Tangled Webs

ONE

“Hell’s fire.”

Surreal SaDiablo stared at the page she was currently reading, then let the book drop into her lap. “A body in a closet? What kind of idiot leaves a body in a closet?”

“Someone who doesn’t have large furry friends who think ‘human’ and ‘snack’ mean the same thing?” Daemon replied in an offhand way that told her he was paying some attention but not really listening, his thoughts still on the papers spread out around him.

Another woman might have been insulted by that lack of immediate attention. Knowing the man, Surreal just waited.

Looking at Daemon Sadi wasn’t a hardship at any time, but at the moment, he was comfortably rumpled, which made the picture even more delicious. His thick black hair was disheveled from his fingers running through it while he read reports and made notes of things he wanted to discuss with Dhemlan’s Province Queens. His white silk shirt was partially unbuttoned, giving her a view of toned muscles and golden brown skin, as well as little flashes of the Red Birthright Jewel that hung from a gold chain around his neck. His bare feet rested on a pillow he’d tossed onto the low table in front of the sofa.

His deep, cultured voice always had a sexual edge that made a woman’s pulse race—even when the look in those gold eyes promised pain instead of pleasure. He had a face too beautiful to be called handsome, and he had a temper typical of his caste.

Since he was one of the two males in the entire history of the Blood to wear a Black Jewel, he was as lethal as he was beautiful. And, may the Darkness help her, he was family.

It was that last part that assured her she’d have his full attention before much longer. It was the nature of Warlord Princes to be protective and territorial—as well as violent and deadly—so it was pretty much a given that a Warlord Prince was going to pay attention to the women in his family.

That thought had her narrowing her gold-green eyes as she considered why he was settled in the sitting room of the family’s town house in Amdarh, Dhemlan’s capital city, instead of doing paperwork in his own study at SaDiablo Hall. Where he belonged.

“Hell’s fire, Sadi,” she growled. “Now that you’re the Warlord Prince of Dhemlan, don’t you have enough details to keep you occupied without keeping track of my moontimes?” Which reminded her of the problem that was going to be filling up the sitting room if he was still there in an hour.

He set aside his papers and looked at her, his gold eyes full of warmth and amusement.

“You’re married,” she said, as if he needed the reminder of an event that had taken place a few weeks ago. “You should be keeping track of your wife, not me.”

No answer. Just that annoying amusement.

“Why don’t you keep track of Marian too while you’re at it?” she muttered.

The warmth and amusement in his eyes deepened.

Shit shit shit. He did keep track of his brother’s wife.

Her stomach gave a funny little twirl as she considered that. Daemon Sadi. Lucivar Yaslana. Half brothers linked through their Hayllian father, who was the Prince of the Darkness, the High Lord of Hell. Men who were ice and fire, working in tandem to look after the women in the family—especially during the few days of each moon cycle when those women couldn’t use Craft and might be vulnerable.

Which made her wonder about the Warlord she had met at a party shortly after Daemon became the Warlord Prince who ruled the Territory of Dhemlan in the Realm of Kaeleer. The man had managed to maintain the mask of an interesting companion until she agreed to go to the theater with him. Then his true personality began to seep through. She would have gone with him anyway to find out what he really wanted, but he’d canceled, sending a note to offer his regrets and apologies for being called away unexpectedly. She hadn’t thought anything of it; just figured he’d found out a little more about her and decided not to risk being gutted during the play’s intermission. After all, men who were willing to escort a former whore who was connected to the most powerful family in Kaeleer tended to get nervous when they discovered the former whore was also a former assassin.

Now she wondered whether the little prick-ass had canceled to avoid having a few bones broken (Lucivar’s method of dissuading fools) or whether he had run from a much scarier threat (if the prick-ass had ended up having a chat with Daemon).

“What body in which closet?” Daemon asked.

It took her a moment to remember.

“This one.” She finger-snapped the offending page of the book. “What’s wrong with these people? Why are they leaving bodies around for other people to find instead of disposing of them in some sensible way? And what’s wrong with the person who found the body? With help, I should add, from a cat. What does he need help for? Even a human nose can smell that much rotting meat.”

“What are you reading?”

There was a hint of wariness mixed in with Daemon’s amusement. Which was fair, she supposed, since she’d made a good living as an assassin before she moved to Kaeleer and acquired too many powerful male relatives. Not that he’d be concerned about that. After all, he’d taught her most of the nastier tricks of that particular trade.

She held up the book so he could read the title.

“Ah. That book.”

Definite wariness now, as if he had measured the distance between her chair and his place on the sofa and was determined to maintain it.

“Is there something I should know about this book? And what kind of name is Jarvis Jenkell? Do you think that’s his real name?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Daemon replied dryly. “I do know that since he came out with this new series of books, Jaenelle isn’t allowed to read his stories in bed anymore. She starts laughing so hard, she ends up flailing.”

“What…? Oh. Caught you, did she?”

Stony expression.

Oh, yeah. Back to the first subject. “So why don’t these people have brains enough to bury a body where it won’t be found? Nooo, they’ll put a body in a closet…or in an old trunk in a spare bedroom—not even up in the attic, where it might be harder to find—or in the shed out back, where it attracts critters that want to take home some carrion for dinner.” She clapped her hands to her cheeks, widened her eyes, and wagged her head. “Oh! Look! It’s the gardener. Who is dead. And look! There’s blood on the hedge clippers. Do you think it’s a clue?”

Daemon snorted out a laugh, tried to regain control, then just slumped back and let the laughter roar.

She laughed with him, then shook her head. She was too much a professional to be able to dismiss sloppy work, even in a story. “Really, Sadi. Granted, a landen would have to work harder than we do to dispose of a body, but they do have shovels.”

“It’s a mystery, Surreal,” he said when he could talk again. “That’s the whole point of the story. A person discovers a body, gets caught up in the events surrounding the death, and has to figure out why the person died and who did the killing—usually while trying to avoid being killed himself. Until you’ve got a body, there’s no reason to look for clues.”

“And no point to the story.” She nodded, since that part made sense. “That still doesn’t explain this character who is supposed to be Blood—or the cat. A species of kindred who have chosen to remain hidden while pretending to be larger-than-usual domestic cats, except for this one rogue feline who has decided to help the poor, dumb, smell-impaired human figure out murders?”

Daemon got up and went over to the corner table that held an open bottle of wine and glasses. He lifted the bottle and gave her a questioning look. She shook her head.

After pouring a glass for himself, he returned to his place on the sofa. “It hasn’t been that many years since the kindred dogs and horses made their presence known, so it is possible that a species chose to remain hidden when the rest of them decided to let the human Blood know the kindred existed. Not likely, but possible. As for the human side of the partnership, this is the second book with these characters. The man discovered his Blood heritage in the first story and is still learning how to use his power.”

“Doesn’t that sound a bit too much like the stories Lady Fiona writes about Tracker and Shadow?” Surreal asked.

“I believe it was Fiona’s success that spurred him to write this new story line. Jenkell is a well-known writer in landen artistic circles, and he’s become quite wealthy writing his mysteries. I’ve read a few of the books in the other series; they’re entertaining stories.”

She huffed out a breath and shook the book. “But this! The man has never been in the same room as one of the Blood. At least, not the kind of Blood he’s trying to write about. You can tell he doesn’t understand a damn thing about us.”

Daemon smiled. “I know. For years he’s been considered the top writer in his field, mostly because his characters were clever and found imaginative ways out of difficult situations.”

“And entertained both landens and Blood.”

Daemon nodded. “Then ego or temper overwhelmed sense when Fiona’s Tracker and Shadow stories became popular with landens as well as the Blood, and he began writing this new series about a Blood male and his kindred partner.”

“And he’s still popular with the Blood?” She put as much disbelief in her voice as possible.

“He is, but not because he’s telling a good story anymore.” Daemon lifted his glass in a salute. “His portrayal of the Blood is so bad it’s hysterically funny. At least, a good number of people have thought so.”

Apparently Daemon wasn’t one of them. “Does he know the Blood are buying the books to laugh at the characters? That must be biting his ass.” She riffled a few pages until she got to the next chapter.

“I imagine it is. What are you doing?”

“I wanted to see what other Blood things he’s doing wrong.”

“The point of one of these stories is to read it in order to see the clues as they’re revealed.”

He was getting that bossy tone in his voice. She wasn’t sure if it was family bossy or Warlord Prince bossy, but he’d stare her down if she tried to ignore him. Once he went home, she could…

Shit.

She glanced at the clock on the mantel, considered the man now studying her, and decided not to waste time being subtle.

“You have to go home now.”

“No.”

She hadn’t thought giving him an order would work, but he didn’t have to sound so politely unyielding about it. Now the only way to get rid of him was to tell him why he had to go.

“Rainier will be here soon,” she said.

“So?”

Something under the pleasant tone made her think of a cat sharpening its claws before it went out to play with the mouse.

“You like Rainier,” she said. “He works for you.”

Daemon settled back on the sofa, making himself more comfortable. “I’m aware of that.” He waited a beat. “Why is he coming here this evening?”

For the same reason you’ve got your ass snuggled into the sofa. Which was not something a witch said to any male relative who was bigger than she was and wore darker Jewels than she did.

“Doesn’t he have family of his own to fuss over?”

Hell’s fire. He was going to get pissy about this.

“Actually,” she said, “he doesn’t.” A flicker in Daemon’s eyes warned her he was aware of the lie within the words—he knew perfectly well Rainier had family living in Dharo—but he didn’t know why the words were also true. And she wasn’t looking forward to being the one to tell him. “His family prefers that he stay away.”

“Because he prefers to warm a man’s bed rather than a woman’s?”

It was like seeing a storm coming and knowing you couldn’t get out of the way in time.

“No,” she said softly, “it’s because he’s a Warlord Prince.”

A heartbeat. That’s all it took. Daemon, the amused male relative, was gone. The Warlord Prince who looked at her…Not the Sadist, who could be so elegantly vicious. Thank the Darkness, it wasn’t that facet of Daemon’s personality that had surfaced. No, this was Prince Sadi, ruler of Dhemlan, who was considering the depth of the insult contained within her words.

“They aren’t like our family,” she said hurriedly.

A moment of silence. Then, too softly, he said, “Explain.”

She didn’t dare look at the clock to see how much time was left. It didn’t matter. This discussion had to be over, done, fast.

“Most of the males in the SaDiablo-Yaslana family are, or were, Warlord Princes. So none of you are different from the rest. You know how to live with a Warlord Prince. The women in this family know how to live with a Warlord Prince. But Rainier…From what I gathered, there had been a couple of Warlord Princes in the family bloodlines over the generations, but they’d worn lighter Jewels, so the more aggressive, predatory nature”—Shit! Don’t remind him of that!—“of a Warlord Prince was balanced by not having as much power. But Rainier wears an Opal Jewel that’s considered a dark Jewel. His family didn’t know what to do with him when he was young and wore Purple Dusk as his Birthright, and as sure as the sun doesn’t shine in Hell, they don’t know what to do with him now.”

“So they turn away from him.”

Oh, yeah. This was turning into a fun discussion.

“To his benefit, since they don’t deserve to have him.” She put some snap in her voice, hoping for a flash of amusement from him.

Nothing.

“A Warlord Prince needs a female to fuss over—if not family, then a friend,” she finished quietly.

“Having his company for the evening is fine, Surreal, but—”

“He’ll be staying for breakfast.”

Long pause. “You trust him that much?”

Now they had gotten to the core of it. Did she trust a man who wasn’t family during the hours when she was asleep and would be the most vulnerable? “Yes, I trust him that much. So go home to your wife, Sadi.” Then I can read this book however I want to.

Another pause. Then the Warlord Prince of Dhemlan took a deep breath—and Daemon let it out in a sigh as he stood up.

“All right, then.” Using Craft, he vanished all the papers and called in his black jacket. He slipped on the jacket, then ran his fingers—with their long, perfectly manicured, black-tinted nails—through his hair. Now the hair looked bedroom-disheveled. Now the partially unbuttoned shirt looked like a lure to attract and entice.

Which was insane, because the only woman who could safely have Daemon Sadi as a lover was Jaenelle Angelline, since she was the only woman he wanted for a lover.

Don’t just sit here. Get up. Move. You’ve got no fighting room in this position.

Then a little flash, a blink of light near the floor. Nothing there, but…

He was still barefoot. There was something too sensual about him still being barefoot when he was wearing that silk shirt, the expensive jacket, and the too-well-tailored trousers that taunted women with a hint of what they couldn’t have.

She pondered the feet and not the significance of their movement until he was leaning over her, one hand resting on the arm of her chair, the fingertips of the other hand drifting down the page of her book, then over her thumb and wrist.

She actually felt her heart skip a beat in anticipation of a kiss before it began pounding like a rabbit’s.

Why was he doing this? What did he want from her? Those golden eyes held hers, demanding her attention. The way his mouth curved in a hint of a smile seemed to promise all kinds of delights. Which was probably the exact look the Terreillean Queens who had used him saw right before he killed them.

Then his lips brushed her cheek and lingered there as his chained sexual heat washed over her.

“Enjoy your evening, cousin,” he said.

He eased back—and glided out of the room.

Had he used Craft to open and close the door, or had he used the power that lived within him to simply pass through the wood? She didn’t know, didn’t care. She felt a bit breathless—and more than a little scared. When Daemon was the Sadist, he used sex as a terrifying weapon. She felt as if she’d brushed against that side of his temper, but she didn’t know why he’d be angry with her.

Maybe nothing. Probably hadn’t even been aimed at her. Just feeling pissy about Rainier’s family was all.

Which reminded her.

Shaking off the sexual haze—which she wasn’t in any mood for anyway—she glanced at the clock. Rainier was late. Wasn’t that lovely? Now that she knew the book was meant to be silly, she wanted to read a little more. And she wanted to flip through and discover some of the other stupid things this Jarvis Jenkell thought the Blood did.

She picked up the book and tried to flip through the pages.

Tried to flip through the pages.

Tried to flip through the pages.

“That whoring son of a whoring bitch!”

As he walked down the town house’s steps, Daemon reached inside his black jacket. Then he stopped, baffled that he’d been reaching for a cigarette case he hadn’t carried in several years.

He couldn’t remember when he’d stopped smoking the black cigarettes. Sometime during the years when his mind had been shattered and he’d wandered the paths of madness the Blood called the Twisted Kingdom. During the years when he was slowly regaining his sanity and lived in hiding with Surreal and Manny, it hadn’t been prudent to call attention to themselves by adding an expensive item to their supplies when the invalid—and fictitious—owner of the island had never ordered cigarettes before. Now the only way to get the things would be to buy them from a supplier in the Realm of Terreille, and there was nothing he wanted from Terreille. Nothing.

Which didn’t explain his suddenly slipping into the movements of an old habit.

Then he looked up at the town house’s sitting room windows—and smiled.

His reaching for a cigarette had been a response to memories of the hundreds of times he and Surreal had spent an evening together in exactly the same way—enjoying each other’s company while pursuing individual interests. Which meant the two of them had finally circled back to being the friends they had been once upon a time.

