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Chapter 19

We lay entwined together on a bed of Doyle’s hair It was like having fur rubbing the length of my bare body My head was cradled in the curve of his shoulder His body was like war his waist, over the curve of his hip, an idle gesture, not exactly sexual More to know that I could touch hi each other for several minutes His one hand was trapped underneathme close, but not too close He wanted rooive me room to touch him He wanted the feel of hands on his body It was as if he wasn’t merely starved for sex, but starved for touch I knew that humans could becoh touch, even if every other need is met But I hadn’t known it of the sidhe, especially the unmovable object known as the Queen’s Darkness

But he lay besidethe edge of li across the ht ht his hand up to e of my cheek "What do you see?"

I set my blouse on the mirror"

He turned his head as ht and mine on his hair He had a very wide smile when he turned back "Have you looked for your bra?"

I gave him wide eyes and started to prop myself up to see the rest of the bureau over his body He held entle hand on my shoulder "Behind you"

I fell back, still in the circle of his arreen lace bra, which hadforlornly from the philodendron plant that sat on the black lacquered ar like a badly chosen Christ "I don’t re in that much of a hurry"

He curved his free hand overcloser to ainst his body "I was in a hurry I wanted to see you naked I wanted to feel the touch of you on th of th in his arainst

I slid htness of his buttocks and drew hiainst me He moved his own hands down ether until I had to wonder if it hurt hi front of th of hi He drove hiainst ic a second before the voice filled the rooht?"

We both rolled over to see the Queen of Air and Darkness, Andais,on the foot of her own bed watching us

Chapter 20

The queen wore an elaborate black ball goith black satin gleaht, black ribbons to hold back the flounces, black satin gloves to cover her white arms, black straps over pale shoulders Her black hair was piled atop her head with trails of curls artfully fra her face and slender neck Her lips were the color of fresh blood, her tricolored grey eyes had been kohl-lined so that they see her dressed to the nines was nothing new Andais was fond of parties, and any excuse would do What was neas the fact that the bed behind her was empty The queen never slept alone

We stayed half-frozen, staring back at those eyes Doyle squeezed"Your Majesty, how good of you to call, though unexpected" My voice was neutral, or as neutral as I could get it It was considered polite toin like this You never knehat peoplery I hadn’t done anything to anger her, not that I knew of at least

I settled ainst Doyle’s body I wished for a robe, but knew that covering up when she’d been nothing but polite would imply that I didn’t like, or trust, the Queen The fact that it was true was a matter for my oorries, not hers

"Ia fact We did not expect your call tonight"

"It is not night, niece, it is , just not yet dawn I see you have slept no s to do than sleep"

She touched the full skirt of her ball dress "Yes, another party" She didn’t look happy about it

I wanted to ask if the party had not gone to her liking, but didn’t dare It was too personal a question to ask the queen, and she was too easily offended

She took a deep breath that own shift, alh around her body, a bustier without a boost If you weren’t too well endowed, you could wear those gowns that seemed to just float around your body Forto happen Nudity on purpose is very different fro out of your dress by accident

She turned those draed, narrowed, to one I knew all too well Malice

"You’re bleeding, lanced down at Doyle and realized he was still ave her a view of his back and the fingernail marks on his dark skin

"Yes, my queen," he said in his perfectly neutral, perfectly careful voice

"Who has harmed my Darkness?" But her eyes were already on aze

"I do not see it as harm, my Queen," Doyle said

Her eyes flicked down to hiirl, Meredith"

I pushed up froht you wished irl, Aunt Andais"

"I don’t know if I’ve seen your bare breasts before, Meredith They are a little large for a sidhe, but very nice" Her eyes didn’t hold lust, or kindness, only a dangerous light All that she’d said so far could be mistaken for politeness She’d never seen my breasts bare, so she should co to be attractive, which I was not I just happened to have no clothes on I did not feel the least bit luscious aroundheterosexual, much more

"And you, my Darkness, it’s been so many centuries since I saw you nude that I can’t remember Is there some reason you have your back to ht? Is there some aberration that I don’t remehts to co he flaunt himself to her, that was impolite If it had been alo to hell

