“I’m sure he’d come to you, your majesty.”
I winced at the title. “No. Just take me to him.”
Despite her protests, her sense of duty couldn’t disobey the order. She led me through the maze of corridors where I earned a number of curious looks from the various occupants. Since my initial arrival, I’d become sort of a common fixture around here, accepted and ignored. Now people regarded me with the same frightened curiosity I’d first received.
Outdoors, we found Dorian in one of the gardens, standing over a small, fluffy dog. Muran hovered nearby, and between them, they tried unsuccessfully to coax the dog to lie down and roll over. It merely sat looking at them, tail thumping.
Dorian noticed me first, his face breaking into a wide smile. The healers had been at work on him too; no trace of the burns remained. “Queen Eugenie, lovely to see you out and about.”
Muran nearly fell all over himself to bow. “Y-your majesty.”
“We need to talk,” I told Dorian firmly. “Alone.”
“I never tire of being alone with you. Nia, take this unreasonable beast away with you. And take the dog too.” He waved them off.
Once alone with him, I demanded, “What the hell were you thinking?”
“There are so many incidents to which you could be referring, I don’t even know where to start.”
“Yes, you do. You made me queen of Aeson’s kingdom.”
“Your kingdom now, my dear.”
I paced around in the grass irritably. It was the middle of the day, crisp and sunny. “I didn’t want it. You had no right to do it.”
“It’s done. Besides, if I hadn’t, someone else might have snatched it up. Would you have liked to see your charming little sister on the throne?”
That stopped me. Extensive searching had found no trace of Jasmine. She seemed to have gotten away cleanly during the yeshin fight.
“Give it to someone else. There has to be a better choice than Jasmine or me.”
“Give it away?” He laughed his wondrous melodic laugh, the one that declared all the world was a joke. “The land recognized you. You can’t go back on that. It’s yours forever…well, at least until you die. Or pass it on to an heir.”
“Great. Here we go again. I might have known you’d start pushing that.”
“I did no such thing, but…since you brought it up…”
I stopped pacing and glared at him. “Quit it. I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t even want to think about it.”
Some of his humor faded. “Maybe you should. Jasmine certainly will be. If she has a son first, all your good intentions won’t matter. You say you don’t want it, but you know…it could all turn out differently if you beat her to it.”
It was so alarmingly close to what Storm King had told me in the Underworld that I didn’t even know what to say at first. Was this a coincidence? I felt pretty sure that all I’d seen there had been an illusion, meant to test my resolve and make me face my fears.
“What’s wrong?” Dorian asked, seeing my face. There was nothing sly or knowing in his expression, only worry.
“Nothing. Look, forget about the prophecy for a minute. Go back to the Alder Land thing. If you were so worried about it falling into the wrong hands, why didn’t you just seize it for yourself?”
“Why, Eugenie, do you think me so power hungry?”
“Yes. I do. I’ve heard and seen as much. When these kingdoms were formed, you wanted more. And you had your chance when Aeson died.” He didn’t answer, and I pushed on, knowing I was right. “But that would have upset a lot of people, wouldn’t it? Maiwenn and the others might have turned against you. But by making me Alder Queen…you got a placeholder. No one can say anything because I defeated Aeson fairly in battle, and now you have easy access to the same power. You plan to use me and this fucking title to extend your control.”
“You have a very low opinion of me. No wonder you’re so upset.”
“Come on. Why else would you have done it?”
He stared in astonishment. “Why, because I love you.” He said it as though it was the most reasonable thing in the whole world. Like I should have known this already.
“You barely even know me.”
“We’ve known each other almost as long as you’ve known the kitsune, and I daresay you think you’re in love with him. Your little foray that night demonstrated as much. By the gods, that was one of the most foolish things I’ve ever witnessed. You stopped breathing. I thought you were dead.”
I heard the catch in his voice, and it really struck me that he just might love me after all. It gave me a strange feeling, one I didn’t know how to cope with. Dorian loving a person was almost incomprehensible. I thought of him as loving only his own amusements and ambitions.
“I do love Kiyo,” I said in a low voice. “And if we can work it out…I’m going to-”
He shrugged, carefree and lax again. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t mind sharing you.”
“You told Aeson you don’t share.”
“As a general rule, no-and certainly not with the likes of him-but I don’t think you’ll give me exclusivity, so I must compromise.”
“There isn’t going to be any exclusivity or compromise.”
“So you say. You also said you’d never come to my bed in the first place. Or that you’d ever use magic. You probably said a dozen other things too. We all saw how those turned out.”
“Stop it. I’m serious about this.”
“And so am I. You’re a queen now. You control part of this world. Ally with me, and we’ll be the greatest power since your father.”
“I don’t want the power or the Alder Land.”
“It’s the Thorn Land now.”
“I-what?”
“The land conformed itself to you. The Alder Land was Aeson’s domain. Yours is the Thorn Land. You’re the Thorn Queen.”
“The smokethorn,” I recalled. If someone tried to force a crown of thorns on me, that was going to be seriously fucked up.
“Very fitting actually. A tree covered in beauty yet possessing a sharp and deadly core.”
I shook my head. “I don’t care about metaphors. I don’t want to rule this kingdom.”
He moved into my space, something passionate kindling in those gold-green eyes. “So what? You think you can just ignore it? Pretend it’ll go away? The land conformed itself to your will! You can’t turn away from that. Its survival depends on you-particularly since, for reasons only the gods know, you turned it into a wasteland.”
I faltered. “Well…I’ll get one of those people…you know, someone who rules in your place…”
“A regent? That’ll only work for so long. You can’t avoid the land. You have to come back and visit it, or it will die. You’re connected now.”
“I didn’t want this, Dorian.” I felt tired. Maybe getting up hadn’t been such a good idea after all. “You shouldn’t have done it.”
“We’ll have to agree to disagree on that, but I’ll do what I can to make amends. Take Shaya. She’d make an excellent regent. And I’ll give you Rurik and Nia and any other servants you seem to like reasonably well.”
“I don’t really like Rurik.”
“No, but he’ll be as loyal as that dog I just had. More so, actually, considering what an unreasonable little bastard it was. Rurik will sift through what’s left of Aeson’s guard and keep only those who’ll support you.”
“You mean who support Storm King.”
“It’s the best I can do,” he said with a shrug. “You may take it or not. And you’ll still have to fill other positions yourself. Nia will do nicely for a lady-in-waiting, but she’s not quite up to being a seneschal. You’ll need one of those. And a herald too.”
He spoke like he was reciting things I needed to pick up at the grocery store. “Oh, God. I’m trapped in the fucking Chronicles of Narnia.”
“I’m sure that would be an amusing reference, if I understood it. For now, I can do no more. I’m giving up some of my favorites for you. The rest is in your hands.” There was a smile on his face, but his eyes were serious. “No matter what you think of me and my motivations, I swear to you I wouldn’t have had you seize Aeson’s land if I didn’t think you were worthy. There’s power burning inside of you, Eugenie. I meant it when I said you’d surpass us all.”