“Uh, right.” I didn’t believe her and it showed.
“I’m serious.” Her expression sobered. “I expected you to look more human, or more vampire. But there’s more than a trace of us in you. In fact, you bear more of a resemblance to Queen Lopaka than Adriana does. Except for the teeth, of course.” She smirked and even that expression looked good on her. “Of course, Adriana takes after her father in every way.”
I had no idea what that was supposed to mean, so I couldn’t answer. Probably best that I stay quiet anyway.
She must have taken my silence to mean I was insulted. “I meant no offense. It’s never a bad thing to have people underestimate you.”
“Particularly my enemies.” I kept my tone light, but I’ll admit to being a teeny bit worried. My first encounter with my grandfather’s relatives had been at Vicki’s wake. While my current visitor actually spoke in American idiom and seemed friendly, it was entirely possible she was giving me a line of bull.
“You don’t trust me.”
“It’s nothing personal.” I gave her a polite smile. “I don’t trust anybody.”
That was the honest truth, put bluntly enough to make her blink and give me a long look through narrowed eyelids. “You mean that.”
“I tend to say what I mean. It’s easier.” I gave her a grin that was only partly manufactured. “Of course I can lie, if the occasion calls for it.”
“Of course. We all can.” She walked over to the window, pulling aside the curtain with one hand and turning to watch the waves hitting the beach. “May I ask what arrangements you’ve made about your hearing?”
A siren had crashed Vicki’s wake to tell me that I would have to attend a hearing on the siren island. They seem to think the vampire bite has made me a monster that may need to be put down. I’ll have to go there and deal with it—assuming I get through the court hearing okay. “I haven’t made any. Why?”
She whipped around so fast she pulled down the curtain, rod and all. She stared openmouthed at me, delicate peach-colored cotton in a death grip in her fist and puddled at her feet
I shrugged. “The other one . . . Adriana?” I made the name a question and she nodded. “Didn’t tell me squat. She showed up, caused a scene, challenged me to a duel, said I’d be put up before the tribunal of Pacific lords. Then she left.”
“A duel? The Pacific lords?”
“To the death. And yes.”
She blinked a couple of times, batting lashes almost long enough to create a breeze. “Oh my. You certainly have managed to antagonize her.”
“It wasn’t hard.” My tone was dry. “She was monumentally rude and looking to take offense.”
My visitor threw back her head and let out a peal of honest laughter. “That would be Adriana all right.”
“I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me where the ‘Isle of Serenity’ is and when I’m supposed to be there? Or are you the escort?”
The woman’s head tipped down, her eyes narrowing dangerously. Her voice took on a dangerous purr. “She truly didn’t tell you?”
“Nope. Got pissy, issued her challenge, and told me that since I wouldn’t treat her like a proper princess she didn’t feel compelled to tell me squat.”
“That is also like Adriana and completely unacceptable.” The woman smiled again, but this time it was more a baring of teeth. “As you guessed, I’m a siren; in fact, I’m as much a princess as Adriana and as you.”
She sounded defiant about it, as if she expected me to argue with her, and I did, but obviously not in the way she expected. “I’m no princess. Not even a little.”
“Oh, but you are.” She shook her head, her blue-green eyes dancing with mischief. “You come from a royal line. Your great-grandfather was brother to the queen. In fact, you come from the Pacific royal line, just like Adriana. And she has pissed off so many of the other royals that having an alternative, even an unlettered heathen like you, will put her in a very precarious position indeed.”
“Unlettered heathen?” I tried not to sound as hideously insulted as I felt but didn’t quite manage it.
“You don’t know the first thing about our culture, do you?” Her smile was poisonously sweet.
“Well, no. But unlettered heathen?” I repeated the words with some heat. “That has got to be an insult.”
Her cheeks went a teeny bit pink. “I’m sorry. I’m just quoting some of the more vocal members of the family. Atrocious snobs for the most part.” She paused. “Just so you know.”
“I take it you’re not from the Pacific line.”
She blinked and blushed more furiously. “Oh dear. I really am handling this badly. How rude of me. I haven’t introduced myself, have I?”
“Nope.”
She curtsied. Actually pulled out her skirt and dipped a leg back before bowing her head for a split second. Then she stood. “I am Princess Eirene Medusi of the Aegean royal line, but you may call me Ren. I do beg your pardon. It was unbelievably gauche of me not to introduce myself the moment I walked in.”
“It’s no big deal.” Right now, the lack of a proper introduction seemed like the least of my worries.
She gave me a long, measuring stare. “You actually mean that. You’re not going to throw a fit or challenge me for the insult?”
I smiled. “Nope.”
She grinned back at me, showing a set of fetching dimples. “How very refreshing. If we’re not careful, I may actually come to like you.” Her voice bubbled with amusement.
“Don’t sound so shocked.”
“Oh, but it is surprising. Your branch of the family and mine very politely loathe each other. Your side considers us upstarts because my mother broke off from the clan and formed her own hierarchy. We think they’re a bunch of pompous . . . well, never mind. Let’s just say that my motive here was to see if I could catch Adriana having done something embarrassing. And I have.” Her delight was obvious. She gave me a conspiratorial wink. “Of course, the excuse we gave was something else entirely.”
“Which was?”
“We’re giving you a gift to welcome you to the family.”
A gift? I tried to think positive and not conjure up mental images of big wooden horses. After all, my visitor could apparently get inside my skull.
“Adriana is going to hate having you actually show up for the hearing before the queens.” Ren sounded positively gleeful. “You’ll appear before the queens, not the lords. Entirely different areas of authority. The lords tribunal handles the laws of the sea. The queens deal with family matters. Oh, this is delicious! She would have had you at the wrong time and in the wrong place on the island. Queen Lopaka will be beside herself at the insult to her brother’s great-grandchild.”
“It’s the same queen as when my great-grandfather was alive? Yikes. She must be a sturdy old girl. Then you’re going to tell me where, when, and how?”
“Oh, better than that.” She waved a hand, making the bracelet of seashells and tourmaline wound with gold wire she wore glitter in the sunlight. “If I can possibly manage it, I’m going to take you there myself. I can’t wait to see Adriana’s expression when you appear.”
Ren’s voice was delighted, but I could hear a deep bitterness in her words. She really did loathe the other princess. While I didn’t have any reason to love Adriana, I’m not a fool. I was staying out of the middle of that catfight. “Um, I’m under house arrest.”