She was twelve when he first met her and her mother, Titian. A pretty, leggy girl with the Hayllian coloring of black hair and light brown skin that had come from her sire, Kartane SaDiablo. But her eyes were gold-green instead of pure gold and larger than usual, and her ears were delicately pointed. The slightly oversized eyes and the ears, along with a slim body that was stronger than it looked, came from Titian, who had been a Black Widow Queen of the Dea al Mon, one of the Children of the Wood.

So Surreal had a dual bloodline, as it was politely called in Kaeleer. Hayllians were one of the long-lived races; the Dea al Mon were not. Her body had matured closer to the pace of the short-lived races, but her emotions…

Because he’d seen her only for an evening here and there, and because she’d had to grow up hard and fast after Titian was murdered, it hadn’t occurred to him that Surreal’s emotional maturity might develop at a slower pace, that even after a few centuries of being a whore and an assassin, she had still been more of an adolescent girl than a mature woman. So in a way, the night that had broken their friendship was as much his fault as hers.

She’d been young and foolish and drunk the night she had asked him to show her what Hayll’s Whore could do in bed. She’d said it would be a feather in her cap because no whore who worked in a Red Moon house could claim actual experience in bed with him. And he, who had thought of her as a young cousin, had been bitterly hurt at what he’d seen as a betrayal of his trust. So he had responded with a cold fury, and he had shown her what it was like to dance with the Sadist.

That night changed things between them, and it was only because of Jaenelle that their friendship began to mend. Jaenelle, who was Witch, the living myth, dreams made flesh. She had been a child when they had both met her. She grew up to be an extraordinary Queen. Then she sacrificed herself to stop the war being orchestrated by Hekatah and Dorothea SaDiablo—the High Priestess of Hell and the High Priestess of Hayll, respectively.

Because of their mutual commitment to Jaenelle, he and Surreal had found their way back to being friends—and family. Maybe it was because they were finally comfortable with each other again that his leave-taking had been as much warning as distraction. Even Surreal couldn’t afford to become complacent and forget what he was.

Now there was another connection he had to consider: Rainier.

Prince Rainier had met Jaenelle and the coven when he’d been hired to be their dance instructor. Unlike the instructors who had come before him, he had been no more than a few years older than them and had thrived on the contact with the young Queens who, not many years later, would rule Kaeleer. When Jaenelle formally became the Queen of Ebon Askavi, Rainier joined her court as a Second Circle escort, although he’d continued to make a living as a dance instructor.

Now there was no court at Ebon Askavi. Not officially. And that was the problem. The Warlords and Warlord Princes who had served in the First Circle already had a connection to other courts—usually the court of the Queen they had married or were related to in some way. But Rainier had served in the Dark Court, and when it ended, he could no longer legitimately claim to be serving a Queen. Oh, no one had pushed it during that first year, especially after they’d heard Jaenelle had survived. No one had disputed Rainier’s claim that he still served Witch in an unofficial capacity. But the day had been coming when other Queens wouldn’t have considered that a valid reason to refuse service in another court.

That was why he had hired Rainier and given the man a five-year contract, duties to be flexible and as needed. While no male born in the Shadow Realm was required to serve, it was assumed that most would spend some time serving in a court at one point in their lives or another. And Warlord Princes, who were considered a dangerous asset because of their tempers and nature, were sometimes treated as outcasts if a Queen wasn’t holding the leash. Even in Kaeleer.

Despite his family’s opinion of him, a man like Rainier would be a prize. He was a fine-looking man with a dancer’s lean build, fair skin, green eyes, and a mane of brown hair. He had an easy manner and a mild temper for a Warlord Prince. But while he made a delightful—and protective—companion, he wasn’t suited for bedroom duties. Even if Rainier had taken a contract with one of the coven—and because he was a friend, they had all offered him a contract—service in the bedroom for the other Ladies in the Queen’s First Circle would have been unspoken but understood.

Serving the new Warlord Prince of Dhemlan was the best solution. There was no court, so there were no Ladies who could demand service. And yet no one was going to argue that service to him wasn’t sufficient to control another Warlord Prince.

So the arrangement promised to work well for both of them.

And here comes the innocent now, Daemon thought, suppressing a grin as Rainier turned a corner and walked toward the town house, his stride easy and graceful.

“Prince Sadi,” Rainier said when he reached the town house’s steps.

“Prince Rainier,” Daemon replied.

Rainier’s eyes flicked to the town house’s door before focusing on the Prince he served.

“I’m on my way out,” Daemon said. “I understand that you’re on your way in. For the night.”

“Is that a problem?”

“Not for me.” Daemon stepped aside and waited until Rainier had climbed the stairs and raised the knocker on the door. “How are your reflexes this evening?”

Rainier twisted at the waist and looked down at him, clearly puzzled. “They’re fine. Why?”

“You may need to be fast on your feet.”

With that, Daemon walked away. It was a pleasant summer evening. Since he wasn’t expected home, he’d walk to his favorite bookshop and see if there was anything new that might whet Jaenelle’s appetite for stories.

Then he’d go home and see what he could do about whetting her other appetites.

“I saw Prince Sadi on my way in,” Rainier said as he walked into the sitting room. “He seemed amused about something.”

“Let’s see how amused he is when I put his balls through a meat grinder! While they’re still attached!”

To give him credit, Rainier didn’t turn and run out of the room. But he also didn’t come any closer. Surreal wasn’t sure if the wariness was sincere or a sop to her ego, since he was the dominant power right now, despite the fact that she wore Gray Jewels and he wore Opal. She didn’t care if it was sincerity or sop. She just wanted someone to howl at.

“Look what he did to my book!” she wailed, shaking the book at him. “Look!”

Cautious, he came closer. Encouraged that she wouldn’t lose her audience, she tried flipping through the pages to demonstrate.

“The pages are stuck together,” Rainier said. “Is the book defective?”

“He did this.” She turned the page, as if she’d finished reading it. That she could do. Then she tried flipping through pages and all the pages stuck together. “I can turn one page at a time, but if I want to skip around to—”

“Wouldn’t that spoil the story?” Rainier asked, breaking into her rant.

“Stop thinking like a male,” she snarled.

He grinned at her. The grin didn’t last long when she just stared at him.

“Sorry,” he said, doing his best to sound meek.

She looked down at the book, and her eyes filled with tears. Stupid to get weepy over something so foolish. Moontime moodies. Didn’t hit her often, thank the Darkness, but she was entitled to a mood or two when she didn’t feel well and couldn’t use Craft on top of it.

A tear plopped onto the back of her hand. She sniffled—and heard a low sound rumble through the room. Growl? Snarl? She looked up to ask Rainier and…

“He made you cry,” Rainier said, staring at her through the glazed eyes of a Warlord Prince who had risen to the killing edge.

“The bastard played a cruel trick and made you cry.” He took a step toward the sitting room door.

Hell’s fire, Mother Night, and may the Darkness be merciful. He was going after Sadi. He saw tears and gut instinct kicked in, and he was going after Sadi, who was the most powerful male in the Realm. And Daemon, when challenged, would give Rainier a chance to back down—and then would lash out in response to his own predatory nature, destroying the other man completely.

“No.” The book went flying as she propelled herself out of the chair and grabbed his arm. “You’re not doing this.”

“He made you cry.”

“He pissed me off, and I got weepy. He wouldn’t have done it if he’d known I’d get weepy.” Which was true. On any other day, she would have raged for a few minutes and then tried to figure out how the spell worked. Or she would have stomped over to the nearest bookshop and bought another copy of the damn book.

“Rainier.”

At the moment, she had some sympathy for his family’s inability to deal with a Warlord Prince, but she wasn’t going to let him leave. She could think of a lot cleaner ways to commit suicide than challenging Daemon. If that meant channeling her power when her body couldn’t tolerate being the vessel for that power, so be it. She’d slap enough shields around Rainier to cage him for a while. It would hurt like a wicked bitch, but she’d do it. And then she’d grab the fastest messenger she could find to ride the Winds to Ebon Rih and deliver a message to Lucivar. He’d arrive with that Eyrien temper of his stoked to the point of explosion and yell at Rainier for considering something so stupid. He’d yell at her too, for hurting herself by using Craft when she shouldn’t. And then he and Rainier would be merciless about fussing over her because, to their stone-headed way of thinking, she needed to be fussed over.

What did Jaenelle keep telling her? Work with a Warlord Prince’s nature instead of trying to work against it.

She sagged against Rainier so suddenly, he grabbed her to keep her on her feet.

“Surreal?”

Razor-sharp tone, but not the killing edge. This was worry now, focused completely on her.

Good.

“You promised to stay with me tonight,” she said. Don’t sound pathetic. He won’t believe it for a moment if you sound pathetic.

“I know but—”

“A mood, Rainier. Just a mood. You don’t ask a man to step onto the killing field for a mood.” At least, not in Kaeleer. The bitches in Terreille had done it all the time.

He studied her, and she could feel the tension in him slowly fading.

“That’s all it is?” he finally asked. “Just a mood?”

She nodded, then rested her head on his shoulder. It was nice to have a male friend. Her one attempt at a romantic relationship with a man had left her with a heart bruised badly enough to wither any sexual interest she had in the gender. At least for the time being. So it was nice to spend time with a male who didn’t want her to be more than a friend.

All she had to do was avoid getting him killed.

“Was there anything you wanted to do this evening?” Rainier asked.

The brilliance of an idea dazzled her for a moment.

“Well,” she said, “I was curious about that book, especially now that I know the things in there about the Blood are very silly. But I don’t want the frustration of those stuck-together pages.” And she was going to send Daemon a blistering letter about tricks that almost backfire.

No. Not Daemon. She’d send a note to Uncle Saetan. He may have retired from being the Warlord Prince of Dhemlan, he may have taken up residence at the Keep as a retreat from the living Realms, but he was still the patriarch of the SaDiablo family, and no one could flay an erring son with a look or a phrase as well as the High Lord of Hell.

Cheered by the thought, she almost didn’t respond in time when Rainier said, “I could read the story to you, if that would be pleasing.”

“I’d like that.” She stepped back. “I’m going to freshen up first. Could you see about getting some food we could nibble on?”

A relaxed smile and a look of pleased anticipation in his eyes. “I could do that.”

As she climbed the stairs to her room on the second floor, Surreal considered how annoying the evening might have been. She would have wanted to read the book; Rainier would have wanted some way to look after her, and his need to fuss would have scraped on her temper. Now, with him reading the story to her, they could talk about it and laugh over it, and they would both have an enjoyable, entertaining evening.

She paused outside the door of her room to consider everything that had happened.

One spell, designed to annoy her just enough. One man, who understood the nature of Warlord Princes all too well.

Since Daemon had found a clever way to take care of her and Rainier, maybe she wouldn’t send that note to Uncle Saetan after all.

She shook her head and smiled as she walked into her bedroom. “Sneaky bastard.”

TWO

Early morning. Cool air against his bare skin—air that held the promise of heat later in the day.

No longer sleeping and not quite awake, Daemon breathed in the scent of his wife, his love, his Queen, and breathed out a sigh of contentment. His hand caressed Jaenelle’s thigh, traveled up her belly. Not to arouse, just to confirm that she was here, was real. It wasn’t something he took for granted.

Then his hand moved higher, curved around a breast, and he smiled with pleasure at the feel of that warm, round flesh against his palm and the caress of soft, thick fur against the back of his hand.

Fur?

Fully awake now, he opened his golden eyes halfway. He tried straightening his legs, but the weight that was pressed against the back of his knees gave an annoyed grunt followed by a sleepy yawn.

Ladvarian. The Sceltie was a Red-Jeweled Warlord and the most trusted liaison between human Blood and kindred, who were the Blood of the nonhuman races that lived in Kaeleer. He’d been a puppy when he’d decided Jaenelle belonged to him as his Queen and had come to live with her at the Hall. Years later, he’d been the stubborn heart that had rallied the kindred to do the impossible and save Jaenelle when she’d been torn apart by the power she had unleashed to stop a war.

The kindred had developed a fine sense of when not to come into the bedroom, but Daemon had gotten so used to some of their psychic scents that their presence no longer roused him from sleep when they slipped into the room.

Didn’t mean it didn’t annoy him to wake up and discover company in his wife’s bed. Especially since the bed was big enough to be a small room and there was no reason to be crowding him. Unless…

He raised his head and looked at the bed’s fourth occupant.

Kaelas lay on his back, sprawled over the large bed. Eight hundred pounds of limp Arcerian cat. An enormous blanket of white fur.

Kaelas stared at him through half-lidded eyes. Daemon couldn’t decide if it was a deliberate imitation of his own look or lazy arrogance.

Daemon bared his teeth, a show of dominance.

Kaelas bared his teeth, leaving no doubt that his teeth were more impressive.

Contentment vanished. Temper scratched. It didn’t matter that Kaelas wasn’t a rival lover. It didn’t matter that he usually tolerated the cat’s presence, acknowledging that the Red-Jeweled Warlord Prince was one of Jaenelle’s fiercest protectors. What mattered was that on this particular morning, he, who was Jaenelle’s husband, didn’t want to share her bed with a damn cat!

The feelings swelled, bubbled up, demanded an outlet.

Daemon snarled, using Craft to let that soft sound roll through the room like thunder.

Kaelas snarled, not needing Craft to fill the room.

Then Jaenelle snarled.

Suddenly he was the only male in the bed.

«We’ll tell Beale you need coffee,» Ladvarian said, using a psychic spear thread to keep the comment just between the males.

«You do that,» Daemon replied, watching the way Kaelas shifted from one paw to the other, as if uncertain whether to stay or run.

Jaenelle stirred.

Kaelas sprang toward the glass doors connected to the balcony that looked out over Jaenelle’s courtyard. He passed through the glass, leaped over the balcony railing, and landed in the courtyard two floors below.

Ladvarian ran straight for the inside wall and passed through it to the corridor, no doubt racing to find Beale and inform the Hall’s butler that the Lady was awake.

Which left him to deal with his wife, who was not the friendliest person first thing in the morning.

He kissed her bare shoulder, an acknowledgment that he knew she was awake. “Good morning.”

He’d been a pleasure slave for centuries when he’d lived in Terreille. He knew all the nuances for playing bedroom games. The rules were different for a husband, but a lot of what he’d learned about women still applied. So he kept his voice warm and loving, with just a husky hint of sex—enough to tell her she was desirable but not enough to imply he had any expectations.

She shifted. Turned toward him. There was nothing loving or loverlike in the sapphire eyes that stared at him.

“You woke me up.”

A shiver of fear went down his spine. He had seen her in the Misty Place, that place deep in the abyss where she appeared as the Self that lived within the human skin—a Self that clearly revealed that not all the dreamers who had woven this dream into flesh had been human.

Despite the fact that the body still looked like Jaenelle, it was Witch who stared at him. And Witch was not pleased.

“Sorry,” he said, brushing his fingers over her short golden hair. “Didn’t mean to.”

She braced one hand against his shoulder and pushed.

He could have resisted, physically, but he’d waited seventeen hundred years for her, and he could no more disobey her than he could stop loving her. So he rolled onto his back, passive, knowing he wouldn’t defend himself from anything she did to him.

She settled over him, her nails lightly pricking his shoulders. She rubbed against him—and his cock responded with enthusiasm.

“You woke me up.”

She nipped his lower lip, then settled in for a long, slow kiss that had his blood pumping. The scent of her arousal, both physical and psychic, filled him until there was nothing but need and desire.

