in a more than normal way, but he wasn’t sure what it had been. I was betting the ambassador was carrying some kind of charm against our magic. He’d need it.

“It is the last country on the planet that would allow your people to immigrate,” Benz said.

“That is true, but the goblins would not see it as harming you, but as your proving unworthy to deal with them as a representative of the government.”

“Are you saying that an ambassador to the goblin court would have to be a soldier?”

“Unless you’re willing to shoot someone when you step through the door, no, not a soldier,” I said.

“What then?” he asked.

“A human witch or wizard, though it’s a more patriarchal society, so a wizard would be better.”

“A wizard with military training would be your best bet,” Rhys said. He came closer to the ambassador and raised the eye patch that was covering the smooth scars of his empty eye socket. “The goblins took my eye, Ambassador Benz, and I’m a lot harder to injure than a human.”

Benz did a long blink but didn’t flinch, which earned him another point. I wondered what he’d think if he saw the goblins. They prided themselves on extra limbs and eyes, so that females that looked like humanoid spiders were the height of beauty among the goblins. For that matter, he hadn’t seen Sholto with his extra tentacles visible. Benz was going to have a lot more chances to practice not flinching.

“Are you saying the goblins would attack me?”

I stepped in. “No, it is perfectly possible to visit and negotiate with the goblins in safety, but it requires an understanding of their culture that is rare even among the sidhe. I know of no human who has ever been that successfully intimate with the goblin court.”

Rhys snugged his eye patch back into place. “I’ve learned that my injury came through a lack of cultural understanding.” His voice was only a little bitter. He lost his eye hundreds of years ago, but I’d explained the misunderstanding to him only about a year ago. He’d hated the goblins and blamed them for it for a very long time, and had only a short time to get used to the idea that his injury was as much his fault as that of the goblin who took his eye.

“My goal is to be a true ambassador to both of the high courts of faerie, both Unseelie and Seelie, but no one in our government has spoken to me of the goblins, or even of Lord Sholto in his role as king.”

“Perhaps if your post as ambassador goes very well, we could escort you through the other courts at some point,” I said.

“I would be most grateful for the education in your wider culture,” he said, with a very nice smile. Even his brown eyes were shining with pleasure. I still felt we’d presented him with something he wasn’t prepared for, but he covered it better than most envoys, human or faerie.

I smiled, and turned carefully away in my designer sundress, not sure I could equal his pleasant falseness. He really was very good.

“Now, Princess Meredith, I had my own security wait outside the room with yours, since those inside the room are fathers and royal consorts, and security stays out. I’ve acted in accordance with your wishes this time.”

“Thank you, Ambassador,” I said with a smile.

“But I also have additional diplomatic security for you.”

“We discussed this, Ambassador; they are not needed.”

“Not meaning any insult to your bodyguards, but you were allegedly kidnapped by the king while under their care.”

“We’ve explained that I told them all to leave me alone, and they had to obey my orders.”

“But don’t they still have to obey your orders, Princess?”

“We’ve all agreed that Merry is never to be left alone without guards, and the same is true of the children,” Rhys said.

“Even if she orders you to do so?” Benz asked.

Rhys and Galen both nodded. “She will never be left alone again,” Galen said, and his voice held that new seriousness. I knew he meant it, and he was well trained as a fighter, but he didn’t have the skill level of Rhys, or Doyle, or Frost. I wasn’t sure if it was just the difference in years of practice, or if it had been a willingness to do deadly harm. The other men had been in real wars and had learned what it meant to kill and be killed. Galen had never had that; he’d had very few “real” fights. Honestly, I’d always thought that it wasn’t just lack of battle hardness, but that his personality, the very gentleness that I loved him for, prevented him from being the warrior he could have been. Now I was no longer sure of Galen, or of many things.

He came to me then, took my hand in his, and smiled down at me, his green eyes filling with that warmth they’d always held. “You look sad, my Merry. I would do anything to chase that look from your eyes.”

