Page 75 of Fortune's Blade

I turned to see him surrounded by the pissed off guards, who he was batting away like annoying gnats. And then noticed the woman in the seat of honor on the queen’s right. It was the Pythia, looking uncomfortable, perhaps because my butt was in her face.

I moved it slightly, and she flashed me a look out of pale blue eyes that I couldn’t read. That was probably just as well, as the last time we’d met, I had tried to kill her. I had been laboring under a misapprehension caused by the North American consul, who had wanted to drive a rift between her and my father, and had used me to do it.

And yet, she limited her reaction to seeing me again to a stern look? I remembered the wide-eyed, frightened woman she had been that night, and did not understand what had changed. But something had.

I looked from her to Mircea on the queen’s other side, who was looking quite at home, and as perfect as if the fight in the arena had never happened. His daywear had been exchanged for dark blue velvet robes with silver embroidery at the neck and the cuffs of the tight-fitting sleeves. His hair was dark and shining, as were his eyes, which reflected my flames as he looked at me.

His expression was neutral, and as usual gave nothing away unless he wanted it to. But his gaze was strangely intense. I didn’t understand it for a moment, as he had seen me in many guises through the years, with this far from being the strangest of them. But then I realized: yes, he had seen guises, but he hadn’t seen me, not without Dory being present.

He had never seen me just on my own, with nothing else in the way. Not before today in the arena, where there had been no time for scrutiny. In a real sense, then, my father and I were meeting face to face for the first time.

I suddenly felt flustered and looked away, not wanting to know whether he approved of what he saw.

And met another pair of eyes, only these were easier to hold, despite not looking any happier. If anything, the opposite was true. Marlowe was on the other side of father, leaning forward so that he could see past him, and looking as fierce as he had when faced by an army of fey.

He had cleaned up nicely, however, with his goatee well-trimmed and his own robes, deep green and without ornament, being attractive enough. But his hair was a riot of dark curls that it appeared no comb had ever touched. I blinked at them, wondering if he had merely forgotten to brush them, or if this was supposed to be a fashion statement.

I did not know.

“What is this?” he demanded furiously, as if he didn’t know what to make of me, either. “What fresh hell are you up to now?”

I gazed back at him, unsure how to respond to that. I looked at Ray, who was now flanked by a whole bevy of pixies with knives on their belts and swords slung over their backs. They looked rather fierce, possibly because of the previous batting, but Ray was snubbing them with the aplomb of a man who had recently stared down a giant, a dragon and a vampire senator.

“Ignore him,” Ray advised. “He’s just being a bitch.”

“Sit, sit,” the queen said impatiently, and I sat.

“I have a problem,” she began, before Marlowe cut her off.

“Haven’t you been listening?” His hand hit the table. “She’ll only make it worse! She’s a time bomb waiting to go off! Impossible to predict, and we don’t even know—”

He stopped talking rather abruptly, I assumed because father had silenced him. Outbursts were rarely useful and not his style. But when I leaned forward a little to look around Mircea, I found Marlowe with two tiny, leather clad guards in his face, small spears out and almost touching his nose.

Their expressions were eloquent, and I didn’t need to know the language to read the message: “Don’t try it.”

“Our apologies,” Mircea said, smiling ruefully. “Kit is still ruffled by our experiences in the arena. He doesn’t usually speak out of turn.”

“I should hope not,” the queen said, waving a small hand. The guards broke off and went back to their positions by the wall, but not without a few more spear flourishes in Marlowe’s direction.

“However,” Mircea said, and she scowled. “He has a point. Fairie appears to have brought out new abilities in Dorina, ones that she has had no chance to learn how to control. Employing them on any kind of a—”

“Bored now,” the queen said, and turned to the Pythia. “Are you going to try it, too?”

The pretty blonde, who was wearing a lovely gown of tissue of silver that clashed terribly with an ugly gold and ruby necklace, just sighed. And rolled her eyes, shook her head and drank wine, all at the same time, the latter rather aggressively. The queen smiled briefly at her and then switched it to me.

“As I was saying, I have a problem that we should discuss, but perhaps I should put the little one to sleep first, before we are interrupted. He gets fussy when he’s tired.”

“Oh.” I tried to hide my disappointment. “Do you have to?”

Her smile broadened, from smug satisfaction to something more genuine. “You can come with me, if you like.”

I nodded and got up.

“I gotta go, too,” Ray said, somewhat aggressively for one addressing a queen. “She can’t talk without me and I—”

He broke off, but the queen wasn’t fooled. “You don’t trust us?”

He didn’t answer, but she didn’t look offended. “She is perfectly safe here.”

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