Then she ended the kiss and her teeth closed over his throat. Not a love bite on his neck, but a predator’s hold meant to strangle the prey. No pressure, no real menace from her, but the hold—and what it stood for—shredded the chains that usually held a Warlord Prince within the boundaries of civilized self-control.

His long nails whispered down her back, encouraging her to take him. His hands rested on her ass for a moment. Then he pricked her with his nails just hard enough to have her hips pushing down against him.

Snarling, she raised her head.

“You woke me up,” she said for the third time.

This wasn’t lovemaking, and it wasn’t just sex. He wasn’t sure there was a word for where they were at that moment.

And he didn’t care.

Lifting his head, he licked her throat as he shifted her hips and sheathed himself inside her. Then he purred, “I guess I’ll have to make it up to you.”

Daemon watched his hand as he poured a cup of coffee, pleased to see that the uncontrollable shakes had settled down to little tremors.

Their mating had been a combination of unrestrained arousal mixed with dollops of fear, which, because of the woman, had intensified his excitement. Sex that was savage and yet still tender, that was all physical and yet was possible only because of the depth of their feelings for each other. When they were done, Jaenelle had staggered into the bathroom, and he, braced by self-discipline and sheer stubbornness, had stumbled his way to the bathroom in the adjoining Consort’s suite. In safe privacy, he had braced his hands against the shower walls, and while the hot water poured over him, his body shook in response to what he’d been doing in bed with the woman who was his wife and Queen.

He sincerely hoped they would enjoy each other like that again in the future. And he hoped, just as sincerely, that it wouldn’t be anytime soon.

“I thought men liked morning sex,” Jaenelle said, looking baffled.

“We do,” Daemon replied. Of course, “sex” was a pale word to describe what they had been doing, but he wasn’t about to debate her choice of words. Especially since she was watching the hand holding the coffee cup. Had noted the tremors. “Of course we do.”

The baffled look changed to something that was almost angry, almost hostile. “You said it didn’t matter. You said you could accept that I no longer wore Ebony Jewels, was no longer dominant.”

Her quiet intensity alarmed him. He set the cup down. “It doesn’t matter. I can accept it. What is this about?”

“It’s about that.” She waved a hand to indicate his own. “It’s about pretending that you were with a witch who was stronger than you, and now acting all shaky and nervous.”

Sweetheart, you didn’t see the look in your eyes when we were in bed. But he saw the problem now. Despite having gotten married twice—once in a private ceremony and again in a public ceremony a few weeks later—she still wasn’t certain he had accepted the choice she had made.

After he’d dealt with the witches who had tried to stop the wedding by hurting her, Jaenelle had brought him to the Misty Place and shown him the truth. So he knew she could have been exactly the same as she had been before she’d sacrificed herself to save Kaeleer. She could have worn the Ebony Jewels again instead of Twilight’s Dawn, which had only a hint of Black. But she hadn’t wanted that much power, had never wanted to be so different and so distant from everyone else. And everyone around her, everyone who had loved her, was still adjusting to what they thought of as a loss.

“I’ll agree with the part about my being shaky, but I’ll dispute the accusation that I’m pretending to be nervous.” He put enough punch in his voice to assure he’d have her attention.

“Men pretend sometimes. You can’t tell me they don’t.”

He acknowledged that fact with a nod. “Sometimes a man does pretend he’s a little intimidated by the woman he’s bedding, even if he’s the one wearing the darker Jewels.” And sometimes it wasn’t pretense; men just didn’t argue with women’s incorrect assessment—mostly because they figured women wouldn’t understand that the power that was sometimes being wielded had nothing whatsoever to do with the Jewels.

To give himself a moment to collect his thoughts, he picked up the cup and took a sip of coffee.

Damn. If he’d known they were going to have this kind of discussion, he would have put a warming spell on the cup. He swallowed the cold coffee and set the cup down.

“Would you say our enjoyment of each other this morning was intense?” he asked. “Because I would.”

A blush stained Jaenelle’s cheeks. She nodded.

Daemon sighed, a sound of strained patience. Or patient exasperation. “Sweetheart, sometimes the body reacts. Should I apologize for feeling weak in the knees and quivering? I’m your husband, and I’m your lover. Being both—being able to be both—still takes my breath away.”

She studied him a moment longer, then reached across the table. He clasped her hand, craving the touch.

And that touch was enough to rekindle his arousal. He let his chained sexual heat wash over both of them, leaving her with no doubt that if they ended up in bed before the breakfast dishes were cleared, he would be the dominant partner.

She offered him a small, embarrassed smile before she released his hand and picked up her fork, a clear signal that she wasn’t ready for another romp in bed.

Then again, neither was he. Not really.

Relieved they could change the subject, he poured more coffee and gave his attention to his own breakfast. Since he’d already had his exercise for the day—and more—he was ravenous.

“What are you planning to do today?” he asked.

“I’m meeting Marian. We’re going to walk through the building we’re going to transform into a spooky house.” Jaenelle gave him a bright smile that said, Ask me. Come on, ask me.

No sane man with any kind of functioning brain would go near that statement. But he knew his duty as a husband, so he said, “Spooky house?”

Jaenelle swallowed a bite of omelet. “I was visiting one of the landen villages that’s located near the family vineyards, and I got to talking to some of the boys. They had the strangest ideas of what the Blood are like—especially since common sense should tell them the things they think can’t be true.”

“They’re boys,” he said. “They don’t have common sense.”

“No doubt, but I thought it would be fun to create a house based on all the silly, spooky things they think we live with day to day. There are usually harvest festivals in the late autumn. We could have it ready by then as an entertainment.”

“An entertainment.” Hell’s fire, Mother Night, and may the Darkness be merciful. “Where is this entertainment?”

“We got a big old house in a landen village located in the central part of Dhemlan. Well, I bought it. It’s structurally sound, but it looks…” She shrugged.

There was something stuck in his throat. He was pretty sure it was his heart. “You bought a house?” And didn’t tell me?

“Yes.”

She gave him an unsure but game smile—and he had a sudden understanding of the terror his father, the powerful, Black-Jeweled High Lord of Hell, must have felt during Jaenelle’s adolescence when greeted by that smile.

“What are you doing today?” Jaenelle asked.

Had Marian told Lucivar about this spooky house? Surely the lovely Eyrien hearth witch hadn’t kept it a secret from her own husband! Which was a thought he wasn’t going to follow to its logical conclusion because then he would start to wonder why his own lovely wife hadn’t informed him until now.

But if Lucivar had known, why hadn’t the prick sent a warning? A man did not need to be blindsided by something like this at the breakfast table. Or any other time, for that matter.

“Daemon?”

“Uh?” Pay attention, fool. “Oh, I have some paperwork to finish up for my meetings with the Province Queens.” He focused on his coffee cup and added, oh so casually, “And I thought I would drop in at the Keep and see how Father is doing.”

“Uh-huh.” Jaenelle sliced her omelet in half, put a half between two pieces of toast, and wrapped her breakfast in her napkin. “I have to run if I’m going to be on time to meet up with Marian. She’s a little nervous about doing this.”

I wonder why. “Are you taking one of the Coaches?”

“No, I’ll just ride the Winds.” She drained her coffee cup and stood up.

Something not quite right here. “It shouldn’t take that long to reach the landen village, should it?”

She came around the table and gave him a sweet kiss. “No, it won’t take that long.” Then she gave him a wicked grin. “But first I have to yell at the cat for waking me up.”

THREE

How did I get talked into this? Marian wondered as she followed Jaenelle into the next gloomy room of the old landen house that had sat empty and neglected for the past decade or more. Of course, based on what she’d seen so far, the house hadn’t been cared for even when people had lived in it.

She waited until Jaenelle nudged open one of the slatted shutters to let in dingy light through the grimy window. Then she looked around and decided this was the worst room yet. Judging by the furniture, this must have been the dining room. Judging by the wallpaper, the people who had lived here must have wanted to discourage everyone from lingering over a meal.

“Cobwebs,” Jaenelle said, looking at the corners of the room.

Marian winced as she forced herself to take a closer look around. She was here because her hearth witch practicality provided balance for Jaenelle’s more whimsical ideas. Besides, they were family. Jaenelle had been adopted by Lucivar’s father when she was twelve, so even though there was no bloodline connecting them, Jaenelle was Lucivar’s sister—and Lucivar’s Queen. Since Marian was Lucivar’s wife, that meant Jaenelle was also her sister now.

And there was another connection between them. If Jaenelle hadn’t saved her and brought her to Kaeleer, she wouldn’t have survived the attack by five Eyrien Warlords, and if she hadn’t survived, she wouldn’t have fallen in love with a strong, wonderful man, and she wouldn’t have a son.

So she owed Jaenelle. But debt or not, family or not, there was only so much ick a hearth witch could handle.

“Yes,” she said. “Those cobwebs definitely will have to be cleaned out.”

“No. Well, yes, those will have to be cleaned out, but we’ll put new cobwebs in the corners. Black, sooty strands. Clots and layers. Maybe add an illusion spell in a couple of them so it looks like there’s something moving.”

Marian shuddered. Her membranous wings, shades darker than her brown skin, were pulled in tight to her body, an instinctive response to make herself look smaller. “They think our homes have cobwebs?” She wasn’t sure if she was insulted or appalled.

“And rats,” Jaenelle said cheerfully as she called in a list and handed it to Marian. “I took notes when I was talking to the boys.”

Those weren’t boys, Marian thought darkly as she studied the list. Those were maggot-brained little beasts. “We can’t have rats.”

“Not real rats,” Jaenelle conceded. “But we can create a skittering noise so it sounds like there are rats in the walls.” She looked around, considering, then frowned as they both heard a skitter skitter.

Marian closed her eyes for a moment. They’d bring some of the kindred wolves with them the next time to deal with the rats already in residence.

“So these”—maggot-brained beasts—“boys think the Blood live in moldy rooms with creaking doors and squeaking floors and furniture that hasn’t been dusted in a decade, and we eat in rooms that have cobwebs in the corners and rats in the walls.”

Jaenelle smiled brightly. “Yes. Exactly.”

Marian walked around the table that clogged the center of the room. What would it take to clean that thing? Maybe a chisel. Or a sledgehammer. She stopped at the serving board and stared at the silver serving tray set just off center enough to make her grit her teeth.

At least, she thought it was silver under all that tarnish.

Seeing it made something in her brain fizzle. She turned and marched to the closest door, baring her teeth in a silent snarl as she turned the grimy doorknob. It took some muscle to open the stuck door, but when she finally succeeded, she discovered it wasn’t a way out of the room. It was a storage cupboard with shelves that had more blackened silver and bug-infested linen. And she couldn’t take any more.

“Why not a rotting corpse?” Marian said in a voice so snippy she didn’t recognize it as her own. “Wouldn’t we lock our enemies in a cupboard and let them starve to death while they watch us dine?”

“Well…,” Jaenelle began.

“You said you were thinking of ghostly narrators. So just tell the” —maggot-brained beasts—“boys not to open that door. If they’re anything like Daemonar, they’ll open the door as soon as they can just to find out why they’re not supposed to.”

“But these aren’t little children Daemonar’s age,” Jaenelle protested. “These children will be old enough to have gone through the Birthright Ceremony—or would be if they were Blood. A child that age is not going to open a door after he’s been told not to.”

“Then have an illusion of a boy the right age. Have him be the one who opens the door. In fact, don’t even have a knob on the door until the ghost boy appears. Then a ghostly knob will appear that only he can turn.”

“He’d been told not to open the door, but he did—and the knob came off in his hand, breaking the locking spell on the door,” Jaenelle said. “The ghost boy will back away, and visitors will hear a malevolent laugh as the door slowly opens.”

“And that’s when they’ll see the skeleton of the boy who had been told not to open that door and had disobeyed.”

And, apparently, would still be disobedient even as a ghost.

“The skeleton,” Jaenelle said softly. “Yes. A boy’s skeleton. With just enough scalp left to hold a little hair, but otherwise ragged clothing over clean bones.”

“Isn’t that what we all have in the closet that holds the tablecloths and napkins?”

Silence filled the room. Then…

“Marian,” Jaenelle breathed, “that’s brilliant. We’ll have to figure out why he wasn’t supposed to open the door, but…It’s brilliant.”

That would teach her to try to be bitchy. Obviously she didn’t have the temper for it.

“Come on,” Jaenelle said, heading for the hallway. “Let’s see what sort of nonsense we can come up with for the upstairs rooms.”

Marian stared at the empty doorway and considered what would be upstairs. Bedrooms. Bathrooms. Closets. And above that, the attic.

As she reached the doorway, she heard the loud creak of the old stairs. Heard Jaenelle’s delighted laugh. She looked at the list Jaenelle had made based on how landen boys thought the Blood lived.

May the Darkness have mercy.

Daemon carefully leaned back against the large blackwood table that provided a work space for the scholars who were permitted to use the material in this part of the Keep’s library. A sore muscle in his back. Nothing more than that. All things considered, he’d gotten off lightly.

Damn cat.

“What brings you to the Keep today?”

Affection. Dry amusement. Love. He heard all those things in the deep voice. He turned his head to look at the man sorting the books stacked in the center of the table.

A handsome Hayllian whose thick black hair was heavily silvered at the temples. His face was beginning to show the weight of his long life, but it was the laugh lines fanning out from the golden eyes that cut the deepest in the brown skin. He was a Guardian, one of the living dead, and had walked the Realms for more than fifty thousand years.

He was Saetan Daemon SaDiablo, a Black-Jeweled Warlord Prince who was the Prince of the Darkness, the High Lord of Hell, the High Priest of the Hourglass. Formerly the Steward of the Dark Court at Ebon Askavi—and still the unofficial Steward of that same unofficial court—he was now the assistant librarian/historian at Ebon Askavi.

He had one other title, the one Daemon considered the most important: father.

They hadn’t known each other for that many years. The Birthright Ceremony, where a child acquired the Jewel that indicated the power born within that young vessel, was also the time when paternity was formally acknowledged or denied. At Daemon’s Birthright Ceremony, while he’d stood proudly holding his Red Jewel, paternity had been denied. Saetan had been stripped of all rights to his son, and they had been lost to each other—until the need to protect a powerful but fragile girl brought them back together.

Now he had a father, someone he could talk to, someone who, being the only other male who wore Black Jewels and was also a Black Widow, understood his nature better than anyone else could. Even Lucivar.

“Do I need a reason to visit you?” he asked.

“Certainly not,” Saetan replied, walking to the far end of the table and putting three books next to another stack.

Daemon shifted a little to get a better look at the stacks. Were those the books to be discarded or the ones Saetan and Geoffrey, the Keep’s historian/librarian, were trying to preserve?

Old books, from the looks of the covers. Most were so old the titles had faded and the bindings had become fragile despite the preservation spells that must have kept them intact for so long. Culling the volumes in the Keep’s vast library was an ongoing project, and every book had to be handled with care.

“I’m always delighted to see you, Daemon,” Saetan said, returning to the stacks in the center of the table. “But I recognize the difference between a casual visit and when one of you drops by because you have something on your mind.”

Caught. But he wasn’t ready to ask the question. So he lobbed a different conversational ball onto the table. “Have you heard about the spooky house?”

“The what?”

