The Arbora got to her feet. Moon judged her age as well into maturity, but not near the point where the dark bronze sheen of her skin would begin to gray. Her dark hair was straight and her face round, her features pleasant. She looked Tempest right in the eye and said, “My name is Russet, teacher of Opal Night. I’ll tell our queen what you’ve said, and how you speak of the consort you’re supposedly protecting.”
Moon blinked, caught off guard. Even Tempest looked more surprised than offended.
Arbora had a higher status within the court than warriors, but seeing one actually confront a queen was rare.
Beacon and the other warriors looked equally taken aback. Tempest said, slowly, incredulously, as if she couldn’t believe she was having this conversation, “I meant no disrespect toward the consort.”
Russet’s eyes narrowed. Obviously unconvinced, she inclined her head stiffly to Tempest and walked out, the younger Arbora in the doorway scattering before her.
Tempest sighed, and lowered her brows to give Moon a look that suggested that this was clearly his fault. Moon hissed at her and headed for the back of the main chamber. As he passed Dart, he heard the warrior mutter to Gust, “They’re not going to invite us to eat with them, are they?”
Moon went to stand in front of the opening into the central well. The huge space was lit from high above, the shafts of morning light making the green drapes of vine darker and glinting off the mist from the waterfall. He could see garden terraces a few hundred paces below this level, all heavily planted with bushes, small trees, vines, berry brambles, and the green leafy plants that usually meant belowground root vegetables. The reservoir that caught the waterfall runoff was lined with flat gray stones. Several Arbora walked along it, some of them pausing to pull up basket traps that might be for fish or crustaceans.
Russet’s reaction had confused him. But then Russet was just one Arbora, doing what Arbora did best and reminding the Aeriat to follow their own rules.
Vines rustled as Tempest moved up behind him. Moon felt the back of his neck itch with her proximity, but he didn’t shift. She said, “If they don’t send someone to greet me before the sun reaches noon, we’re leaving.”
Moon’s breath caught in his throat. He hadn’t considered this, that Opal Night’s failure to greet Tempest might negate the whole arrangement. If Tempest took him back to Indigo Cloud, they couldn’t refuse to accept him, could they? If they weren’t all dead, if Jade hadn’t run into disaster on her way here. He said, carefully keeping his voice neutral, “‘We?’”
“Not you,” she said, her voice dry. “If Indigo Cloud refuses to take you back, I’m not getting stuck with you.”
Moon’s whole body went tight, as if somebody had punched him in the heart. Jade’s not coming. Tempest knows she’s not coming.
He flung himself away from the wall, shoved past Tempest, and slammed across the room to the bench where he had left his pack. He didn’t realize he had shifted until he reached for the worn leather and saw the black scales and fully extended claws.
He started for the door and Tempest came from overhead, bounced off a root pillar and landed in front of him. She demanded, “What are you doing?”
“I’m leaving.” You would think it was obvious.
“What? You can’t—” She hissed in disbelief, then said, “Moon, that was a joke.”
Moon lashed his tail, frustrated, furious. It struck him then, the difference between what she had said and what he had somehow heard. But he was too angry for that to make much of a difference. “Get out of my way.”
She growled in exasperation. “You can’t go back to Indigo Cloud! They can’t take you in unless Opal Night formally gives you up—”
“I know that!” He meant to say the words but they came out as a snarl of rage so loud the watching warriors flinched. He hissed in a breath, and forced his voice down to the normal range. “Get out of my way.”
Behind him, stupid Dart said, “He wouldn’t really go solitary—”
“He is a solitary, idiot,” Streak told him. “That’s why this queen doesn’t want him.”
Beacon hissed at them. “Shut up.”
Tempest watched him intently. She knew he was serious now. She thought he was crazy, but she knew he meant every word. She said, “You know I have to stop you.”
Moon could feel her trying to force him to shift to groundling, but that was much harder to do when he was already in this form. Pearl hadn’t been able to make him shift, and Tempest wasn’t nearly so strong. He showed his front row of fangs. “So stop me.”
She grimaced in disbelief. “You won’t fight a queen.”
There was an idea. Fighting to the death with Tempest would solve all his problems. He sneered, “That’s what your dead sister thought.”
Tempest hit him in pure reflex, a backhanded blow that rocked Moon back even though he had been prepared for it. He didn’t give her a chance to think twice. He dropped to grab the kettle from the hearth and flung it into her face. She ducked, the ceramic shattered against the stone doorframe, and she charged him. He fell back, used her own momentum to flip her over his head. She tumbled but rolled to her feet, braced to lunge at him.
The ear-shattering roar from the corridor startled Tempest into bouncing backward and sent Moon leaping up to sink his claws into the wall. The scattered warriors all shifted to groundling and huddled in place.
The consort who stepped into the room was in his winged form, a full head taller than Moon and broader in the shoulders and chest. His spines were flared, his wings partially extended to brush both sides of the wide doorway.
In a level voice that still managed to convey boiling rage, he said, “What is this?”
Uh oh, Moon thought, still breathing hard from the aborted fight.
Moving slowly and carefully, Tempest straightened up and dropped her spines. “It was a misunderstanding.” The consort regarded her for what felt like far too many heartbeats. It seemed evident that he considered that explanation inadequate. Moon wasn’t sure how bad it was for a visiting queen to be caught fighting a consort, especially a consort who didn’t belong to her. From everyone’s reaction, he was guessing it was fairly serious. Tempest added, belatedly, “I thank you for your intervention.”
The consort didn’t react, not with so much as a flick of a spine. After a very long, silent moment, he cocked his head toward Moon. “Get down from there.”
Moon thought about it, but decided he didn’t have much of a choice. After this, Tempest was unlikely to let him provoke her enough to kill him. He dropped to the floor.
He landed two paces away from the consort, who stared down at him. The room was so silent it didn’t sound as if anyone was breathing. Moon realized what the consort was waiting for, and thought, Why not? He had no reason to protect himself and being knocked unconscious would be a relief. He shifted to groundling.
The blood pounding in his temples was suddenly louder, and the room swayed. Moon took a deep breath and stayed on his feet. The cheekbone where Tempest’s first blow had landed was numb and he could feel the skin around his eye swelling. Tempest made a sound, a faint intake of breath; possibly she hadn’t realized how hard she had hit him.
The consort twitched a spine, the only hint of agitation he had shown so far. His gaze moved over Moon from head to toe. Betraying nothing, he said, “Get your things.”
Well, you got your wish, Moon thought sourly, and looked around for his pack. He was getting thrown out. Leaning over to pick up the fallen pack made him feel less faint but more nauseous. He stumbled a little as he straightened up.
The consort still stared at him. “That’s all you brought?” He turned to Tempest.