Lucivar took another look at each of them. “That’s enough for today. At least from me. Prince Raine?”
“Some time to reflect would be valuable,” Raine said. “Then I’ll meet with the Ladies for the Protocol lesson after the midday meal, and the gentlemen later in the afternoon.”
“Very well. You’re all dismissed—except you five.”
Lucivar walked to the end of the room and looked out the windows. Then he waited for the young Warlord Princes to join him. Still looking outside, he said, “Have any of you had a problem with her? Any questionable or inappropriate behavior that Prince Sadi should have known about?”
No response.
He turned and looked at Daemonar.
The boy sighed. “Alvita came into my bedroom recently and displayed her breasts.”
Four boys sucked in a breath. Lucivar couldn’t tell if they were envious or appalled. But his boy . . .
“And when you mentioned that to Prince Sadi?” Lucivar asked mildly.
“Well, I haven’t had a chance to talk to him, have I?” Daemonar protested.
Lucivar stared at him.
“I handled it,” Daemonar said, an edge in his voice. “I told her to leave. When she didn’t, I put a Green shield around her and shoved her out the door. And locked the door.”
“But didn’t mention it to the man who has made the commitment to protect all of you who live here?” It was a struggle not to snarl at the boy. If they’d been alone, this discussion would have been a lot louder.
“It wasn’t an immediate concern, so I asked Holt to give me a slot in the Prince’s audience times. Hell’s fire, Father. If Uncle Daemon didn’t draw a line about when we could talk to him about . . . whatever . . . the man would spend all day every day listening to people complain about something or about each other or whine about something else until Breen got annoyed and started nipping people to get them out of his study. I didn’t think it was important enough to interfere with his other duties. He’s got plenty of those.”
Protective of the man. He couldn’t argue with that.
The other four boys looked ready to bolt—or lose their breakfast out of fear of being so close when Green squared off against Ebon-gray. Good. Let them learn when to yield and when to stand.
“Do you still think it isn’t important?” Lucivar asked.
“Considering what Uncle Daemon is dealing with right now, it can wait,” Daemonar replied.
“What’s he dealing with?” one of the boys asked.
“Some old trouble.”
A dismissive response, and an interesting way to put it. The question in his son’s eyes was also interesting.
“Tell them,” Lucivar said. “Better to have all the Warlord Princes on guard for possible trouble.”
“Yes, sir.”
Lucivar walked out of the room and headed for the part of the Hall where he would most likely find Holt and Beale.
“Ah, Prince Yaslana,” Beale said when Lucivar located the butler. “If you wouldn’t mind waiting in Prince Sadi’s study, Holt and I will be with you in a few minutes.”
“Sure.”
He prowled Daemon’s study, turning when the door opened. But it wasn’t Holt or Beale who’d opened it; it was the Dharo Boy, who was now Mrs. Beale’s primary assistant cook. Lucivar still didn’t know what the young Warlord’s actual name was, since nobody called him anything but Dharo Boy.
“Compliments of Mrs. Beale,” the Dharo Boy said, setting a mug of coffee and a plate of food on the table in front of the long sofa. “She thought you could use some sustenance.”
“I guess she heard about my way of giving instructions.”
The Dharo Boy grinned. “Prince, we’ve all heard about it.”
Well, wasn’t that just fine?
The Warlord left.
Lucivar had time to enjoy the food and the rich coffee before Holt and Beale returned to hear whatever he wanted to say officially.
Daemon stepped off the landing web in front of the Hall and let his Black power gently wash through the place to get a feel for what he’d be walking into.
No hot fury, so nobody had pissed off Lucivar too much. But . . .
Breen, along with several more Scelties, rushed out to greet him and give him the news.
One human female went hissy-cat boo-hoo and had to be penned in her room. Yas said so. The other females had special lessons instead of going where they were supposed to. Teachers were confused but no one wanted to ask Yas about that. Except the Scelties. They asked so they would know where to herd the females. Lord Weston and Prince Raine and Daemonar were herding the young males.
Daemon walked into the great hall and saw Beale waiting for him.
“High drama?” he asked.
“High drama,” Beale agreed. “Your brother is staying over for a day or two.”
“He’s in his usual suite?”
Beale hesitated. “Not the suite he occupies when Lady Marian is with him. He’s in the suite he used to occupy when he lived here with your father.”
Which meant Lucivar was in the High Lord’s square of rooms, which was now his square of rooms.
Daemon felt a moment’s light-headedness before his temper iced and he strode to the staircase in the informal receiving room.
*Daemon?* Breen called, running after him. *Daemon!*
He was halfway up the stairs before her unhappy whine penetrated his fury. He hurried down the stairs, scooped up the puppy, then went back up the stairs and headed for his suite. The cold that crackled around him had everyone scrambling to get out of his way.
When he reached his sitting room, he set Breen in her basket, gave her a quick pat, and said, “Stay here while I talk to Yas.” Then he went out the glass doors that opened to the large balcony and spotted Lucivar in the garden below.
Almost blinded by rage, Daemon rushed down the stairs to the courtyard. “What in the name of Hell are you doing here?”
Lucivar rose slowly and dropped a weed in the basket next to him. “Weeding. This garden needs work. I guess you don’t let Tarl in here very often.”
“Don’t play with me, Prick,” Daemon snarled. “What are you doing here?”
No one came to this square of rooms. This was where he stayed when his control was slipping, when he needed isolation. At least, that was how he’d used this square in the past. When Surreal was at the Hall and wanted his company, he stayed in the bedroom adjoining hers. Otherwise, he was here now, close to Titian and Zoey and the other girls who needed to feel protected—even if that protection came from the Sadist.
But having Lucivar here . . .
“I asked Beale and Helene for my old suite.” Lucivar tipped his head to indicate the open glass doors on the second floor. “Those rooms were mine when I lived here.”
“Lucivar . . .”
Lucivar looked him in the eyes. “You and I both know that you could have me on my knees begging if that’s what you wanted to do. But the Ebon-gray I wear is as dark as that Jewel can be without being Black, and frankly, Bastard, when it’s leashed your sexual heat rolls off me like it always did. I’m in the same position you are, have been for years, but I saw it happen to you and did what I could to minimize the problems the last phase of the sexual heat causes for men who wear Jewels as dark as ours.”
Daemon took a step back. Felt the cold of his temper break against concern. “You and Marian?”