But that raised the question: who had? Because they’d sure wanted somebody. Gessa had been right—they’d made a beeline for the stairs and never so much as looked at anything else.
“Why do the Svarestri want a troll kid dead?” I asked.
“They don’t!” Claire said, whirling around.
Olga didn’t say anything, but the look she gave me was eloquent. She didn’t agree with Claire, but she wasn’t going to argue with a frantic mother who was low on sleep. That never got anybody anywhere.
“It’s that bitch Efridis,” Claire told me. “She’ll do anything to see her son inherit!”
And, okay, Claire was the type who ran on nerves, even on a good day, and she hadn’t seen many good days lately. So she was a little distraught. But she nonetheless had a point.
Efridis was a bitch.
The beautiful blond fey queen was Caedmon’s sister, but other than for looks, I didn’t see a lot of resemblance. For example, she’d used her position to steal the rune now guarding baby Aiden for her son, a piece of work named ?subrand, who was the Svarestri heir apparent. Yeah, I know. The names kind of get to me, too.
But, basically, Caedmon’s sister, who had married the Svarestri king, had stolen baby Aiden’s protection to help her own son, who dreamed of a Faerie united under his rule.
And one land means one throne, doesn’t it?
?subrand had planned to inherit Caedmon’s kingdom, merge it with his own, and then go conquer everything else. And the fact that Caedmon had a son hadn’t really thrown a spanner into the works, because said son—Claire’s fiancé, Heidar—was half-human. And Blarestri law required their king to have more than half fey blood.
Which was good for Heidar, since it kept him out of the hot seat.
And was bad for Aiden, because it put him right in.
Because the law had neglected to say what kind of fey blood was required. So Claire’s, although Dark Fey, still counted. And she was slightly over fifty percent, thanks to that Brownie great-something grandma. Meaning that, while Heidar couldn’t inherit, his son could.
Thus making Aiden the target. His birth had knocked out ?subrand’s chances of succeeding to his uncle’s throne, something the Ice Prince had been kind of hot about. So much so that he’d tried to kill Claire while she was pregnant to prevent Aiden from ever being born. Yet, afterward, he’d also said that he wouldn’t hurt a child, but would wait for Aiden to grow up to duel him for the throne.
I would have laughed at that, but I’d asked around, and it seemed that, yes, the fey had the view that a baby wasn’t a baby until it was born. So, while ?subrand could retain his honor and kill it in the womb (killing an innocent human mother apparently didn’t count as an honor ding), his rep would take a hit if he murdered a child. And we’d eventually gotten the rune back, making future assassination attempts on Aiden much less likely to succeed anyway.
So, end of story, right?
Only no. Because ?subrand had done us a favor recently, and pimped on his batshit-crazy dad’s plan to bring back the gods. One that had almost worked.
Aeslinn had attacked the consul’s home, where all six vampire senates were meeting, to try and knock the vamps out of the war by destroying their leadership. That would have given a huge black eye to the war effort, since vamps are almost the only creatures who can fight effectively in Faerie, where human magic doesn’t work. If they dropped out, there would be no one to take the war to Aeslinn, allowing him all the time he needed to find a way to bring the old gods he worshipped back into this world.
And, presumably, to kill us all.
His plan had been a good one, but ?subrand and his mother had come to warn us first, so we’d had a slight heads-up. Yeah, you read that right. After trying to assassinate Claire, almost killing all of us over the rune, and generally being a massive douche nozzle, the prodigal son had returned to the fold and dragged momma along with him. It seemed that, while his father was happy at the idea of being a godly flunky, ?subrand actually wanted to rule his own kingdom.
And that did not include being a puppet to anyone.
Of course, warning people who have every reason to view you as an enemy is not easy. They tend to be too busy trying to kill you to listen. But that wasn’t a problem for Efridis, who had conjured up a glamourie, disguised herself as a cook, and snuck into the house along with a bunch of servants Louis-Cesare had loaned us.
And drugged the whole lot.
I’d arrived to find everyone out cold, including Claire, who had been slumped over a table in the backyard, while Efridis and her spawn held on to the two kids. It’s the closest I’ve ever come to a heart attack. But they hadn’t hurt the boys, just used them as hostages to get me to listen.
Yet now they were suddenly trying to kill Aiden again? When they, of all people, knew that he had the rune? It didn’t make sense.
“You don’t believe me, do you?” Claire demanded, watching me.
“It’s not that. I wouldn’t put anything past those two. It’s just . . .”
“Just what?”
“What Olga said. They didn’t stab him, Claire,” I said gently.
And immediately flashed on that old saying about not poking a bear, especially when the bear is a dragon.
“No, Ymsi stabbed him,” she told me, her voice low and furious. “With that bitch riding him! And troll eyes are notoriously bad, especially in the dark—”
“Wait. What?”
“—and the boy only arrived today, and unexpectedly, so Aiden and Stinky were the only two people supposed to be in that room—”
“Claire, hold up.”
“—and Stinky snores to high heaven! There’s every reason to believe that anybody walking in there would assume—”
“Claire!”
She looked at me, eyes wide and startled, because that had practically been a shout. But she’d just said something important, and I needed to grab it before my wonky brain let it slip away again. “Riding?” I asked.
“What?”
“You said ‘that bitch’ was riding Ymsi. What—”
She threw out a hand, in a gesture that somehow managed to be elegant and exasperated at the same time. “Caedmon told me what happened with you and Efridis. I know—”
“Me and Efridis?”
“Well, who else are we talking about, Dory?” Claire stared at me. “Who else do we know who desperately wants Aiden dead, who probably knows how to remove the rune, since it’s her family heirloom, and who also happens to be a vargr?”
“A what?” I said, because I was trying to keep up and not doing so great.
And, suddenly, everything stopped.
It was almost funny. Claire had been gesturing again, with her arm up and her mouth open, about to say something that never made it past her vocal chords. The only thing that did was a small “Oh.”
And then she abruptly sat down again.
“What I say?” Olga asked her mildly.
Claire was still looking at me, her face almost tragic. “Caedmon didn’t tell you,” she said softly, a hand on my leg.
And, okay, getting freaked out here.
“Tell me what?”
The two exchanged a look. Claire shook her head, and bit her lip, obviously passing the buck. Olga sighed.
“You remember spriggans?” she asked me.
I had to think for a moment.
“Those little round things at the fair?”
She nodded. “Old days, spriggans used as spies. Look like rocks. Blend in. Troll vargar ride them far away, all directions.”
I blinked a little, because my brain was suddenly sending me the disturbing and quite hilarious image of a thousand-pound troll riding around on top of a crowd of those little things. Just this mass stampede of tiny, straining creatures, each with a bit in its mouth, the reins held by the troll. And dust flying everywhere as they thundered o’er the—
I cut it off.
I was losing it.
“Vargar rare now,” Olga said sternly, as if she knew I wasn’t taking this seriously. “Used to be many. Spriggans put on all borders, even into enemy lands. We see far—”