With perverse glee, Daemon told his father all about Jaenelle’s plans to create a house based on landen children’s ideas of how the Blood lived—and watched the High Lord of Hell pale.

“You’re joking,” Saetan said hoarsely.

Daemon shook his head. “Jaenelle and Marian are there right now, inspecting the property.”

“Can’t you stop this?”

“Would you like to suggest how?”

Absolute silence.

For a minute, Daemon watched his father sort books, certain the man wasn’t paying any attention to what was being placed where and would have to sort them all over again.

“Wasn’t there anything else you wanted to discuss?” Saetan asked, picking up a stack of books.

It was that tiny hint of desperation, the little undercurrent of a plea, that made it possible to ask the question. But he turned his head and stared at the wall instead of the man.

“When I was a pleasure slave in Terreille, I woke up each morning and wondered who I needed to kill that day, or what kind of vicious game I would have to play, or if I’d be the one who was killed. I lived on the knife’s edge every waking moment, and I honed my own temper on that edge. I earned being called the Sadist.”

“And now what’s the most frightening thing you face?”

“Morning sex.”

Saetan dropped the books.

Daemon cringed, hoping none of the volumes had been damaged.

Saetan fussed over the books, then stopped. Just stopped.

“I’m your father,” he said quietly. “And I am Jaenelle’s adopted father. So there are aspects of your marriage I would prefer to remain ignorant about unless necessity requires me to know about them. But I’ll ask you: Do you need a Healer?”

The question startled him. “No.”

“You’re favoring your back.”

“That’s not because of Jaenelle; that’s because of the damn cat. She yelled at him, and he got upset.”

Saetan sighed, a quiet sound full of relief. “Kaelas is a Red-Jeweled Warlord Prince who is eight hundred pounds of muscle and temper. It always amazes me that all it takes to turn him into an anxious puddle of fur is for Jaenelle to say ‘bad kitty’ and rap him on the head with her fingertips.”

“She did a bit more than that, actually. She yelled at the cat.”

“Why?”

“He woke her up.”

Another silence. “You were in bed with Witch?”

Sharp concern, Steward of the Court to Queen’s Consort. And the understanding that Jaenelle, allowed to wake up by herself, woke up grumpy. When startled awake, Witch was the side of her that woke first—and Witch woke up deadly.

“Then I’ll ask again, Prince,” the High Lord said. “Do you need a Healer?”

Daemon shook his head.

“Your back?”

He raised a hand, then let it fall to his side. “Just a bruise. I was sitting at the desk. He came in too fast. I didn’t expect Kaelas to completely lose his brains and try to climb into my lap while I was sitting in the chair!”

“You shielded?”

“Kept me from getting impaled,” Daemon replied dryly. Didn’t do him much good otherwise. Lying there on the study floor, a little stunned, getting smashed between broken chair and anxious cat, whose huge paw—with claws thankfully sheathed—patted at his head while Kaelas’s thoughts batted at him. The Lady was upset. Daemon was the Lady’s mate. Daemon would make things better.

At the time, Daemon had been a bit busy trying to breathe.

Saetan rubbed his chin. “That was a nice chair. Wasn’t meant to take that kind of weight, though.”

Neither am I, Daemon thought.

“The name of the craftsman who made it is in the household files.”

“I’ll contact him to make a replacement.”

Another silence. Then Saetan said, “What else?”

“I like my life now. I truly do. I like waking up in the morning knowing the day will be full of small challenges and pleasures, that I’ll spend part of the day tending to the family properties and finances, as well as my own business ventures, and part of the day tending to Dhemlan. And through it all, there is being with Jaenelle. There is the wonder, and the joy, of being with Jaenelle.”

“But?”

“But sometimes I wonder if I’ll lose the edge that makes me who and what I am. Sometimes I wonder, when the day comes for me to stand as defender, if I’ll have become too soft, too tame, to protect what matters most. Is that the price I’ll have to pay to have a pleasant life?”

There. He’d said it. Asked the question.

And Saetan just stood there, staring at the books, his fingertips gently brushing the topmost cover.

“You’ll never lose that edge,” Saetan said suddenly, quietly.

“Daemon, this life you have now is everything I could have wished for you, and I hope you have decades where the worst challenges you face are morning sex with your wife and dealing with an anxious cat. But I can tell you, here and now, you will never lose that edge. No matter how long who and what you are remains sheathed in that pleasant life, when the day comes for you to draw that cold blade of your temper, it will be as sharp and as honed and as deadly as it is now. Maybe even more so.”

A tension he hadn’t been aware of drained out of his muscles. This was the question he’d come to ask. This was the answer he’d hoped to hear.

“Now,” Saetan said, giving him a dry smile, “why don’t you go tend the family business and let me—”

The door opened. Lucivar walked in. Daemon felt his body freeze, felt Saetan stiffen beside him. Not because of Lucivar, because of—

“Unka Daemon! Granpapa!”

Daemonar held out his arms, little feet braced and pushing on his father’s hip, little wings flapping. A happy bundle of Eyrien boy…in a room full of priceless books.

The thought terrified Daemon.

“Hey,” Lucivar said, trying to control the squirming boy without setting off a full-scale tantrum. “Have you two heard about this spooky house Jaenelle and Marian are planning?”

Suddenly Saetan had Daemon by the arm and was hauling him toward the door with enough speed to have Lucivar backing up into the corridor.

“Yes, Daemon was just telling me about that. I think this is something the two of you should discuss, since this is something that should be dealt with by husbands rather than a father. But if I think of anything that might help, I’ll be sure to let you know.”

And somehow he was standing in the corridor, staring at a closed door, listening to the distinctive snick of a lock.

“Well,” Lucivar said, “I guess that puts us in our place.”

Lucivar’s mouth was curved in that lazy, arrogant smile that usually meant trouble, but the tone of voice was wrong.

Daemon studied his brother. Half brother, but they had never made that distinction. What made the difference obvious was that Lucivar had the dark, membranous wings that distinguished Eyriens from Hayllians and Dhemlans, the other two long-lived races. And he had all the arrogance and attitude that came naturally to an Eyrien male—especially one who was a Warlord Prince and wore Ebon-gray Jewels.

“Do you want to—?” Daemon began.

“No.” Too sharp, almost cutting, even though the smile didn’t change. “Have things to do.”

Daemon felt a sudden distance between them. Why it was there, he couldn’t begin to guess. “Could we get together for a drink this evening? I could come—”

“I’ll come to the Hall. See you then, Bastard.”

“Take care, Prick.”

“Bye-bye, Unka Daemon! Bye-bye.”

He waved bye-bye until Lucivar and Daemonar disappeared around a curve in the corridor. Then he looked back at the locked door and sighed.

He might not need to dance on the knife’s edge the way he did when he lived in Terreille, but it didn’t look like his life was going to get complacent after all.

Saetan leaned against the locked door and stared at the ceiling.

Why did I want children?

He’d been rattled by the conversation with Daemon, had reacted instead of thinking. And the look in Lucivar’s eyes just before he’d closed the door had shown him the depth of his error. He’d fix it. He would stop by the eyrie this evening, and he would fix it.

He wasn’t sure how to fix the other problem. Spooky house. The words had become a sharp bone stuck in his throat, an insult to everything he believed in. An insult inflicted by his Queen.

He had two choices. He could swallow the bone or he could cough it out. Either way, it was going to hurt. He just had to decide which choice he could live with.

Pushing away from the door, he returned to the blackwood table just as Geoffrey stepped through one of the archways that led to the stored books. The other Guardian looked sympathetic and amused as he watched Saetan shuffle a few books.

Geoffrey approached the table, picked up a book, then opened it to read the title page. “How long do you think you’ll be able to keep this up?” he asked. “Sooner or later one of them is going to figure out these are new books with an illusion spell on the covers to make them look old, and you’re just using them for a prop.”

“None of them have figured it out so far,” Saetan replied, tugging the book out of Geoffrey’s hand. “If I’m occupied, they can take their time working their way around to whatever they’ve come to talk about. None of them look closely enough to notice that the condition of the paper doesn’t match the supposed age of the books.”

“And you used some of the real books to create the templates for the spell. Quite ingenious, Saetan. But from what I overheard before I retreated, you do have a problem.”

“I do.” The bone in his throat scraped a little more. “Yes, I do.”

Lucivar landed in the small courtyard outside his eyrie, shifted his grip on his bundle of boy, then turned to look at the mountain called Ebon Askavi.

He wasn’t like them. Could never be like them. His father. His brother. Two of a kind. The difference wasn’t so sharp when it was one of them or the other. But when they were together…

Educated men, with a passion for books and words and learning. He was the outsider, the one who didn’t fit.

It hurt. No matter how often he tried to shrug it aside, it still hurt. And now the hurt went deeper. Because of the boy.

He rubbed his cheek against Daemonar’s head, felt the sweet ache as little arms reached up to hug.

He knew why he’d been locked out of the library. Knew why he’d been excluded. But if he had to choose between them, he would choose the boy he held in his arms.

Giving his son a kiss, he said, “Come on, boyo. You get to play with your papa today.”

FOUR

The clatters, bangs, and curses coming from the eyrie’s kitchen were not sounds Lucivar usually associated with his darling wife. He hesitated a moment, then set Daemonar down near the side door that opened onto the part of the yard that could withstand the rough-and-tumble play of an Eyrien boy and a litter of wolf pups—and had a domed shield around the whole thing to keep boy and pups from tumbling down the mountain.

“Stay here,” he said.

Another hesitation as he stepped over the threshold. The command would keep the boy out for a minute or two, but not much longer. But if he shut Daemonar outside, he wouldn’t have even that much time to assess what was upsetting Marian before Daemonar voiced his unhappiness loud enough to be heard all the way to Riada. So he left the door open and strode across the large entry room to the archway that led to the kitchen.

“Marian?” he said softly.

His voice startled her enough that she kicked one of the metal buckets—and said words he’d never heard her say before.

“Your sister,” she panted as she gathered up rags and mops and brooms. “Those maggot-brained little beasts.”

He flinched a little over the word “maggot,” then shifted into a fighting stance. Just as a precaution. He wasn’t sure why looking at an old house would cause this reaction, but—Hell’s fire!—something had her riled up.

“My home is going to be clean.”

He wasn’t sure if that was a wail of despair or a declaration of war.

“Our home is clean,” he said calmly.

She turned on him so fast, he took two steps back before he was aware of moving.

“Don’t you patronize me, Lucivar Yaslana. Don’t you dare!”

He raised his hands chest high in a gesture of surrender and kept his mouth shut. There was no point trying to reason with her until she started sounding a little more like Marian and less like some hysterical, mop-wielding Harpy.

“My h-home does not have cobwebs in the corners or rats skittering in the walls or decaying bodies.”

Just as well he hadn’t told her about the partially eaten rabbit the wolf pups had left in one of the out-of-the-way rooms. He’d gotten rid of the carcass—and the maggots—hadn’t he? And he’d scrubbed everything down to get rid of the smell.

Maybe he hadn’t scrubbed everything down quite well enough?

“Mama!”

Lucivar shifted just enough to block entry into the kitchen. Daemonar, who was pelting toward the opening, smacked into his leg.

Before the boy could voice his displeasure, Marian wailed, “They think we live like that!” Then the wail changed to a snarl as she added, “I need to clean.”

Since he’d spent the past few years teaching her how to defend herself with objects she would normally have at hand, he was looking at a pissed-off woman whose hands were full of potential weapons.

“All right.” He nudged his son back with his foot. After Daemonar heard his mother snarl, instinct had kept the boy silent and cautious—and watching everything while hiding behind his father. “Why don’t I stop by The Tavern later and pick up something for dinner?” When she bared her teeth, he added, “It’s just a suggestion, Marian, not a criticism.”

The wild look in her eyes finally faded enough for him to see the wife he loved in the riled woman standing before him.

“That would be good,” she said.

Still watching Marian, Lucivar crouched and picked up Daemonar. “We’ll get out of your way for a while.”

He didn’t wait for an answer, just turned and headed back out to the yard. Once the door was closed and he was moving toward the far end of the lawn, he began to relax.

That’s when he fully realized what he’d done, and he jerked to a stop.

He was an Eyrien Warlord Prince. He wore Ebon-gray Jewels. He was the third most powerful male in the Realm of Kaeleer. And he’d just run from a hearth witch who wore Purple Dusk Jewels.

Of course, the usual rules of battle didn’t apply to a wife, which put him at a distinct disadvantage when it came to dealing with her.

A little hand pressed against his face, so he turned his head and looked at his son.

“Mama was scary,” Daemonar said.

“Ooooh yeah.” He gave Daemonar a smacking kiss that made the boy laugh. “Come on, boyo. We’ll just play outside for a while longer.”

And, he hoped, wife and son would both be tired out in a few hours, so he could tuck them in before heading to the Hall for his chat with Daemon.

“The house has a lot of potential,” Jaenelle said as she faced the mirror over her dressing table and fastened a sapphire and ruby earring to her left ear. Her eyes met Daemon’s as she smiled. “But I think the condition of the house had Marian a little upset.”

Damn. He’d hoped the lovely hearth witch would be able to calm her husband a little before Lucivar got here. If Marian was upset, Lucivar would arrive at the Hall as a walking explosion.

“So you’re going to do this.” He’d thought about it all afternoon. There wasn’t anything dangerous about this spooky house; it was just a silly amusement. The Darkness knew the Queens in Terreille had done some vicious things in the name of amusement, and this wouldn’t hurt anyone. But something about it bothered him. He just couldn’t figure out why.

“Yes, Daemon, we’re going to do this.”

She fastened the other earring to her right ear, and his attention was caught by something much more interesting than an old house.

He’d loved her long golden hair, had loved the feel of it in his hands or when it brushed over his skin. But the short hair, properly cut and styled thanks to Surreal’s badgering, nicely framed her face and revealed her neck. And that was the fascination.

There was something about the spot where her neck and right shoulder met. Not the left side, just the right. An enticing scent. A special taste. It wasn’t something she put on her skin, and there wasn’t a scent gland under the skin. But for Warlord Princes, that particular spot was like catnip. They wanted to breathe in the scent of it, lick it, close their mouths over it, and—

Down, boy. Don’t start what you can’t finish until much, much later.

He hadn’t thought about how often he came up behind her and kissed that spot, lingering for a moment to get the taste of her, until he realized Lucivar did the same thing, except the kiss was quick and friendly. Until he noticed all the Warlord Princes in the First Circle did the same thing, even Kaelas and Jaal, so the fascination wasn’t just to human males.

And it wasn’t exclusive to Jaenelle. He hadn’t noticed this behavior in Terreille, but every Queen in Kaeleer had that special little spot—a spot that appealed only to the Warlord Princes who served her.

Which had him circling back around to Jaenelle’s hair. Long, it had hidden the enticement unless she put her hair up or braided it. Now the short golden hair led the eye down her neck right to that spot and—

“Are you all right?” Jaenelle asked. “Your eyes are glazing.”

It took a little too much effort to leash his libido, but he managed to do it. Or to be more precise, Jaenelle’s slightly puzzled, slightly amused look managed to do it. Besides, this wasn’t an evening to let his mind wander.

“I’m fine.” He hesitated, then decided he’d better warn her.

“Lucivar will be coming over after dinner.”

She picked up a bottle of perfume he’d given her recently and applied a drop to her pulse points. “Is he upset about something?”