"There is nothing spoiled here, Aunt Andais," I said, and I knew h I’d lost the knack of keeping my voice in line over the years I’d been away fro to have to relearn, and quickly

She gaveto you, Princess Meredith I was speaking to my Darkness"

She’d used my title; not niece, or just n

Doyle squeezedme to behave He answered Andais, but not in words He rolled onto his back with his knees bent so his thigh hid hi closest to her, slowly, like a curtain co down

There was heat in her eyes now, real heat, real need "My,secrets"

He turned and looked at her "Nothing you couldn’t have discovered at any time in the last thousand years" Noas his voice that was not neutral It was just a slight change in tone, a mild inflection of reproof, but I’d never heard him lose even that much control in front of Andais

It washand on his sto to I don’t thinkht not hurt ht hurt ret it later, but dead is dead

The look she gave Doyle was enough to tightenof nails It h to rehtly

"Have a care, Darkness, or I will grow distracted and forget why I called"

"We await your news, Queen Andais," I said

She looked atfrom her eyes, replaced by puzzlement and, underneath, tiredness Andais wasn’t usually this easy to read, I think because she didn’t have to be careful around anyone "The Nas to the floor and sat up Suddenly it didn’t matter that he was nude, nobody cared The Nameless was the worst of both courts, Seelie and Unseelie It was the last great spell that the two courts had cooperated on They had stripped thery, to allow us to live in this new country Nobody had demanded it of the sidhe, but we didn’t want to be forced out of the last country that would have us, so we’d sacrificed some of ere in order to become more huin to fade, but that wasn’t true The sidhe had been fading for centuries The Nameless was just a necessary evil So we didn’t turn America into another battlefield

"Did you set it free, my queen?" Doyle asked

"Of course not," she said

"Then who?" he asked

"I could tell you a pretty story, but in the end, the answer is, simply, I don’t know" It was obvious she didn’t like saying it, and equally obvious that she was speaking the truth She stripped off one of the black gloves in an abrupt h her hands

"There are very few beings in faerie who could do such a thing," Doyle said

"Don’t you think I know that?" she snapped

"What would you have us do here, my queen?"

"I don’t know, but the last hint we had of it, it was traveling west"

"Do you believe it will co the glove against her ar we have given up, and that was a great deal of wielding power If it was sent for Meredith, then you would need all the preparation tie"

"Do you truly think it was loosed to hunt the princess?"

"If it had ed the countryside by now But it has not" She stood, giving us a view of the nearly naked back of the dress She turned back to us with an abrupt gesture "It vanished frohts, very quickly We cannot track it, which hly placed help"

"But the Nameless is a part of the courts, a part of who you were You should be able to track it as you would track your own shadow" The moment I finished, I knew I should have kept quiet

All the anger flowed into her face, her posture, her hands where they gripped her elbows She shivered with rage I think for a second she was too angry to speak

Doyle stood, putting himself in front of me "Have you told the Seelie Court?"

"You do not need to hide her away, Darkness I a too hard to keep her alive to kill her myself And, yes, the Seelie knohat has happened"

"Will the two courts coether to hunt the Nameless?" he asked He hadn’taround his body like a child That wasn’t exactly the way to be a strong presence I nored me

"No"

"But it is to each one’s benefit, surely"

"Taranis is being difficult He’s acting as if the Na that all his light has no taint" She looked like she’d tasted soive no aid, for to give aid is to ad"

"That is foolishness"

She nodded "He was always one more interested in the illusion of purity than in purity itself"

"What can stand against the Na aloud

"We do not know, for we bound it without testing it But it is full of old, oldeven the Unseelie" She sat down on the end of the bed, alht if they can truly control it, it is a powerful weapon"

"What do you need of me, my queen?"

She looked up at that, and the look was not unfriendly "What if I said come home, come home and protect me? What if I said I don’t feel safe without you and Frost at my side?"

He dropped to one knee His face was lost in a wave of his own hair "I am still captain of the Queen’s Ravens"