She lifted up her chin, grateful more than she could say for the silent supportive oasis Tiago had given her. He gave her that subtle smile again, squeezed her shoulders and stepped back.
She should have a new personal slogan. WWDD—What Would Dragos Do? She turned back to Aubrey and Naida. Naida, who had apparently decided to join them uninvited for their private chat.
She said to Naida, “Thank you for requesting the refreshments for us. Please shut the doors on your way out.”
Okay, she wasn’t so sure Dragos would have said “please” and “thank you.” He had only just started experimenting with trying out those three new words on his inner circle. But the message was still sent and received. Naida bowed her head and walked out. Tiago watched the Dark Fae woman leave, his expression impassive.
Niniane expelled a pent-up breath. She walked to an armchair and sat. Her legs felt rubbery again. Tiago moved in silence to take a position behind her chair.
Aubrey said, “Naida means well.”
Niniane looked up. The Dark Fae male was watching her, his face troubled. She made a gesture of negation, waving away what had happened. She said, “Would you both please have a seat?”
Aubrey’s gaze went to Tiago in quick surprise, but the Chancellor moved to sit at the end of the couch closest to her on her left. Tiago chose the armchair to her right.
Niniane tilted up one shoe to look at it. She said to the shoe in a flat voice, “I was in the palace when my family was killed. Tiago already knows. Taking this journey is bringing up a lot of old bad stuff, Aubrey. I get close to something of Urien’s, like when I walked in this room, and I want to set it on fire.”
Aubrey’s brows pulled together. “I had no idea.”
She said to her shoe, “Of course you didn’t. How could you? You didn’t even know I was alive until recently.”
“Do you know how famous you are to the Dark Fae?” he said. That caused her to raise her gaze to his. The older male regarded her with a bittersweet expression. “You had simply vanished. There was no body, no evidence of your death. It was assumed you must be dead, but the question always remained, a rumor that you were alive and in hiding somewhere, and that one day you would return to rule. At first it was a comfortable whisper, one of those ghost tales told around a campfire, but over the last couple of decades the rumor grew to have quite a bite.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
Aubrey said, “Urien, and those who supported him, were reacting to many things when they overthrew your father. One of those things was the British losing the American War of Independence. I agreed with your father. When change comes, you must change to meet it. But his opponents claimed they were protecting the Dark Fae’s status quo against being overrun by what they saw was a barbaric horde of heathens. They were really protecting the Dark Fae’s Powerful elite, protecting themselves, but over time it came at the expense of the more ordinary of us, who might otherwise have thrived with all the advent of fresh opportunity that came along with those barbarian hordes.”
Aubrey had never been ordinary in his long life, but she chose not to remark upon that. Instead she said, “Why, you sound almost democratic.”
He laughed. “Perhaps I wouldn’t go quite that far, unless it’s possible to be a democratic-minded supporter of a benevolent, open-minded ruler?” He sobered as he continued, “At any rate, opportunities became rare, and they went to Urien’s circle of friends and supporters, which grew fewer over time as our economy slowed. In the meantime, many of the ordinary ones suffered, and people began to speak of your legend with quite a dangerous sense of longing. It used to drive Urien into a rage. Of course now we know he knew the truth about you.”
She gave him a grim look. “Indeed he did.”
“I hated him,” Aubrey said. He shook his head. “We’re all adjusting to his death, I think, because it still feels dangerous to admit that. Your father had been a good friend of mine, and I, like so many others, had been half in love with your mother.”
She smiled. “Really? I guess she might have been beautiful. I don’t know, I don’t remember that very well. What I remember is she was so funny and loving, and lively, and she made the room light up whenever she came into it.”
“Yes,” Aubrey said. “She was all of that. She would be so proud of you.”
Niniane’s eyebrows shot up. She was so shocked at his words, tears sprang to her eyes. “My goodness,” she said. She laughed a little and wiped her nose. “Do you really think so?”
“I do,” Aubrey said. “Not only did you survive against all the odds and turn into a beautiful woman, but you also learned skills and made connections, and you became someone she would have been thrilled to see take the throne.”
“I don’t know about that, but it means a lot to me that you said it.”
She caught sight of Tiago out of the corner of her eye. He was smiling at her.