“Yes.” No point in denying it.

She set the bottle on the dressing table and turned to face him. It had been easier talking to her reflection than being pinned by those sapphire eyes.

“Do you know what it is?” Witch asked.

He shook his head. “But it’s…between brothers.”

She turned back to the mirror and put on the multigemmed bracelet he’d given her before they were married, during the weeks when he’d been afraid she was going to turn away from him forever. “Then I’ll stay in the suite this evening. It sounds like this discussion would be easier if there are no distractions.”

“I think so.” He wouldn’t have asked her to stay away, but he was relieved that she understood her presence would hinder any attempt at getting to the root of the problem.

She walked over to him and gave him a soft kiss. “You’ll work it out. The two of you always do.”

Giving in to one need, he wrapped his arms around her and nuzzled that special spot on her neck.

The psychic scent rolled through the lower rooms of the Hall, announcing Lucivar’s temper before he crossed the study’s threshold. Arrogance. Anger. And hurt.

Daemon leaned back against the blackwood desk and waited for his brother to smash through the door.

On second thought, enough things had already gotten smashed that day. He used Craft to open the study door just ahead of the Eyrien’s entrance.

Lucivar’s temper was leading, and most people would have scrambled to get out of the way of the storm that was about to shatter everything in its path. That anger didn’t bother him. They had clashed before and would, no doubt, clash again. And the arrogance was simply Lucivar being Lucivar. But the hurt…That was the wound they were going to have to lance.

“Bastard,” Lucivar said as he began prowling the room.

“Prick.” He watched Lucivar take in the room, assessing it as a battleground.

Unless he was completely relaxed and in a familiar place, Lucivar made that same assessment. He didn’t see the furniture for its craftsmanship or the decorations for their aesthetic value. He didn’t look at the space of a room in terms of its comfort or pleasing dimensions. He saw weapons, traps, and defense. The fact that he was making that assessment of the study did not bode well for this discussion.

“What’s wrong with your back?” Lucivar asked as he prowled past the desk, his gold eyes taking in the details of a potential enemy with one slashing look.

Should have realized he’d notice, Daemon thought as he braced his hands on the desk. “Jaenelle yelled at the cat.” Even though Jaal was around as much as Kaelas was, everyone understood “the cat” referred only to the big white feline and not the tiger.

“If you don’t have brains enough to shield, you deserve to get hurt.”

He felt his temper flex, lightly testing the leash of self-control.

“I know why we were closed out of the library today.”

Daemon blinked. Worked to shift his mental balance.

“Daemonar’s just a little boy,” Lucivar growled. “He doesn’t understand about the thrice-damned precious books.”

There was the hurt, suddenly bubbling up to the surface. And there was something more under the hurt. Something that worried him.

“That’s right,” Daemon said carefully. “He’s just a little boy. That library isn’t an appropriate place for him.”

“Isn’t appropriate for an uneducated Eyrien, isn’t that what you mean?”

Someone had managed to hit Lucivar in one of the few places where the man was emotionally fragile.

Daemon’s temper unsheathed its claws. He pushed away from the desk. “Who took a jab at you?”

“What?” Lucivar stopped prowling. His wings opened slightly for balance. And wariness was now added to the messy stew of emotions that filled the room.

“Who?” Because whoever had hurt his brother would find herself in a deep grave—and the bitch wouldn’t necessarily be dead when he put her there.

“I’m not like you! I can’t be like you. Either of you.”

A mental skid on emotional ice. Trying to restrain a temper that wanted to snap the leash. So this was about him after all.

The truth of it was like a knife slicing his heart.

“No, you’re not like me, any more than I can be like you.” He went back to the blackwood desk and leaned against it, clamping his hands on the edge of the wood. “What is this about, Lucivar? You were pissed at me when we were at the Keep; you’re still pissed now. Why?”

Vulnerable. Fragile. He couldn’t stand seeing Lucivar like this.

“I don’t have the schooling you do,” Lucivar said, looking at the wall, not meeting his eyes.

Do I hug him or kill him? “Eyriens don’t value that kind of schooling. I absorb information from books for the pleasure of it, but it’s also another kind of weapon.” He paused to assess the battleground and the man, and then added, “Besides, you don’t like to read.”

“I can read.” Quick, automatic defense.

“I know you can,” Daemon said dryly. “From the first time I met you—or the first time I thought I’d met you—I pushed and bullied and bruised your ego until I goaded you into learning. In the same way that you pushed and bullied and bruised my ego until I learned a few basic moves with hand weapons.”

During the centuries they had been enslaved and had clashed over and over again, they hadn’t understood why they felt compelled to push at each other to share the knowledge and skills they had acquired. Even after they had learned they were brothers, they hadn’t realized that this need to protect each other’s weaker side had begun in a childhood they didn’t remember.

Lucivar’s shoulders relaxed a little, and the smile was fleeting but genuine.

“You can read,” Daemon said, “but you don’t enjoy reading. It was always difficult for you. Maybe that’s not just you, Lucivar. The Eyrien race has a strong oral tradition to pass on stories, but they don’t put much value on the written word.”

“Marian reads a lot,” Lucivar mumbled. “She likes books.”

“Then maybe it’s cultural. Reading is a female entertainment, something the males can sneer at indulgently.”

“I don’t sneer,” Lucivar said. Then added under his breath, “Wouldn’t dare.”

They were circling around the heart of the wound now, so Daemon just leaned back and waited. And felt memories stir awake.

“Maybe it is a part of being an Eyrien male,” Lucivar said.

“Like being stronger and having more muscle than females.”

“Maybe.”

Lucivar took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Daemon almost sighed with relief. They’d gotten past the worst of this without too many bruises.

Then Lucivar looked him in the eyes and the words burst out. “I want that for Daemonar. The education. That kind of knowledge. I don’t want him to feel hobbled. I don’t want him to feel like he’s…less.”

Daemon snapped upright. Then sucked in a breath as his back protested. But his voice held a chill and an edge not quite honed enough to cut. “If that’s your way of saying you feel inferior to me in any way other than that I wear darker Jewels, I will beat you to a bloody pulp.”

Lucivar smiled that lazy, arrogant smile. “You could try.”

They were on even ground again. Just that simple.

Since they were on even ground again, he allowed himself a huff of exasperation. “I’m not blind, Prick. So you don’t read for pleasure. The mountains won’t fall down because of it.”

“Daemonar was shut out of the library.”

Daemon threw up his hands. “He’s a little boy. The only value those books have for him right now is they’re things he can throw or tear or chew. Lucivar! His grandfather is the High Lord of Hell and the assistant historian/librarian at the Keep. When that boy reaches an age when he can understand what is held between the covers of those books, do you really think you can stop his grandfather from taking him into that library and showing him all it can offer? For that matter, do you think you can stop me from buying him books and reading him stories and showing him the other side of his education?”

Lucivar tipped his head in a considering manner. “Other side?”

“You stand on a mountain and taste the wind. That’s what you’ve called it when you’ve tried to explain it. You taste the wind. And you understand more about what is around you in that moment than I can ever hope to know. I can teach Daemonar about books, but you’re the only one who can teach him that.”

Lucivar mulled that over and finally nodded. Then he took a step back and turned toward the door. “Why don’t we get that drink?”

“That bitch is centuries gone. If you let her keep jabbing at you, you deserve to be hurt.”

Damn. He hadn’t meant to say that. Hadn’t intended to share that memory. But he watched Lucivar turn. Saw the look in his brother’s eyes that demanded an explanation.

“You were never good at reading,” Daemon said. No. That wasn’t the place to start. “I don’t have many memories of my childhood before living with Dorothea. Didn’t have any for most of my life. But sometimes now…It’s more the feel of something remembered that opens up the rest.”

Lucivar said nothing. Just nodded.

“I remember the feel of Father’s arms around me. I remember the sound of his voice, the rhythm of it when he read a story.” Daemon paused to sort out a jumble of images. “You weren’t good at reading, but you soaked up a story if someone read it to you or told it to you. You remembered all kinds of things, saw all kinds of things in the story.”

“And probably related everything in terms of a fight.”

“Of course. You’re Eyrien.” Daemon shrugged. “There was a teacher. I don’t remember her name and can’t recall a face. I think she was tutoring me, but you were there a lot of the time too. She used to jab at you. Not physically, but she made it clear that you were a waste of her time.

“One day she gave us a story to read. Challenging for me; impossible for you. She did it so you would feel bad. And you were so miserable because you couldn’t read it.

“You must have gone home until the next lesson, because I don’t remember you being there when Father came to the cottage that evening. Instead of reading the next chapter of the storytime book, I asked him to read the story to me. At first he refused because it was my lesson, and I should read it myself. I pleaded with him, so he gave in and read it to me. But the third time I asked him to read it, he wanted to know why.”

“Why did you ask him to read it more than once?” Lucivar asked. “You would have gotten the story the first time.”

Daemon looked at the floor. “I wanted his cadence, his rhythm, his phrasing of the words.” He looked up. “I wanted to read the story to you before the lesson, and I wanted the way he read the story.”

Now Lucivar looked away.

“Father would let us get away with little fibs, but he wouldn’t let us lie to him,” Daemon said. “And he always knew. So I had to tell him why I needed to know the story so well. And I told him about the teacher being mean to you because you were Eyrien and you didn’t read as well as I did. He didn’t say anything.”

Lucivar swore softly. “He’s at his scariest when he doesn’t say anything.”

Daemon nodded. “He read the story over and over, then had me read it, working with me until I was satisfied.”

“I think I remember this part.” Lucivar sounded a little uncomfortable. He stared at nothing. “You grabbed me before the lesson and read me the story. She was pissed because I could answer her questions about what the story was about.”

“He let her come back that last time because we were prepared to meet her on that battleground. But the next lesson, we had a different teacher.”

They stared at each other. Prince of the Darkness. High Lord of Hell. They knew enough about the man now that neither wanted to speculate, even between themselves, what had happened to the witch who had been foolish enough to hurt one of Saetan’s children.

“How about that drink, Bastard? Then you can tell me all about this spooky house.”

Daemon pushed away from the desk to join Lucivar at the door. “Didn’t Marian say anything?”

“Marian was too riled about cobwebs to have any kind of discussion. Hell’s fire. The next time she gets that worked up about something, I’m dragging you over to the eyrie to deal with her.”

“Drag Falonar,” Daemon replied. “He still deserves to sweat a bit for bruising Surreal’s heart.”

“Nah. Marian would probably rein it in and be polite, since he isn’t family.” Lucivar gave Daemon a wicked smile. “I’ll just make the son of a whoring bitch look after Daemonar for an afternoon.”

A brush of bodies, shoulder to shoulder.

“You have a mean streak, brother,” Daemon said as he opened the door. “I like it.”

Lucivar slipped into bed and cuddled up against Marian, more relaxed than he’d been all day. He wasn’t drunk. Far from it. But he was hoping she wasn’t in the mood for more than a cuddle.

Marian stirred. Let out a sleepy sigh. “You’re home.”

He brushed his lips over her cheek. “Yeah. It’s late, sweetheart. Go to sleep.”

She shifted a little, snuggling closer. “Your father came by not long after you left.”

So much for contentment. “Why?”

“I think he wanted to talk to you, but he wasn’t surprised that you’d gone to the Hall to see Daemon.”

Should he have expected Saetan to show up? Maybe. But there were things he could say to a brother he’d known for centuries that he couldn’t say to a father he’d known only for the past nine years.

“He spent the evening reading stories to Daemonar. He’s got a wonderful voice for it. I think they read almost every storybook we own. Daemonar fell asleep halfway through the last one.”

Lucivar smiled. “Gave you a bit of a rest, then.”

A change in her breathing, in her body going from sleep relaxed to aware.

“Before he left, he said something interesting.”

“He says interesting things all the time.”

No amusement. Her body was telling him he didn’t have to be concerned about her temper, but he wished there were a little more light in the room so he could see her face.

“He said children aren’t the only ones who like to hear a story.”

He tensed. Couldn’t stop his body’s response to the words. His father might say interesting things, but sometimes the man talked too damn much.

“No one valued reading in my family,” Marian said. “Even when I asked for a book as a gift, it was viewed as wasted coin. So I was relieved that you were indulgent about my buying books and spending time in the evenings reading.”

“I’m not indulgent,” he growled. Envious sometimes because she got so much pleasure from blots of ink on a page while he struggled to read what he had to, but not indulgent. “Your coins, your time. You can do what you please with both.”

“I didn’t realize you would enjoy sharing those stories.”

Embarrassment. A coating of shame. And a healthy sense of survival because he knew if Daemon and Saetan were aware of those feelings—or more aware than they already were—they would both pound on him.

“He suggested having a family story night once a week. Just us—you, me, Jaenelle, Daemon, and him. Surreal, too, if she’s interested.”

He shifted. All right. He squirmed. “You don’t have to do this. You would have read the book. All of you would have read it.”

“Not if we picked a new story. And maybe in the winter, when it’s too cold to do much, maybe I could share some stories with you that I enjoyed. But not the romances. I couldn’t read the…”

“The…?”

“I couldn’t read those parts out loud.”

“Maybe I could read those parts for myself.” At least he’d have incentive.

“Don’t get ideas. It’s late.”

“Yes, Lady,” he replied, chuckling.

He tucked them in and curled himself protectively around her.

“Lucivar?”

“Hmm?”

“I’d like to do that story night. It would be fun.”

“I’ll talk to Daemon about it.” Who would pounce on the idea, so the decision was already made.

As he drifted off to sleep, he thought about his father coming here to talk with him, to read to Daemonar.

No, he hadn’t been reunited with Saetan for that many years, but the man did understand his children.

FIVE

Sometimes the only way to deal with a Warlord Prince was not to let him in the door.

Surreal was so pleased with that solution, she repeated it to herself two more times while waiting for Helton, the town house butler, to open the front door.

“Now,” she said, in a tone that held both warning and forgiveness. The warning was for the attempt to delay her departure until Rainier arrived. The forgiveness was because Helton wasn’t half as scary as Beale, the butler at SaDiablo Hall, and she didn’t want the man to resign because he felt unable to deal with her. He’d been fine serving the rest of the SaDiablo family, including the ones who had been demon-dead, but he seemed to find her more of a challenge.

She wasn’t sure if that was flattering or frightening.

Helton hesitated a moment longer, then opened the door. Slowly.

Running out of patience, she slipped through the meager opening and stepped outside just as Rainier bounded up the town house’s steps. When he saw her blocking his entry, he teetered on the edge of a step—as much as Rainier ever teetered—then settled one step below and gave her a look that blended a hopeful-puppy expression with the Warlord Prince I-am-a-law-unto-myself attitude. The attitude came naturally to that caste of male. She suspected Rainier, along with the rest of the boyos, had learned the hopeful-puppy expression by studying his kindred brothers. It was damn hard to slap at any male when he had that look on his face. Even if he wasn’t furry.

“We’re going out,” Surreal said pleasantly.

“No, we are not,” Rainier replied just as pleasantly.

She saw that little extra something in his eyes now, that subtle difference in the way he held himself.

Jaenelle had told her once, When a male sets his heels down with the intention of standing between you and whatever he’s decided isn’t good for you, he will remain pleasant and he’ll sound agreeable—but he won’t budge.