How could I tell him that it was his new resolution that made me sad? I couldn’t; we were all being changed by the events of the last year. We were parents now, and that would change us more.

“Kiss me, my green knight, and it will wipe the sadness from my eyes.”

I was rewarded with that brilliant smile of his, the one that had been making my heart skip a beat since I was fourteen, and then he leaned over, bending that six feet of muscle down to lay his mouth upon mine. The kiss was chaste by our standards, but the ambassador finally cleared his throat.

I had to break away from the kiss and explain, “Throat clearing is a human way of expressing awkwardness, or impatience with something sexual, or romantic.”

Galen glanced at the ambassador. “That wasn’t sexual by court standards, not by Unseelie standards anyway.”

“I’ve been told that sexuality is freer among the sidhe,” he said.

“If you try the throat-clearing routine with my aunt, the queen, either it will prompt her to say something scathing, or she will be more vigorous at whatever is bothering you.”

“It was not the kiss, but the fact that I think you are changing the subject from the princess having extra security from our government, that made me want to interrupt. I think of myself as fairly bohemian.”

“Bohemian,” Rhys said, “that’s not a term I’ve heard in a while.”

Benz looked at him, and there was intelligence in all the charm, which was good; he’d need it. “Is it the wrong word to use?”

“No, but to thrive at the Unseelie Court, you’ll need to be a little bit more than bohemian.”

“What would you suggest?”

“Profligate, perverse, but perhaps not.” Rhys looked at Galen and me.

“You’ve thought of something,” Galen said.

“I was just thinking that the queen never allows the human media to see her at her most flagrant. I was wondering if a human ambassador to our court might have a … calming effect.” His eye was full of humor at the very mildness of his word choice. If Queen Andais had to behave for human sensibilities, then torture as dinner entertainment might be over. It was always mild torture, by her standards, and it wasn’t common, but her love of true torture might have to be more controlled if Benz was visiting our court—if she could control herself and hadn’t gone so far into her own madness that nothing would help her regain herself. That was actually the question that stood in the way of her visiting the babies. Was she truly mad or just aiming her grief at her own court because she could? If she had to find other outlets for her grief, I wondered if I could talk her into grief counseling. She’d gone to human fertility specialists; maybe she’d do therapy.

Rhys came to join Galen, adding his arms to the other man’s so he had an arm around both my waist and Galen’s. “Now it’s you who’ve thought of something interesting, our Merry.”

I nodded. “We’ll discuss it later.”

“When I’m not here to listen in,” Benz said.

I glanced at him. “Yes,” I said.

He laughed then, and said, “You know that most humans would have denied it, just to be polite.”

“It’s too close to a lie, and a lie that you would know was one. Why should I bother?”

“Ah, Princess Meredith, I think I am going find being ambassador to you a very interesting, even educational, experience.”

“Which means it could be good, or bad,” I said.

He nodded. “I don’t know which it will be myself, yet.”

“Be careful, Ambassador Benz,” Rhys said, “or we’ll make you too honest to be a diplomat out among the humans.”

He looked surprised then, before he could stop himself, and then he laughed out loud, head back. It was the most unprotected and real expression I’d seen from him.

“Oh, Lord Rhys, a diplomat who cannot lie would be useless indeed out among the humans, but for a time I think a little brutal honesty might be a nice change. Now, about adding some diplomatic security agents to the princess’s detail …”

We let him talk, and I hoped that the “brutal honesty” wouldn’t be too brutal on Ambassador Peter Benz, or on us, for that matter. I couldn’t trust my aunt, Queen Andais, to be safe and sane around our babies, but I also wasn’t entirely sure we could keep telling her no. How do you tell someone who has been the ultimate power of life and death for more than two thousand years that she can’t come visit her great-nieces and nephew? That was always the trouble with dealing with the immortal; they were so used to getting their way.