I stepped forward and touched his arm. The touch made him look at me. His eyes were filled with such pain, and I realized that Frost was jealous of me. As much as I cared for him, he hadn't earned the right to be jealous of me in that way. Not yet. Though I realized with a start that the thought of never having him in my arms again was a painful one. I couldn't afford the sinking sense of loss any more than he could afford the jealousy.
"Frost... ," I began, I don't know what I would have said, because there was a sound of sharp bells from the bedroom. It was as if someone had taken the delicate sound of silver bells and turned them into alarm bells. The sound sent my pulse racing, and not in a good way. I'd let go of Frost's arm when the sound came. We stood there looking at each other while everyone but Galen and Kitto moved toward the bedroom.
"I have to go, Frost." I started to apologize but didn't. He hadn't earned it, and I didn't owe it.
"I will come with you," he said.
I gave him wide eyes.
"I will do for my queen what I would do for no one else." And I knew in that moment that he didn't mean Andais.
Chapter 17
Doyle was kneeling on the burgundy bedspread, speaking to the mirror, when Frost and I entered the room. "I will allow shared sight as soon as our princess is with us, Queen Niceven."
The mirror was a swirl of mist as I crawled across the bed. It put Doyle kneeling at my back, slightly to one side. Rhys was sitting behind both of us, against the headboard, propped up among the pile of burgundy, purple, mauve, pink, and black pillows. I couldn't tell for certain, but he seemed to be nude, except for a few well-placed pillows. I had no idea how he'd stripped that quickly.
Frost crawled onto the bed to half sit, half recline a little behind me and to one side, so that I was framed by Doyle and him.
Doyle made a sideways movement with his hand and the mist cleared. Niceven sat in a delicate wooden chair, carved so that her wings slipped through the slotted back without damaging them. Her face was a near perfect triangle of white skin. But her whiteness was not the same as mine, or Frost's, or Rhys's. Her white skin held a greyish tinge. Her white-grey curls had been done in elaborate ringlets like those of some old-time doll. A tiny tiara held those curls back from her face, and the tiara sparkled with the cold warmth that only diamonds can manage. Her gown was white and flowing. The looseness of the cloth would have hidden her body, except that it was absolutely sheer and you could see the small pointed breasts, the almost skeletal thinness of her ribs, the dainty crossed legs. She wore slippers that seemed to be made of flower petals. A white mouse, as large to her as a German shepherd to me, sat beside her chair. She stroked the fur between its ears.
A trio of ladies-in-waiting stood behind her, each in a different color dress that matched the brilliance of their wings, rose-red, daffodil-yellow, and iris-purple. Their hair was black, yellow, and brown, respectively.
Niceven had gone to a great deal more trouble than we had to stage her little scene.
I felt positively ordinary in my green skirt outfit. But I didn't mind too much. It was a business call, after all.
"Queen Niceven, it is good of you to return our call."
"In truth, Princess Meredith, I have been awaiting your call these three months. Your affection for the green knight is well known among the court. I am most surprised that it has taken thee so long to contact me."
She was being very formal. I realized it wasn't just the speech that was formal. She wore her crown; I had no crown, not yet. She sat upon her throne, while I was sitting in the middle of a slightly rumpled bed. She had ladies-in-waiting like a silent Greek chorus behind her. And a mouse, mustn't forget the mouse. I had only Doyle and Frost on either side of me and Rhys in the pillows behind. Niceven was trying to put me at a disadvantage. We'd see about that.
"In truth, we have sought the aid of healers out here in the world of mortals. It is only recently that we had to admit that a call to you was necessary."
"Sheer stubbornness on your part then, Princess."
"Perhaps, but you know why I have called, and what I wish."
"I am not some fairy godmother to be granting wishes, Meredith." She'd dropped my title, a deliberate insult.
Fine, we could both be rude. "As you like, Niceven. Then you know what I want."
"You want a cure for your green knight," she said, one hand tracing the pink edge of the mouse's ear.
"Yes."
"Prince Cel was most insistent that Galen remain injured."
"You told me once that Prince Cel does not yet rule the Unseelie Court."
"That is true, but it is not at all certain you will ever live to be queen, Meredith." She'd dropped the title again.
Doyle moved from beside me to put his back to Rhys. He made sure he was still at the edge of the bed, at the limit of my peripheral vision and well within the queen's. As if they'd arranged it, Rhys rose from the pillows to his knees and showed clearly that he was nude. He rolled Doyle's long braid in his arms until he came to the end and began to undo the ribbon that bound it.
Niceven's eyes flicked behind me to the movement, then back to my face. "What are they doing?"
"Preparing for bed," I said. Though I wasn't 100 percent sure of that
Delicate grey brows furrowed. "It is, what... nine o'clock where you are. The night is young to waste in sleeping."
"I did not say we would sleep." I kept my voice even.
She drew a deep enough breath that I could see the rise and fall of her dainty chest. She tried to keep her attention on me, but her gaze kept flicking to the men. Rhys was working Doyle's thick hair free of the braid. I'd seen Doyle with his hair free of that braid only once. Only once had it been like some dark living cloak to shroud his body.
Niceven watched them furtively, giving me very little eye contact. I wasn't sure if it was Doyle's hair or Rhys's nudity. I doubted the nudity, because being nude just wasn't that unusual among the court. Of course, maybe she was gazing at Rhys's washboard abs, or what lay just below them.
Frost sat up, took off his suit jacket, and began to slip out of his shoulder holster. Her eyes flicked to him.
"Niceven," I said softly. I had to repeat her name twice more before she looked at me. "How do I cure Galen?"
"It is not certain that you will be queen, and if Prince Cel becomes king, then he will hold it ill that I helped you."
"And if I am queen, I will hold it ill that you did not."
She smiled. "So I must find a way between the two snarling dogs. I will help you here, because I have already helped Cel. It will even things up."
I remembered Galen's screams, and the pain in his eyes these last months, and I didn't think it evened things up. I didn't think fixing what she'd ruined came close to evening things up. But we were doing faerie politics here, not therapy, so I said nothing. Silence is not a lie. A sin of omission, but not a lie. Our cultures allow you to omit as much as you can get away with.
"How is Galen to be cured?" I asked.
She shook her head, making her curls bounce and her diamond tiara glitter. "No, we talk price first. What would you give me to make your green knight whole?"
Frost and Doyle moved up beside me almost simultaneously. "You will have the goodwill of the Queen of the Unseelie, and that should be enough," Frost said, his voice as cold as his name.
"She is not queen yet, Killing Frost." Niceven's voice was full of a cold, cold anger. It had the taste of an old grudge. Was it personal to Frost?
I saw Doyle begin to reach toward the other man, and I stopped him with a look. There was a tension between them tonight. It wouldn't make us look strong to argue amongst ourselves. Doyle stayed at my side, only his eyes looking at Frost. The look was not friendly.