Letting out a huge sigh, Surreal stepped to the side, giving Rainier clear access to the door. He smiled at her as he came up the last steps and reached for the door. She smiled at him—and raced down the steps.

She got to the house next door before he caught up to her.

“Surreal.”

She clenched her hands and clenched her teeth. He had a shield fanning out on either side of him, effectively blocking the whole sidewalk. As long as he stayed put, she could dodge around the shield by going into the street. Since he wasn’t likely to stay put, the only way to get past him would be to knock him down—which had a lot of appeal at the moment. Unless Rainier reported the incident to any male in her family.

Forcing herself to relax, she said, “I’m going out.” She didn’t give him the chance to snarl about it. “It’s the fourth day, Prince. I can wear my Birthright Green without discomfort. I could wear the Gray if I needed to.”

“You still—” He bit off the words. Hopefully that was all he bit off.

When they were in public, Blood males rarely admitted to having the ability to pick up something in a witch’s psychic scent or physical scent that indicated her moontime. They considered it discourteous to remind a woman that she was vulnerable because she couldn’t use her own power to defend herself. The Blood didn’t talk about it very much, but that ability was silently acknowledged by everyone because Warlord Princes stood a heartbeat away from the killing edge during the vulnerable days of any witch to whom they had given their loyalty, and they were more inclined to kill first and ask questions later.

Still, there were limits to indulging the male temper.

“I had considered making a sign that said ‘I have a sharp knife and a large Warlord Prince’ and floating it over my head, but I don’t want to tell anyone about the knife until after I use it, and anyone dumb enough not to notice you deserves to get knocked into a wall.”

A twitch of his lips. A shift toward humor instead of temper.

“Where are we going?” Rainier asked.

Ah. Got him. “Bookshop. It’s fun reading that Jarvis Jenkell book together, but I wanted something to read at other times.”

“Well, that’s convenient. I was asked to pick up some books.”

Surreal hooked her long black hair behind one ear and narrowed her gold-green eyes. “You were going to suggest walking to the bookshop, weren’t you?”

“Was I?”

Bastard. Prick. Arrogant, insufferable Warlord Prince.

When she moved forward, he dropped the shield and pivoted in a graceful dancer’s move to fall into step beside her. She took a couple of steps, then grabbed his arm to stop him as she swung around to put herself on his left, which was the subordinate position.

“Surreal.”

She was just a witch and he was a Warlord Prince, but her Jewels outranked his, so he wasn’t comfortable standing in the dominant position.

Good. He deserved to squirm a little.

“It rained last night,” she said. “Puddles. Carriages. Splashing. Whether you create a shield or decide to take your chances, you being on the street side means I won’t get splashed.”

A male caught between Protocol and the desire to protect. He didn’t like it, but he didn’t argue about it and he didn’t try to switch positions.

They walked in silence for a couple of blocks. Then Rainier said, “Have you heard from your cousins lately?”

“No.” Thank the Darkness.

“Then you haven’t heard about the spooky house?”

“Spooky house? What’s a spooky house?”

Rainier just smiled.

It took several blocks and a few rash promises she shouldn’t have made before Rainier told her about Jaenelle’s little project.

“You’re not serious,” Surreal said as Rainier opened the bookshop’s door for her. “You made this up.”

He shook his head.

She stepped into the shop, then waited for her eyes to adjust to the dimmer light. “Does Daemon know about this?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Lucivar? Uncle Saetan?”

“I would think so.”

“Hell’s fire, Mother Night, and may the Darkness be merciful.”

“That seems to be the general reaction.”

Surreal sniffed. She hadn’t wanted Daemon or Lucivar showing up to fuss over her, but one of them could have stopped by to tell her about the spooky house. After all, she was family.

And that little thought made her scowl at Rainier. “When did you hear about this?”

“I was at the Hall early this morning.”

Why?

Her expression must have conveyed the question, because he gave her a puzzled look. “I stop in a couple of times a week. I do work for Prince Sadi, remember?”

She remembered. Even though she’d met Rainier before he’d signed a contract with Daemon, she had to consider what kind of task a male cousin might give an unattached Warlord Prince.

“Am I a friend or an assignment, Prince Rainier?”

She saw the insult in his eyes, saw the way his jaw tensed with the effort to keep his anger leashed.

“You’re a friend,” he snapped. “At least, I thought we were friends. Picking up the books is an assignment.”

“I’m sorry.” And she was. “I just…” Oh, that particular wound was still more raw than she wanted to admit.

Rainier’s look was too sharp, too understanding. “You just wanted to spend time with someone who liked you for who you are and didn’t see you as a way to advance his standing in a court?”

A light touch of his hand on her elbow, shifting them both away from the door as a dapper-looking man entered the shop.

“I’ve had sex with a lot of men, but Falonar was my first lover. It felt different, being with a man when it wasn’t business of one kind or another. Maybe if we’d had a romp during the days after we arrived at the Hall and then had gone our separate ways—Falonar to Ebon Rih and me somewhere else—it might have been an easy good-bye. You know. ‘Thanks for the hot ride in bed’ sort of thing. But I ended up going to Ebon Rih too, and somewhere along the way, enjoying a hot ride turned into something else. At least, I thought it had. But toward the end, instead of having a lover, I felt like I was being serviced by someone who wasn’t enthusiastic about the work.” That wasn’t the only bone still stuck in her throat where Prince Falonar was concerned, but that was all she was willing to share at the moment.

Rainier smiled wryly. “Your introduction to the courts in Kaeleer was the Dark Court. The men who served in Jaenelle’s First Circle were the exceptions, Surreal, not the rule. The Consort of a Territory Queen is one of the three most influential men in that Territory. A man usually isn’t offered that ring until he has credentials.”

“So he sleeps his way into a position of power?”

“He doesn’t do much sleeping in his Lady’s bed, but, essentially, yes. Usually there is attraction, basic lust on both sides. Most often there is affection. Sometimes even love. And sometimes there is lust on the Lady’s side and ambition on his—and nothing more.”

She moved toward the shelves of books, wanting to be farther away from the counter and the other customers. “It was like that in Terreille, but I hadn’t thought it was that way in Kaeleer.” And Falonar had come from Askavi in the Realm of Terreille. Maybe he’d seen servicing her as a way of solidifying his position as Lucivar’s second-in-command.

What bothered her more? That Falonar’s interest in her could have been a combination of lust and a desire to have a connection with the witches who ruled Kaeleer, or that his interest in his current lover had nothing to do with ambition and everything to do with heart?

Let it go. He wasn’t the right man for you anyway.

“What I’m trying to say is, I will stand as an official escort for you whenever you need one—or whenever it is required that you have one,” Rainier said. “But I’m not here for the sake of ambition. I’m here because I like you. All right?”

She nodded, then puffed out a breath. “I guess I’m just being moody. Or bitchy.”

A warm smile now. “I hadn’t noticed.”

He was teasing her, poking fun of her usual sharp tongue. Something a friend would do. Something a man wouldn’t do unless he was sure the teasing would be taken as intended.

Cheered by the thought, she moved toward the back shelves. The dapper-looking man who had come in while she and Rainier were talking saw her coming toward him, flushed as if he’d been caught doing something dirty, and ducked out of sight.

Her cheerful mood vanished as she stared at the spot where the man had been. Something about him. Something not quite right. Like he’d dressed very carefully for an afternoon out, but it was a laboriously constructed costume, and he had missed some small detail that skewed everything else just enough to scratch her temper. Added to that was the suspicion that he’d been trying to eavesdrop on a conversation and hadn’t been happy when she’d caught him at it.

She considered sending Rainier down another aisle and boxing the man between the two of them, but she had seen no Jewel, didn’t get any sense of threat or power. In fact, she got so little sense of him, she wasn’t even sure he was Blood. Was she going to scare the shit out of a man and spoil his pleasant afternoon of browsing in the bookshop just because she didn’t like something about the way he dressed?

Since she couldn’t say with certainty that her reaction wasn’t the result of an edginess caused by talking about Falonar, she turned to Rainier and said, “Help me find the first Jarvis Jenkell story about the Blood. And while we’re doing that, you can tell me again about this spooky house.”

Late that evening, Daemon sprawled across the big bed, naked, sated, and blissfully content, his head pillowed in Jaenelle’s lap. They had bathed after a hungry session of lovemaking, but he still caught a light whiff of their mingled scents beneath the clean smell of soap.

So tempting to turn his head and press a kiss on that triangle between her thighs. But a kiss through her nightgown would make him want to push up the fabric in order to taste skin, and that kind of kiss would lead to other kinds of kisses.

He’d already indulged himself with those other kinds of kisses.

Besides, she was reading a book and petting him, her fingers drifting through his hair, over his shoulders and back. He could float on that sensation, and he did, beginning to settle into sleep when… tap. tap tap. tap. tap tap. Her finger against his shoulder.

He knew that rhythm. It seldom boded well.

“Are you asleep?” Jaenelle asked.

“Mmmm.” Noncommittal response. Could mean anything. tap. tap tap.

“Daemon?”

He opened his eyes halfway.

“When we have sex, does your penis weep with gratitude?”

A handful of answers flashed through his mind. If he said any of them, he would end up sleeping in the Consort’s room. Alone.

“In what context?” he asked.

She lowered the book. Since he’d acknowledged being awake, he raised his head and read the passage. Then he read it again.

“Sweetheart, if my penis ever does that, you will be the first to know. Not as my wife, but as a Healer.”

“That’s what I thought, but I wanted to be sure.”

Hearing the frown in her voice, he shifted, reluctantly, and propped himself up on one elbow. “What are you reading?”

She flashed him a guilty look. “A book by Jarvis Jenkell.”

At least you didn’t kick me this time. “That book doesn’t start with a body in a closet, does it?”

“Yes, it does.”

Hell’s fire. Well, Rainier would get to deal with Surreal when they reached that part of the story. And wouldn’t that be fun?

“Do you think there’s something wrong with his brain?”

He studied her expression. Not a flippant question.

“Do you think there’s something wrong with his sanity?”

Definitely not a flippant question when asked by a witch who was a Black Widow as well as a Healer.

“Are we talking about the writer or the character?” Daemon asked.

“I’m not sure,” she replied, looking troubled.

Uneasy now, he pulled the sheet up to his waist, a defensive gesture. “Why are you asking? Because Jenkell wrote a bad sex scene?” Appalling was a more accurate description.

“No, I’m asking because he seems to think this is normal behavior for the Blood.”

He hesitated a moment, then said softly, “It’s not that far off from what was done in some of the Terreillean courts.” Other places. Other beds. None where he served willingly. Those weren’t memories he wanted to stir up and bring to the surface. Not now. Not ever.

Jaenelle looked at him with those sapphire eyes. Looked through him. Saw him in ways no one else ever had—or could.

She vanished the book, then shifted so that she was propped up on an elbow, close enough to him that all she had to do was lean a little to kiss him.

Memories swam up to the surface. Ugly, hateful memories. As he looked at Jaenelle, his heart pounded, but it wasn’t from excitement or lust.

Submit. Serve. Play the whore.

He couldn’t do it. Not even as a game. Not with Jaenelle.

“Daemon?” Her lips touched his in a soft kiss.

He couldn’t do this, had to stop this before she became aroused. If he tried to oblige her while the memories churned inside him, it would damage the feelings between them.

“Do you want to sneak down to the kitchen and snitch whatever Mrs. Beale is hiding in the cold box?”

He blinked once. Twice. Waited for his heart to settle back down to a normal beat.

Love and mischief. That’s what he saw in her eyes. She, too, had emotional scars that had come from violence in the bed. She would recognize when something came too close to one of his scars.

As she looked at him, waiting for an answer, different memories washed through his mind. Memories of Jaenelle when she was twelve and he had been her grandmother’s pleasure slave. She had talked him into silly, mischievous adventures during those months, dragging him into the game like a well-loved toy that had half the stuffing hugged out of it. She’d given him a taste of innocent childhood.

She was making the same offer now.

“We do have our own kitchen and some food in the cold box.” Well, he had his own small kitchen where he could putter around when he felt like cooking. That recent renovation was a very large thorn in Mrs. Beale’s side, and he had the feeling that the negotiations required before she accepted that addition had just begun.

The fact that a Yellow-Jeweled witch, whom he paid very well to be the cook at the Hall, could make him uneasy about renovating his own home sparked a little, boyish flame of defiance in him.

“Do you think there’s anything worth snitching?” he asked.

“This afternoon, when I went to the kitchen doorway to ask for a plate of fruit and cheese, she seemed more territorial than usual.”

That was a terrifying thought.

He brushed a finger over Jaenelle’s shoulder. “We do own the Hall, and we do pay for all the food, so we are entitled to eat anything we want from either kitchen.”

“Uh-huh. If we’re caught, you should try that argument.”

A picture in his head: him with his hands full of pilfered food; Mrs. Beale and her meat cleaver, both wearing old-fashioned, frilly nightcaps, blocking the doorway and waiting for an explanation.

Mother Night.

Since they were partners in this late-night venture, he reached for Jaenelle’s mind and lightly brushed against her first inner barrier. When she opened the barrier, he showed her his imagined picture of Mrs. Beale.

“Oh. Ick.” Jaenelle scrunched up her face and made gagging noises. Then she stopped making noises and looked at him, her eyes owl wide. “Do you think she really wears one of those things? Does anyone wear those anymore?”

“I have no idea.”

“Beale sleeps with her,” Jaenelle whispered. “Do you think the meat cleaver has its own little bed?”

He shuddered. “If I were Beale, I wouldn’t share a bed with that meat cleaver.” Although Beale might think the same about him occasionally sharing a bed with an eight-hundred-pound cat.

“They have sex,” Jaenelle whispered.

“No. No no no. That is too scary to consider.” He swung out of bed. “Come on. Let’s do this before one of us remembers we’re supposed to be adults.”

She laughed, and that silvery, velvet-coated sound washed away the rest of the bad memories, leaving nothing but the anticipation of a mischievous adventure.

They were laughing at him.

He’d gone to the bookshop in Amdarh that afternoon to spend some time among his own kind, to give them a chance to recognize who he was—and to listen to their praise of his latest book.

The Blood hadn’t recognized him, hadn’t recognized the significance of his being in that store. As for praising his latest book…

Oh, they had liked him well enough when they had thought he was a clever landen who could spin a good tale, but when he had tried to show them who he really was, the truth about what he was, they had laughed at him.

Landry Langston wasn’t just a character in a story. Landry Langston was him. A half-Blood raised by a landen mother. A half-Blood who had matured into a man strong enough to be Blood.

He didn’t know their customs, didn’t know their Protocol, didn’t know what it meant to be Blood. How could he? He hadn’t grown up in one of their precious villages, hadn’t grown up surrounded by this dance, as they called the constant ebb and flow of dominance that depended on who was in the room. Instead of being trained all through his childhood and youth, as he should have been, he had to pay for information about his heritage. His “consultants” had been quick enough to take the gold marks he offered in exchange for “research,” but he now wondered about the accuracy of their information—and wondered if they’d given him just enough to make him look foolish.

As for his other “consultant”…Well, he couldn’t trust much of anything that came from that mind.

At the bookshop, they had laughed at his portrayal of the Blood, had laughed at him. But they had done much worse here at the hotel. Here, they pitied him.

