Moon shifted to groundling, folded his arms, and tried not to tense his shoulders. Stone was silent in a way that seemed to speak volumes. Moon wanted to say something, like I didn’t mean for this to happen. Saying it to Stone would be useless; he should have said it to Jade. He had helped Ash do something terribly stupid. A real consort would have ignored her or deflected her attention and never let it get to this point.
Self-consciously he looked for Ash, trying to see if she was perched somewhere on the vines or branches, but she wasn’t here yet. Maybe she won’t come.
On a broad balcony built out onto a curving branch above and to one side of the greeting hall entrance, Tempest stood under the shadows of the vines.
After a moment, a subdued group with two queens and several warriors walked out of the greeting hall entrance and moved to the opposite side of the platform from Moon and Stone. The two queens must be unattached, because they were Ash’s age or younger, and they hadn’t been among those introduced by Tempest. The warriors were in groundling form, all young and pretty, wearing colorful clothes and an excess of jewelry. He wondered if these were the rash companions that Willow had mentioned. So far they were the only spectators. Keeping his voice low, he asked Stone, “Why aren’t the Arbora coming out?”
Stone said, with a tinge of irony, “They have more sense. The court won’t want to make more of this than it has to.”
Moon heard a rustle overhead and looked up in time to see Ash shoot out of an opening high in the curve of the mountain-thorn. He twitched and managed not to shift, watching her arc toward Jade.
Jade waited until almost the last instant, then twisted in midair and fell out of Ash’s path. Ash banked smoothly back toward her and the two circled each other. They might have been talking but they were too far away for Moon to hear.
This went on long enough for Moon’s already tense nerves to tighten past bearing. He kept hoping Ash would change her mind, but the way she steadily gained height wasn’t a good sign. Jade had to see it, but she wasn’t trying to counter. Then Ash suddenly twisted to fall on Jade.
The two queens met in a furious flurry of wings and tails, plunging down toward the ground far below. Moon set his jaw, though his whole body shook with the instinct to leap into the air and join the fight.
The flurry stopped, with Jade on Ash’s back. Jade’s wings shot out and cupped to slow their descent. Ash flapped weakly and Jade released her, and watched as she glided down toward the lower branches of the colony.
Three warriors jumped off the platform to spiral down after her. The others stood there, not looking at each other, clearly uncomfortable and guilty. Jade flew leisurely toward the balcony where Tempest waited. It was empty now, the other queen having already vanished inside.
Stone just grunted, and said, “Come back in.”
There wasn’t anything else to do. Moon followed him.
They returned to their guest quarters. The warriors were there now, sitting near the pool. This time it was Song who jumped to her feet and demanded, “What happened?”
“Jade won,” Stone said succinctly, taking a seat on the furs.
“We knew that would happen. But what…” Song took in Moon’s expression, and subsided. “I don’t really need to know the details.”
Moon went to the far side of the chamber, where the wall curved around. There was an opening in the woven barrier, a small shelf that extended through the outer wall under an arbor of vines. It looked down onto a broad garden platform with fruit trees. Only a few Arbora worked on it now, climbing the trees at the far end to pick fruit. Moon sat down on the shelf, hoping no one came after him.
The breeze was cool with the approach of evening, thick with the scent of the white flowers on the sapling trees. He wondered what they would do if Frost grew up to be headstrong and overly aggressive, starting fights with every other young queen in reach. He concluded glumly that Indigo Cloud would probably be lucky to get to the point where that was the worst thing they had to worry about. After a time, he heard someone come up the steps from the walkway.
He heard Jade’s voice as she spoke to the others, too low to catch the words. Then she picked her way over toward the back of the chamber, toward Moon. She ducked under the arbor of vines and settled next to him. He slid a look at her, saw she was in her Arbora form, apparently unhurt.
She said, “I spoke with Ice and Tempest and Shadow. We came to the conclusion that Ash is hotheaded even for a queen, and she would probably have gotten in a fight sooner or later. They expressed relief that the fight was with a queen who had the self-control not to hurt her badly, and that the consort she chose to harass was not one who was so sheltered as to be terrified by her. You weren’t terrified by her, were you?”
Moon eyed her. He couldn’t see much resemblance to Pearl, but this was one of the times when he could tell that Jade was descended from Stone. “No.”
Jade flicked away a stray flower petal. “I didn’t think so.”
So that seemed to be the end of it. It had all been mostly Moon’s fault but he had avoided any of the consequences, by virtue of being a consort. Except that all of Emerald Twilight thought he was a crazy savage, but he was used to that. “What does our court think about me?” Jade’s brows lifted at the unexpected question. She didn’t answer immediately, thinking it over. “The teachers and hunters like you. They’ve spent more time with you, they know you better. And they know what they owe you after you went into the Dwei hive after Heart and the others. The soldiers don’t like you, but then…”
Moon had figured that. “They blame me for bringing the Fell.” Jade pressed her lips together. “They’ll get over it.” Her tone suggested that they had better. “In the meantime, Knell will keep them from starting any trouble.”
That was a surprise. “Why? He told Stone he didn’t think I should be with the court.”
Jade gave him a dry look. “That was before you started showing interest in Chime. Chime is his clutchmate, and since he changed, he hasn’t had any status among the Aeriat. So becoming the favorite of a consort wasn’t something anyone expected for him.”
Moon had realized Chime’s lot in the court had improved by association with him. But he didn’t think Chime had calculated it. He thought Chime had just been drawn to someone who was also different, who was a misfit. “That must make it hard for Knell.”
“Knell can handle it. When Chime changed, it was a shock, but it finally convinced everyone who still had their heads buried in the dirt that something was wrong. All the doubters finally admitted that we needed to move to another colony. If a few of the others had changed too, it would probably have made it easier on Chime. He wouldn’t have stood out quite so much. But that won’t happen now.”
“Now that the court is away from the old colony, maybe Chime will change back.” If that happened, Moon was certain Chime would miss flying, but Chime had also made it clear that he would rather be an Arbora than a warrior.
“Flower didn’t think so.” Jade frowned absently. “It was strange enough that it happened once. But we’ll have to wait and see. We’re away from the Fell influence, we have plenty of food at the colony, and more room than we can fill.”
Moon looked out over the terrace. “If we can stay there.” She nodded, resigned. “If we can stay.”
Outside the walls of thorn, the dark of evening settled over the forest. Jade had gone back in some time ago, but Moon stayed, still wanting to avoid conversation with the others until the thrilling excitement of Jade fighting another queen over him had worn off.