“To escaping slavery?” I asked.
“You are not a slave, Jason Kilkenny,” my raven-haired Queen told me. “You are a Vassal. This relationship has obligations and rights both ways. As my Vassal, you hold diplomatic immunity across all fae Courts. From me you will receive aid and information to help keep the peace and fight evil. Think what would have happened here”—She gestured around us—“if I had not tasked you to seek out the plot on MacDonald’s life.”
Taking my silence as a sign, She explained quietly.
“Truths that are now unveiled would be secret. Many would be dead who now live. A war would have started, and Winters would have succeeded,” she said bluntly. “Oberis would be dead. MacDonald would be dead. Many would have fallen prey to the vampires. You stopped all this.”
“Not alone,” I disagreed. “I worked with others, had help—I often just watched.”
“And yet you were the catalyst to so much—because you were my Vassal and served the task I gave you,” She reminded me. “Without you, this city would have burned. Without my aid, you would have died.
“You are your father’s son—it is not in you to stand aside from evil,” Mabona told me. “As my Vassal, you will have the aid and authority to fight it. And while I do not often offer Boons, there are many rewards in my service.”
I touched the collar of the rune-encrusted bulletproof vest I wore under my shirt. Without that gift from Her, I would have been dead. She was right in that, at least. And She was right that I wasn’t willing to stand by and let harm come to the people around me. Stupid of me, but She was right.
“I will hold the Boon,” I said slowly. “And I will hold you to your promise to release me if I call on that Boon.”
“Done and done and done,” She confirmed, repeating three times to prove She would honor the promise. “I want your service, not your unthinking obedience.
“There is something I want in return, though,” She told me. She waited for me to respond, and I gestured for Her to continue. She’d already thrice-bound herself, which made it unlikely what She wanted would be too strenuous.
“I want you to swear fealty to me in your own voice and by your own choice, as well as fealty by your father’s blood,” She said simply.
I sat there on that moss chair in the Court for at least a minute in silence. She waited—I guess when you’ve lived longer than any human could dream of, waiting a few minutes isn’t a big deal.
By my own voice and my own choice. The words were like tombstones—while the boon I held gave me an escape clause if I swore fealty to Her, I would no longer be able to say I’d been forced into this. I would choose to follow the Queen, to accept Her orders, to obey.
I would be a volunteer, not a conscript, which would change...everything. And nothing. I would serve either way. She would release me from my fealty if I invoked the boon either way. It just changed...context. It made it my choice to be a Vassal, because I could claim the Boon now and walk away.
But She was right. I didn’t have it in me to walk away from need. And Her aid had kept me alive this far, and She was right that I would have died without it. I wasn’t so sure the city would have burned without me, but I did seem to have been in the middle.
Finally, I made up my mind. I stood from the moss chair and knelt before Her as She rose to Her own feet. Alone on that mossy floor, we faced each other, and the words were in my mind—like I’d always known what they were.
“I, Jason Kilkenny, offer You my fealty,” I said simply. “To serve with honor, to obey with fidelity, to answer with truth. Your foes are my foes. Your allies are my allies. Your will is my will. I am Your Vassal.”
“I, Mabona, accept your fealty,” She responded. “To reward honor with honor, fidelity with trust, truth with truth. While I am your Lady, you will never be without aid or reward or allies. Those who speak against you speak against me—as my foes and allies are yours, so your foes and allies are mine.
“Fealty flows both ways. I am your Queen; you are my Vassal.”
I CALLED Mary from outside the hotel. After the phone had rung three times, my heart started to quicken with worry, and then she finally picked up.
“You’re okay?” she asked, right off the bat.
“I am,” I confirmed. “You?”
“In desperate need of a shower, but unhurt,” she told me. “There weren’t enough of the feeders in any group we found to be a threat. What happened in the Tower?”
“I killed Winters,” I told her simply. “MacDonald ended the fight and is dealing with the Enforcers. The Queen is here and there’s a giant conference at the Tower tonight—MacDonald wants to try and sort out where we go from here.”
“I’d heard Winters was dead—why didn’t you call me sooner?” she asked. “I was worried.”
“I’ve been tied up with the Queen,” I said. “We were...discussing things. I think we’ve settled on terms of service I can live with.”
“You’re seriously the Vassal of a Power?” Mary asked. “I know Eric said you were, but no one else has said anything about it.”
“We’re keeping it quiet,” I explained. “Being a Vassal normally includes a large bull’s-eye, and I’m not up to the usual weight class of Vassals.”
“I haven’t told anyone, and I won’t,” she promised. “I don’t know if I’m supposed to be at this conference; it sounds like Enli is just bringing a small escort.”
“Can you come for me?” I asked. “The Queen is going to need at least some people around Her so She doesn’t look outnumbered.”
Though, with the exception of MacDonald, my Queen had everyone else in the city outnumbered.
“And I want to see you,” I admitted.
“I’ll meet you there,” she promised. “But I definitely need to shower and find another set of dress clothes.”
“I will see you there,” I agreed, and we hung up. Her closing words caused me to look down at the state of the expensive suit Talus had paid for this morning.
Blood spattered it, a good portion of it mine. Tears and rips in the cloth revealed the healed skin beneath. I needed to change.
Almost as I finished the thought, however, Mabona reappeared from wherever She’d vanished to and handed me a suit bag.
“Wear this,” She instructed. “The people at this meeting are the ones in this city we want to know you’re my Vassal—they’re the ones who have to honor your diplomatic immunity.”
I opened the suit bag and for a moment wished I could just show up in my tattered suit. Swallowing, I slowly dressed in the perfectly fitted black-and-gold uniform. Any real soldier would have laughed at the amount of braid, and then been silenced when he saw how easily I could move in it.
The long purple cape, however, I drew the line at. When I pulled it out of the suit bag, I looked up at Mabona.
“You cannot be serious,” I told Her.
“The cape is the only part of the uniform of my retainers that has never changed,” She told me. “There is a long and illustrious tradition behind it. It’s also one of the more powerful shields against Power you will ever wear.”
With a sigh, I slung the long cape around my shoulders and stood straight. A nearby hotel mirror showed me just how ridiculous I looked, but it was what my Queen wanted. I’d made my choice.
THERE WAS no sign that there had ever been anything resembling a battle when we arrived at the ground floor of MacDonald’s tower in a black SUV borrowed from Lord Oberis. Other cars were also arriving, and neatly dressed valets directed people inside and took the vehicles.
The valet that met us didn’t even finish his first sentence before I realized it was little more than a recording. The “valets” were illusions wrapped around energy constructs, preprogrammed extensions of MacDonald’s will.