Thank the Dark he hadn’t used his real name when he checked in. After that humiliation in the bookshop, he didn’t want anyone to know he was in this thrice-cursed city. He almost changed his mind about revealing who he was when the clerks at the desk did acknowledge him as Blood. Then he looked into their eyes and listened to their carefully phrased words…and realized they thought he was a broken male, someone who had been stripped of so much of his power, he was barely one of them anymore.

Didn’t stop them from taking the gold marks. No, his lack of power didn’t stop any of them from taking a hefty fee for the pittance they were willing to share.

Like this room. If he’d gone to a landen establishment in a nearby city, he could have had a better room for half the price. But he’d wanted to stay at a hotel that catered to the Blood. For what? The room he’d been given wasn’t any different from rooms he’d had in landen cities—was, in fact, stripped of almost everything that required Craft. On purpose. Because they didn’t believe he was capable of being like them.

And he wasn’t capable. Not yet anyway.

They thought they were so special, so powerful, so superior.

Daemon Sadi, for example. He’d personally sent Prince Sadi a copy of his new book. The bastard hadn’t even had the courtesy to write a sentence acknowledging the gift. And certainly hadn’t sent the desired dinner invitation.

And then there was Lady Surreal. He’d heard of her. Who hadn’t heard of her? Nothing but a whore, but she could stand in a shop and publicly laugh at an educated man for no other reason than because she wore a Jewel.

There was more than one kind of power. The Blood made the rules and ruled the Realm, but they weren’t all-powerful, weren’t invincible. A clever man could defeat them and prove he was worthy of notice, of respect.

Pitting one kind of skill against another, a clever man could defeat them. Even the most powerful among them.

Of course, it might not be prudent to admit being the author of such a scheme, but he’d know, for himself, that he could stand among them.

And Lady Jaenelle Angelline herself had provided him with a way of covering his tracks. He’d been a little upset when he’d thought she had stolen his idea and spoiled the setting for his next novel, but now that only meant that people could confirm he’d begun the new Landry Langston story before the tragic events took place.

Yes, there was more than one kind of power, and he had the means of weaving a wonderful plot.

He would give the Blood a story the SaDiablo family would never forget.

At least, the ones who were still alive.

SIX

“No, witch-child. I will not say bwaa ha ha.”

“But it’s for—”

“No!” Saetan slammed the books down on the blackwood table in the Keep’s library. “If you choose to insult what we are, that is your decision. But I will not participate.”

Jaenelle stared at him, stunned. “It’s just a little fun.”

“Fun!” He choked on his anger, since it had no outlet that wouldn’t end in fierce destruction. “You’re turning what we are into a mockery, and you think this is fun?” He turned away from her, his daughter and his Queen, and pressed the heels of his hands against his temples as he struggled for control.

“Saetan…”

Bewilderment. Hurt. She’d come to the Keep to share something amusing and hadn’t been prepared for him to turn on her. How could she? He wasn’t sure if he was lashing out at her as her father or as her former, and still unofficial, Steward.

He turned to look at her, and he also wasn’t sure if it was Jaenelle or Witch who now watched him. No matter. He would have his say.

“We are the Blood, the caretakers of the Realms. We come from various races, but we are no longer a part of those races. We have our own culture that spans those racial cultures. We have our own laws, our own code of honor that landens don’t understand and couldn’t live by even if they tried. We rule the Territories, and we control the lives of all the landens in those Territories. But we are the minority, Jaenelle. Despite the sometimes brutal way we deal with each other, we seldom need to unleash that power and temper against landens because we are feared. Because we are a mystery mostly seen from a distance. And now you are turning us into a cheap entertainment.”

He choked. Such a long, long life. So many things that he’d done, both good and terrible.

“By letting some children dictate what we are like, you turn us into a safe, insignificant fear. Cobwebs and creaking doors and funny sounds. We become something to laugh at. So I ask you, Lady. What happens when those boys who find us amusing become men and feel they can ignore the laws established for the landens? What happens when they challenge the Warlords who come on behalf of the Queens who rule over their villages? What happens when they gather in force to attack the Blood and discover how vicious—and how complete—the slaughter can be when we fight?”

A long silence. Then Jaenelle said, “Why didn’t you mention this when you first heard about it? You haven’t said anything in the past few weeks while Marian and I have been putting this together.”

“It wasn’t my place to say anything. And, frankly, it hurt too much that it was you, of all people, who was doing this to us.”

Another long silence. “My apologies, High Lord,” Jaenelle said quietly. “I didn’t see this as you did, didn’t consider the consequences if people believed this was anything other than make-believe. We’ll close the house. Put an end to it.”

He shook his head. “You can’t. The idea has already taken root, and the news that Lady Angelline”—he saw her wince—“is creating a spooky house as an autumnal entertainment has spread to Blood and landen villages alike. I’m sure Daemon and Lucivar will help you control the crowds—”

“Crowds?” She looked alarmed.

“And Daemon will handle any complaints from the Queens who are dealing with the visitors flooding into the surrounding villages.”

“Complaints? Visitors?”

He crossed his arms over his chest. “What did you expect? Just a handful of children from the landen village where the house is located?”

“Well…yes.”

His heart ached with love and exasperation. “Then you really have no idea what you’ve done.” Sighing, he ran his fingers through his hair. “Very well, witch-child. I’ll give you your funny sound. But I want a favor in exchange.”

She tipped her head and waited.

“Somewhere in your spooky house, let there be one thing that will show those children who and what we really are, that will show them what they face when they stand before the Blood.”

“Done.”

“Then let’s find a room that’s a little more private.”

There were only the two of them in the library, but Geoffrey could return at any moment.

His face burned with embarrassment as he walked to the door, and he knew that, even with his light brown skin, color visibly flamed his cheeks. He would do this, not just because Jaenelle asked it of him, but because someone else’s sensibilities were at stake.

“I promise, Papa. No one will know it’s you,” Jaenelle said as she stopped at the door.

“Thank you,” he replied faintly.

She looked at him. Then she looked at the table stacked with books. Her lips curved in a wicked smile. “If you want us to keep pretending that you’re sorting old books whenever we come by to chat, you shouldn’t slam them on the table. We all know you wouldn’t do that to a book that was truly ancient and fragile.”

He closed his eyes and promised himself that he would not whimper. “You all know?”

“Well, I don’t think any of the boyos have figured it out, but all of the coven knows.”

May the Darkness have mercy on me.

“Come on, Papa. Let’s go bwaa ha ha.”

Daemon tucked the tip of his tongue between his teeth and bit down hard enough to keep himself from saying something stupid.

If he’d walked in on his father having sex—when Saetan was still physically capable of having sex—it would have been less embarrassing than hearing that voice say “bwaa ha ha.”

“What do you think?” Jaenelle asked.

Eyeing the audio crystal sitting on the corner of his desk, Daemon bit his tongue a little harder and counted to ten—twice—before he said, “It sounds like the High Lord.”

She studied the audio crystal, clearly disappointed. “I don’t want to lose the quality of his voice, but I did try to adjust it so it wouldn’t be recognizable.”

There’s nothing you can do to disguise that voice, Daemon thought.

Then she perked up, looked more hopeful. “Of course, you would recognize his voice, but it’s not likely that anyone else will. Not now that it’s altered a bit.”

Which was when Lucivar walked into the study, carrying Daemonar in a grip that indicated they’d already had one discussion about whether the little beast could run free in the Hall.

“I’m not sure what Marian is working on today, but we were strongly encouraged to leave home,” Lucivar said. “So here we are.”

«We can take him up to the playroom,» Daemon said on an Ebon-gray spear thread.

«You’ve got plenty of shields there and nothing breakable?» Lucivar asked.

«Oh, yes.»

“Well, you’re just in time,” Jaenelle said, beaming at her brother and nephew. “Listen to this.”

“Bwaa ha ha.”

Daemonar squealed and struggled to get free. “Granpapa! Granpapa!”

Not daring to look at anyone, Daemon stared at his shoes and began to understand his father’s fascination with footwear.

Jaenelle sighed. “All right. I’ll work on it.”

Lucivar studied both of them and began backing away. “We’ll just wait in the hall.”

“Ba ha! Ba ha!” Daemonar shouted. “Granpapa, ba ha!”

Once Lucivar and Daemonar were safely on the other side of the door, Jaenelle said, “Do you think Daemonar will forget?”

Not a chance. “Of course he will. He’s little.”

She gave him a kiss that tasted of a promise for a very interesting evening, then said ruefully, “Thank you for lying.”

He rested his hands on her waist. “You’re welcome.” He hesitated, but a nagging curiosity made him ask. “What were you going to do if he’d refused?”

Jaenelle looked at him and smiled.

Butterflies filled his stomach and tickled unmercifully before turning into heavy, sinking stones.

“Well,” his darling said, “you have a wonderful deep voice too. So if Papa refused, I was going to ask you.”

Saetan walked into the sitting room where he’d asked Geoffrey and Draca, the Keep’s Seneschal, to meet him.

“My friends, this bottle of wine arrived this evening, compliments of Prince Sadi. Since it came from the wine cellar at the Hall, I can assure you it is a very fine vintage, one best enjoyed when shared.”

He called in three glasses and opened the wine.

Draca said nothing until he handed her a glass. “What iss the occassion?”

Saetan grinned. “My son has just realized how much his father loves him.”

SEVEN

Daemon walked out of the bathroom in the Consort’s suite, noticed the look of apprehension on his valet’s face, and approached the clothes laid out on the bed with a heightened sense of wariness. He studied the gold-checked shirt and dark green trousers, which were not his usual white silk shirt and black jacket and trousers. Then he looked at his valet.

“What are those?” he asked.

“Casual attire,” Jazen replied. “You said you were walking down to the village. For exercise.”

“I said I was going to walk to the village instead of taking a carriage because I could use the exercise.” Which, in his mind, wasn’t saying the same thing. “But I’m going down to the village to talk to Sylvia. The Queen of Halaway. At her request.”

“But you’re walking. So you’ll need these.” Jazen held up a pair of shoes that were not Daemon’s usual black, polished-to-a-gleam footwear. “They go with the casual attire.”

Daemon lightly scratched his chin with one black-tinted nail. “I’ve been an adult for quite some time and have handled all kinds of personal details all by myself. I am now the ruler of a whole Territory, which means I make decisions that affect the lives of thousands of people. So why am I no longer capable of choosing my own clothes?”

“You got married.”

He studied Jazen’s face. “That wasn’t a smart-ass remark, was it?”

“No, Prince. The Lady thinks you look stunning in your usual attire, but she felt a change of pace once in a while would be good for you.”

“I see.”

While Jazen went into the bathroom to “tidy up,” Daemon shucked off the bathrobe and got dressed. There wasn’t much to tidy, but he didn’t need an audience when he dressed or undressed—unless it was Jaenelle—and Jazen, who had been viciously castrated when he’d lived in Hayll, didn’t need to see a whole male and be reminded of what he had lost.

By the time Jazen came back into the Consort’s bedroom, Daemon was dressed and inspecting a cloth bag full of broken biscuits that had been left beside the clothes.

“No!” Jazen said a moment before Daemon popped a piece into his mouth.

His gold eyes narrowed. “Since they were here with my walking attire, I assumed these were treats for the walk.”

“They are,” Jazen assured him. “But not for you,” he finished, hunching his shoulders.

Ah, Hell’s fire.

Daemon opened the bedroom door and stood in the doorway, not ready to commit himself by stepping out of the room.

Five furry little bodies waited in the corridor. Five little tails wagged happy greetings. Five little Sceltie minds yapped at him just outside his inner barriers.

«Walkies?» «Walkies!» «We go with you!»

He got bumped into the corridor when Jazen shut the door behind his back.

“Fine,” he said, vanishing the sack of treats. “Let’s go for walkies.”

The first challenge came when he reached the bottom of the stairs and was stopped by the wails and arooos coming from the top of the stairs. Apparently the puppies could get up the stairs by themselves but couldn’t get back down.

So it was up the stairs, gather a pup in each hand, down the stairs, set the pups on the floor. He could have used Craft to float all five Scelties and bring them down at one time, but…

Exercise, Sadi. You were taking this walk for the exercise.

Two more trips, and they were all heading for the great hall and the front door.

Where Beale was waiting for him, holding a water dish and a pitcher of water. A footman opened the door, and five bundles of fuzzy scampered outside, yipping for him to hurry up.

Daemon vanished the bowl and pitcher. “Thank you, Beale.”

“Enjoy your walk, Prince. I have asked Tarl to bring around one of the small gardening wagons.”

Daemon just raised an eyebrow and waited.

“It is a long walk for short legs,” Beale said. His expression didn’t change, but there was a definite twinkle in his eyes. “I think you will find the wagon more convenient for the walk home.”

When he’d be pulling that wagon full of five snoozing puppies.

“I am a Black-Jeweled Warlord Prince and the Warlord Prince of Dhemlan. I haven’t imagined being those things, have I?”

“No, Prince,” Beale replied. “You have not imagined those things. You are the most powerful male in Dhemlan.”

Nodding, Daemon walked to the door.

“However…”

He stopped. Twisted at the waist to look back at Beale.

“After the Lady came to live with him here at the Hall, the High Lord quite often asked the same question.”

Sylvia looked at the puppies. She looked at her younger son, Mikal. Then she pointed at the door. “Outside in the yard. And stay in the yard. That is not only a request from your mother; it is an order from your Queen.”

Boy and puppies scampered outside.

“Does that work?” Daemon asked. “Using both titles?”

“It usually gives me an extra fifteen minutes before I have to check on him and stop whatever mischief he was about to get into.” She brushed at her hair and seemed surprised when it came to an abrupt end.

“New haircut?” he asked, keeping his voice neutral. It was short and sassy and made her look more…athletic…than the longer, more elegant style he was accustomed to seeing on Lady Sylvia.

“New clothes?” she countered.

“I got married,” he replied dryly.

“We did notice.”

Shadows in her eyes behind the amusement.

“Why?” he asked softly, looking at her hair. But he knew.

“I needed to look different.” She touched her hair again. “I didn’t want to look in the mirror anymore and see the woman who had been the High Lord’s lover.”

She walked into the family parlor. He followed.

“I loved him,” she said. “I still do. I’ve sat in this room through a lot of long nights, thinking about what happened last year and why he chose to step away from day-to-day living—and from me.”

“Sylvia…”

“No. Let me say this to someone. Please?”

He slipped his hands in his trouser pockets and nodded.

“Saetan showed me what I deserve from a lover. Not just skills in bed, but the genuine affection, the interest in my life and my concerns. That mix of tenderness and amusement he would have when I raved on about something. That look that said, whatever was going on, he understood it was female and he would just ride it out.” She pressed her lips together and closed her eyes for a moment. “I finally realized he left…. It wasn’t just because of what was done to him when he was tortured in Terreille. He really needed to go, to step away from the living Realms.”

“Yes,” Daemon said softly. “He really needed to go.”

He watched her eyes fill. Watched one tear roll down her cheek.

“We were friends before we were lovers.” She wiped the tear and sniffled. “I miss my friend. More than the lover, I miss my friend. I wrote him letters on some of those long nights. Just newsy things about Halaway or the boys.”

“But you never sent them.”

“No.”

He held out a hand. “Give them to me.”

