“Don’t start,” Alkamy murmured. Her drink was as brightly colored as his, undoubtedly made of the same organic juice. Hers, however, had vodka in it too.
Creed said nothing. Even if Zephyr had commented, Creed wouldn’t back down in arguments about his lifestyle. Someday soon, they’d have to have that fight. The alternative was letting the Unseelie Queen know that Creed was a liability. For now, Creed lifted his glass in a mocking toast to Zephyr and downed half of it in one go. He caught the waitress’s hand and said, “Another. I’ll be ready for it before you’re back.”
Once she was gone, the three friends resumed pretending that they weren’t being watched like animals in a zoo. These sorts of clubs had perks, usually in the form of pretty, willing humans for a few moments of distraction.
“Which one caught your eye?” Alkamy asked drolly, making him realize he was staring.
Zephyr shrugged.
“Does it matter?” Creed asked, stretching his long legs out and slouching farther into his chair. “They’re interchangeable.” He started pointing at girls. “Ena, mena, mona, mite, which one will bite?”
Zephyr scowled. “Don’t be crass.”
Creed, as per usual, ignored him. He motioned a passing waitress over and said, “The girl in the aqua top. Tell her to meet me at the rope in”—he glanced at his watch—“exactly eighteen minutes.”
The waitress verified that they were describing the same girl, and then she left with his message.
“Really?” Alkamy asked.
He shrugged.
“You could slow down. Pretend to be with Kamy for a while,” Zephyr suggested.
“Is that an order?”
“No.”
Creed nodded. “Then go ahead and update us. I have an appearance to keep.”
“Lilywhite will be here tomorrow.” Zephyr paused to let them marvel at the pending change, but Creed simply nodded and Alkamy waited silently.
“This is it,” Zephyr continued, trying to impress upon them the significance of her arrival. “The start of a new stage of our lives. She is the beginning of . . . everything.”
“Right, then.” Creed lifted his glass, drained it, and held it out to the waitress who’d returned with his drink. “Let’s drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die.”
Alkamy winced. “Creed—”
“Don’t,” he interrupted her. “Just fucking don’t, Kam.” He wrapped a hand around his new drink and walked away.
Zephyr watched him go. “Has something happened? He seems worse than usual.”
Alkamy lifted one shoulder in a noncommittal shrug. She sipped her fruity drink and watched Creed, who was chatting up two girls at the bar. One of them shrieked in laughter, and the other pressed up against him. Typical. Even from here, though, anyone could see that there was something false in Creed’s smiles.
“They were in some film Vi dragged me to see,” Alkamy offered, as if Creed’s choice of girls mattered at all.
When Zephyr didn’t reply, she continued, “Flash in the pan, pretty things, no talent.” She wasn’t being vicious, merely echoing whatever Violet had told her. “They seem fun though.”
“Creed could do with less fun.”
“Not everyone is as sure as you,” Alkamy said gently. “Lilywhite is your intended. We don’t know if we mattered enough for them to even plan a future for us.”
Zephyr turned his attention away from Creed and focused on his best friend. She didn’t say “fae” ever if she could avoid it. It was what she was, what all the Sleepers were, but she never said it aloud, as if silence would change reality. She’d only been with him in the Hidden Lands once, but it hadn’t erased her discomfort.
“Us. We are the same as them.”
“No, we’re not,” she said.
“I’d never let anything happen to you,” he promised her yet again. No one else understood him the way she did. Alkamy felt like his other half. He met her eyes. “Ever. I’d die before I’d let you get hurt.”
Alkamy sighed. “You’ll die for the queen’s cause; you’ll die for me . . . Maybe you should try finding something or someone to live for instead.”
“Is it so wrong to have a purpose?”
She didn’t answer. Instead she asked, “Did you see my new shoes?” She kicked her foot out so he was forced to catch her ankle in his hand or get a pointy-toed shoe in the face.
Silently, he slid the shoe off her foot, set it on the table, and gave her a foot rub. He was used to her not-so-subtle changes of subject, and it made for good pictures. No one needed to know that he and Alkamy were destined for a platonic relationship. That was one of the many secrets they hid—and most were far more deadly.
seven
EILIDH
Eilidh wasn’t surprised to see her mother striding through the assembled fae like a warrior. The queen was undoubtedly notified the moment Torquil’s foot touched the staircase. There were enchantments to protect Eilidh’s virtue woven into the very building that was her home. Had she been beautiful those enchantments would’ve been more necessary. As it was, Eilidh had never considered them, never had reason to, until this moment.
“What have you done?” she repeated for the third time, hoping for some graceful way out of the mess Torquil had created. They needed an answer before the Queen of Blood and Rage reached them.
Torquil stood, keeping her hand clasped in his. Gently, he tugged, leading her to the ground. He said nothing as they descended the stairs.
The queen stood there, her armor absent for a change. They’d obviously interrupted her at a better time than most. For all meetings and affairs of state, she wore her war attire. Right now, though, she was dressed in what passed for casual with the queen—a heavy brocade dress in blood red with black accents. Her midnight dark hair fell unbound. To anyone who didn’t look in her eyes, she might appear as a sister to Eilidh herself, but a brief glimpse of the queen’s eyes would end that thought, as would the weight of her voice.
“Explain yourself, son of Aden.” The queen regarded Torquil, one of the rare fae of Seelie origins who had earned her genuine favor, and her anger was thick in her every syllable. Right now, none of that esteem was in evidence.
“You directed that I take a bride,” he said levelly. He didn’t drop to his knees as he should, as he had every other time the queen had spoken to him, as every fae save the king, the three royal sons, and Eilidh did.
Eilidh tugged his hand, trying to remind him to kneel. He ignored her and watched the queen. He was declaring himself family to her in this action as well. If most fae attempted such a thing, Endellion was likely to kill them.