“Oh, no, I—”

“Give them to me. I can’t tell you that he’ll welcome them or that he’ll read them. But I’ll offer them.”

She opened a drawer in the rolltop desk and took out a packet tied with a rose-colored ribbon. “There are a couple of letters from the boys, too. Maybe…”

He took the packet and vanished it before she could change her mind. “He did love you, Sylvia. He still does. But he’s not coming back.”

“I know.” It was a trembling smile, but it was still a smile.

“Well, I’d best gather the furry children and—”

“No.” Sylvia made a face. “I didn’t ask you here to talk about your father. It’s your mother we need to discuss.”

Daemon studied the fronts of the two cottages, then slowly circled the buildings, checking to see that everything was well tended. Saetan had purchased one cottage fourteen years ago as a home for Tersa. Daemon had purchased the neighboring cottage for Manny, the servant who had been his caretaker when he had been an enslaved prize living in Dorothea SaDiablo’s court. More than that, Manny had raised him, had loved him, had been the one good constant in his childhood.

When he immigrated to Kaeleer, he brought Jazen and Manny with him, not willing to leave them to the mercy of the Queens in Terreille. Jazen remained as his valet. Manny, after a few weeks at the Hall, wanted a place of her own—and work of her own. He bought her the cottage next to Tersa’s, and Manny gradually took over as housekeeper and cook for Tersa and Allista, the journey-maid Black Widow who was Tersa’s current companion.

He rounded the corner and stopped, counting silently to see how long it took the young couple locked in an ardent embrace to become aware of his psychic scent and, therefore, his presence.

He reached twenty before the boy’s body jerked with awareness and the couple jumped away from each other.

He stared at the girl first, letting instinct rule temper. Her embarrassment came from who had caught them kissing, but he didn’t pick up any of the bitch-pride feeling that came from witches who enjoyed putting males in a compromising position. And the shy smile she gave the boy before bolting out of the yard made him feel easy enough about her to relax about the boy. This wasn’t a conquest; this was young love. Most likely, Manny would have shooed the girl out of the yard—after giving the couple enough time for a few unchaperoned kisses.

As he walked toward the boy, he wondered if Manny had taken up her other occupation—village matchmaker.

“Prince Sadi,” the boy stammered.

Sleeveless undershirt, dirt-smeared and sweaty. Wheelbarrow, hoe, rake, shovel. No doubt one of the youths who earned a few coins by helping out with the heavier chores.

“We were just…I was just…” Flustered, the boy looked at the tools and the ground as if an answer would suddenly appear.

“I noticed.” He smiled, letting dry amusement clearly show.

“The next time you want to kiss the girl in a public place, stay aware of what is around you. And try a little less tongue next time. Never hurts to have the girl wanting more than you’re giving. Especially in these circumstances.”

The boy looked at him, shocked delight lighting his face because the Warlord Prince of Dhemlan—and more importantly Jaenelle Angelline’s husband—had offered sexual advice.

Suppressing the urge to sigh, and feeling much older than he had felt when he woke up that morning, Daemon walked to the back door and knocked.

When Allista opened the door, she didn’t seem overly anxious, but he did pick up an undercurrent of concern as he stepped into the kitchen.

“Tersa is up in the attic,” Allista said. “She’s put locks on the attic door, and she’s secretive about what she’s been doing for the past few weeks.”

“Why wasn’t I informed about this?”

“It’s odd, but there doesn’t seem to be any harm in it or any danger to Tersa. In fact, she’s quite pleased about…whatever this is.”

He felt the edge of his temper sharpen. Tersa was his mother, a broken Black Widow who, seven hundred years before, had surrendered her already-tenuous hold on sanity in order to reclaim her power as a Sister of the Hourglass and see the dreams and visions that foretold the coming of Witch. She had given him hope the night she had told him about the vision she’d seen in her tangled web. But the price of seeing that vision was that her life became as shattered as her mind—until Jaenelle brought her as far out of the Twisted Kingdom as Tersa was able to go, and brought her here to live under the care and protection of the High Lord.

“I am here at least once a week,” Daemon said, his voice strained by the effort not to lash out at Allista. “I should have been informed if Tersa was acting unusual in any way.”

Allista stared at him, clearly struggling with the need to balance loyalties. Being here was part of her own education—all Black Widows took the risk of becoming lost in the Twisted Kingdom—and in that, her loyalty was to the Hourglass Coven and to Tersa. But he ruled Dhemlan, and he was the one who provided her with a quarterly income to show his appreciation of her care—just as his father had done before him.

She came to a decision. She raised her chin, squared her shoulders, and said, “She didn’t want you to know.”

He was out of the kitchen and bounding up the stairs before Allista could sputter a protest.

The physical lock on the attic door was undone, but when he tried to open the door, he heard the rattle of another lock on the other side. And he felt the tangle of a Craft-shaped lock. If Tersa had made it, that lock was potentially dangerous, even to someone with his power.

“Tersa?” He pounded on the attic door. “Tersa! Open the door!”

«Go away,» she replied on a psychic thread.

«No, I will not go away.»

Annoyance came through the thread. And a trace of fear.

«Wait.»

He paced the upstairs hallway, and he waited. Five minutes. Ten minutes. Fifteen minutes.

Finally the attic door opened and Tersa slipped into the hallway. She was as thin as she’d always been, despite the regular meals, but her clothes were new and her hair, still as tangled as her mind, was clean.

“Tersa.” He couldn’t read her emotions, couldn’t untangle them enough to get a feel for what was going on. That she was unhappy about his presence hurt, but he set the hurt aside.

“It’s a surprise,” she said, a pleading note in her voice that he’d rarely heard before. “For the boy. Just a little surprise for the boy.”

The boy. Meaning him. He often wondered what she saw when she looked at him. Was it like looking into a shattered mirror with each piece holding an image from the past? Sometimes he knew she was seeing him as the child he had been before Dorothea took him away from her and drove her out of Hayll. Sometimes she saw him as the youth he had been when he’d met her again, thinking it was the first time because he didn’t remember who she was. And sometimes she saw him as he was here and now. But within all the broken pieces of her mind, he was always the boy.

Knowing why she didn’t want him there eased the hurt. She was making something for him, and she was afraid he would insist on seeing it before she had finished it.

He ducked his head and looked at her through his lashes. “When do I get my surprise?”

A moment’s startled hesitation. Then her gold eyes narrowed. “You are teasing me?”

“Just a little.” He gave her his best boyish grin.

Her eyes narrowed a little more, but he noticed the change in her psychic scent as she absorbed the fact that he was being playful instead of demanding answers.

“When do I get my surprise?” he asked again.

“Soon. But not today.”

He waited, watching her make the effort to hold on to the ordinary world.

“Today you can have nutcakes.” Tersa took his arm and tugged him toward the stairs leading to the first floor—and away from the surprise in the attic. “And milk.”

“I don’t need milk,” he said, hustling down the stairs to keep up with her.

“Boys get milk with nutcakes. It’s a rule. Manny told me so.”

He clamped his teeth together. He couldn’t argue with a rule that gave Tersa a way to cope with something other people saw as simple and mundane, not when he knew Sylvia’s son Mikal was a frequent visitor. Manny, no doubt, had established the rule for Mikal’s benefit.

“Fine,” he said, trying not to snarl. “I’ll drink the”—damn—“milk.”

Tersa stopped just inside the kitchen and shook her finger at him. “And no using Craft to vanish the milk. That’s fibbing.”

A mother’s gesture. A mother’s scold. Such an extraordinary thing to come from Tersa because it was so ordinary.

It almost broke his heart.

There were so many things he couldn’t say to her, his mother, because they would confuse her, tangle her up, threaten her fragile connection to the mundane world. But there were other ways he could tell her he loved her.

So he raised her hand to his face and pressed a kiss in her palm. “All right, darling. I’ll drink the milk. For you.”

“So,” Jaenelle said as they inspected the dining room in the spooky house. “We have the skeleton in the closet, the critters in the cobwebs, the snarl in the cellar, the glowing eyes and smoke, and the laughing staircase.”

Marian shuddered. “Can’t you fix that laugh to just one stair?”

Jaenelle turned to her and grinned. “It is much creepier now that I took the original laugh and played it in a cavern to get the final sound. But we don’t want it fixed to one spot. The next set of visitors would anticipate hearing it when they reached the sixth stair.”

“Exactly.” She’d almost wet herself when she’d carefully avoided stepping on the sixth stair and then had that sound rising up under her feet when she stepped on the eighth stair. “At least, fix it to one stair while we’re still working on the house.”

Jaenelle gave her one of those long, assessing looks. “Admit it. This has made you shudder and shiver a lot of the time, but you’ve also had fun.”

“I don’t have to admit anything,” Marian replied. But she smiled when she said it. Just outside the dining room, where people would be waiting for their turn to enter, was a dusty table with a vase of dead flowers. Swipe a finger in the dust—or even better, have one of the landen boys write his name in the dust—and the next thing that appeared was the words “hello, prey.”

She’d thought of that one all by herself.

It was the mix of the absurd, the creepy, and the real that was making the spooky house more than the dumb ideas the landen boys had originally told Jaenelle. Now there were ghostly guides directing people through the house and telling them bits of stories so they would know what to look for in each room. There were phantom shapes that would appear in one of the mirrors, but the spell didn’t engage until someone looked in the mirror. As you walked down one part of the upstairs hallway, you heard a heart-breakingly beautiful voice singing—Jaenelle’s voice, in fact—but if you backtracked to hear it again, it was gone.

And then there were the other guides.

“Nobody is going to be scared of a Sceltie,” Marian said as the two illusion-spell dogs—one black with tan markings on his face, the other brown and white—trotted into the dining room and stared at the humans, their expressions just a little too gleeful.

“That’s because these people don’t live with a Sceltie,” Jaenelle replied.

Marian studied the illusions, whose tails began to wag now that she focused her attention on them. “How complex a spell is this?”

“They’ll be able to interact with the visitors in the most usual ways.”

A wicked cheerfulness shivered through Marian. “In other words, they’re going to herd the landen children going through the house.”

“They can touch you; you can’t touch them,” Jaenelle said, tipping her head toward the dogs. “Your hand will pass right through, but you’ll certainly feel it if one of them nips you.”

She was starting to like this house better and better. Those landen boys wanted to see how the Blood lived? They thought it was all cobwebs in the corners and rats in the walls? Ha! Let them try to deal with the kindred!

“How did we end up with Sceltie ghosts?” Marian asked.

A blush stained Jaenelle’s cheeks. “When I went to Scelt to ask Fiona to polish up the little story bits we wrote, Ladvarian and Shadow heard us talking. And since Kaelas got to be the snarl in the cellar and the ghost cat that’s seen from one of the upstairs windows…”

“They nipped at you until you gave in, didn’t they?”

“Badgered. There were no teeth involved. Mine or theirs.”

Oh, the sour note in Jaenelle’s voice.

Marian turned away to hide a grin. The powerful men in Jaenelle’s life didn’t often win an argument with her. On the other hand, she seldom won an argument with Ladvarian. Did it annoy Lucivar, Daemon, and Saetan to see a dog that didn’t come up to their knees cornering Jaenelle into agreeing to things when they couldn’t get her to budge, or were they grateful that someone could successfully herd their darling Queen when herding was required?

“All right,” Jaenelle said briskly. “We have one more room that needs significant work.” She left the dining room and led the way to the room that must have been a parlor. “This will be the scariest room in the house.”

Marian looked at the furniture and wallpaper and thought the room qualified without their doing anything to it. “What’s going to be in here?”

Oh, the look in Jaenelle’s eyes as she said softly, “A promise.”

Entering one of the small parlors that were in Witch’s private section of the Keep, Daemon used Craft to move another cushioned footstool next to the one that held Saetan’s socked feet. Then he sat down and studied his father as Saetan closed the book he was reading and took off the half-moon glasses.

“Nice sweater,” Daemon said dryly, eyeing the long black sweater Saetan was wearing over a white silk shirt.

“Nice shirt,” Saetan replied just as dryly, confirming Daemon’s suspicion that Saetan owned the sweater for the same reason he now owned this shirt. “The gold looks good on you.”

“I have other clothes besides white shirts and black trousers,” Daemon grumbled.

“If you don’t, you will.” Saetan smiled. “Have any of your silk shirts found their way into your Lady’s closet?”

“No.” Daemon felt amusement bubble up. “My shoulders are broader than yours, so my shirts don’t fit as well as yours did. I gathered this was a disappointment. In terms of the shirts, not the shoulders.”

“Lucky you.”

He grinned at the sour note he heard in Saetan’s voice. Then his amusement faded as he called in a packet of letters tied with a rose-colored ribbon. “Sylvia wrote these,” he said softly. “There are a couple from the boys as well. I told her I would offer them, but you don’t have to take them.” Especially now when he could see the pain gathering in his father’s gold eyes. “I can keep them, or destroy them, or read them if you feel someone needs to know the contents. I will do with them whatever you want me to do.”

“I can’t take them,” Saetan said, his voice strained. “It’s selfish, I know that, but…”

Daemon vanished the packet and rested a hand on Saetan’s ankle. “You’re entitled to make that choice.”

“There are reasons why the demon-dead have their own Realm. There are reasons for the dead to step back from the living. And those same reasons apply to Guardians.”

Step back from whomever you must, Daemon thought. Except me. Except Lucivar.

“You and Lucivar…” Saetan smiled that dry smile. “When I first told the two of you I was retiring from the living Realms, I heard the unspoken warning about what you’d do if I tried to shut myself too far away from all of you. And I wouldn’t have tried to shut you out. Not my children. Not you or Lucivar or Jaenelle. Not from the coven or the boyos, since they, too, are my children in a way.”

“They’ve taken the lessons and the love and gone on with their lives. They aren’t placing any demands on you. Just small expectations, when there are any at all.”

Saetan hesitated. “At this point, my darling, you and the others are fine entertainment most of the time. Not just for me. For Geoffrey and Draca as well. Even Lorn. Once a week, I go down to visit and read him the letters from the coven. The Darkness only knows what the legendary Prince of the Dragons thinks of the content.” Another smile, there and gone. “But it’s not the same with Sylvia.”

“No, it’s not the same.” It could never be the same with a lover who truly touched a man’s heart. He gave his father’s ankle a friendly squeeze, then sat back on the footstool. “There are going to be some changes in her household. That may not be easier for her initially, but it will be different.”

“Oh?”

“I walked down to the village with five Sceltie puppies. I came back to the Hall with four.”

“And the fifth?”

“By now, I’m sure Sylvia has convinced the little bitch to let go of Mikal’s trousers. And Mrs. Beale promised to send her recipe for puppy biscuits to Sylvia’s cook.”

“Mrs. Beale agreed to share a recipe,” Saetan said slowly.

“Mrs. Beale agreed that I could pay for…I’m not sure what it is except that it’s something she wanted for the kitchen but couldn’t justify as a normal household expense.”

“And you agreed to fund this in exchange for a recipe?”

Daemon stared at his father for a long moment before he muttered, “She sharpened the meat cleaver before coming to talk to me.”

One beat of silence. Two. Then Saetan burst out laughing.

Almost time. Everything was almost ready. Big surprises soon. Just a few details left to handle.

Almost ready.

Soon.

And then they would see how many of his surprises the SaDiablo family could survive.