The Queen's Bargain Read online

  Lucivar vanished the war blade. A moment later, when Jillian walked out of the eyrie, her eyes puffy from crying but her chin up—a sure sign of temper—he settled into a fighting stance, ready for a different kind of battle.

  * * *

  * * *

  Jillian walked through the open glass doors to have this “chat” with Prince Lucivar Yaslana. It didn’t matter that he was the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih, that he was the law here. It didn’t matter that he was the second most powerful male in the whole Realm of Kaeleer. It didn’t matter that almost from the day she and Nurian had arrived in Ebon Rih, she had run tame in the Yaslana household, helping Marian with Daemonar when he was a baby, and later helping with Titian and now baby Andulvar. It didn’t matter that Lucivar had defied Eyrien tradition and had given her the training in weapons and fighting that she’d wanted, while insisting on her participation in traditional education—something no ruler in the Realm of Terreille would have done for a young witch who wasn’t from an aristo family.

  What mattered today was that he had treated her like a little girl, humiliating her and hurting Dillon. Terrifying her wonderful Dillon.

  All right. Prince Yaslana wanted to have a “chat”? Had a few things to say? Well, so did she. She just didn’t know where to start, so she stared at him, waiting for all these boiling feelings to shape themselves into words.

  “What in the name of Hell were you doing?” Lucivar shouted, breaking the silence.

  “We weren’t doing anything!” Jillian shouted back, wanting to turn words into daggers.

  “Witchling, I saw enough to know that he was doing something! And I didn’t walk into that alleyway by chance. ‘Prince, Lady Jillian went that way. I don’t think she’s feeling herself.’ ‘Prince, I saw Lady Jillian’s shopping basket on the ground in that alleyway.’”

  Oh, that was more than humiliating that someone had tattled so that she and Dillon would get into trouble.

  “I love him, and he loves me! We haven’t seen each other in days and just wanted a few minutes alone. There is nothing wrong with that.”

  Lucivar took a step toward her. “He had you pushed against a wall on a day when you’re vulnerable. There is plenty wrong with that, witchling.”

  Dillon couldn’t have known her moontime had started. Hell’s fire, she hadn’t known. The fact that Lucivar had sensed the physical change just made the whole thing even worse.

  “You’re done with him,” Lucivar said.

  “No.” Panic filled her, immediately replaced by fury. “No! I love him and—”

  “I don’t doubt your feelings, but I have a lot of doubts about his. Either way, the decision’s made. You’re done with him.”

  “You don’t get to decide that!”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  “No, you don’t! You’re not . . .”

  . . . my father.

  The unspoken words hung between them.

  Jillian saw Lucivar brace for a blow he couldn’t dodge. In that moment, despite the anger she felt toward him, she understood that if she said the words, it would shatter what was between them in a way that could never be mended. He would accept the line drawn by the words, and she would never deal with Lucivar again, the man who taught her to handle weapons, who listened to her, who laughed with—and sometimes at—her. If she said the words, he would distance himself from her, and she would be like almost everyone else in the valley and surrounding mountains, dealing with and answering to the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih.

  Until that moment, she hadn’t realized how much it had mattered to her that he had treated her like one of his children rather than the girl who came over to help Marian by watching the little ones.

  Until that moment, it hadn’t occurred to her that they were both about to fly into some stormy winds.

  “. . . being fair,” she finished lamely.

  The tension in his shoulders eased, but the bright temper in his gold eyes didn’t fade.

  “I don’t have to be fair, not when being fair interferes with my vow to cherish and protect. If I see a threat coming at me or mine, I deal with it.”

  “But Dillon isn’t—”

  “Enough.”

  Defeated, brokenhearted, she stared at the tear-blurred ground between them.

  “Hell’s fire, Jillian. He’s just—” Lucivar turned away from her. He swore quietly but with frightening intensity. Then he turned back. “Go home, witchling. And stay home.”

  “Yes, sir.” She blinked away the tears but was careful not to look at him. Crying in front of the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih was something little girls did.

  She flew back to the eyrie she shared with Nurian. Once she was safely in her own room, she let the tears flow.

  * * *

  * * *

  “What did Rothvar want?” Lucivar asked when he stepped into the kitchen.

  “Jillian had left without the lobsters and shrimp she’d purchased,” Marian replied calmly as she cracked the shells of two large lobsters. “Rothvar wasn’t sure if she had purchased them for me or for herself and Nurian, so he brought the food here. I think she was intending to make a simple meal of seafood on a bed of greens, so I’ll shell one lobster and half the shrimp and take it over to her.”

  He moved away from the kitchen archway, then back again, wings rustling, hands tightening into fists. She wasn’t afraid for herself—Lucivar believed what his father had taught him, that a Warlord Prince leaves his temper at the door—but she gave Daemonar a psychic tap and reinforced Lucivar’s earlier order to remain in the playroom with his sister and baby brother. That Lucivar couldn’t shake off the anger, had brought it inside their home, worried her.

  “What was I supposed to do?” Lucivar snarled. “He had her in an alleyway. His hand was on her breast! Even if she could have used Craft, she wears Purple Dusk and he wears Opal. She couldn’t have held him off if he wanted to do more. And despite what she might have said to you, she was trying to push him away.”

  Of course she was, Marian thought. It hurts to have a breast squeezed when it’s already tender from the onset of moon’s blood. The fact that Lucivar knew even the gentlest touch could be painful some days had to have fueled his temper when he saw Jillian with the young Warlord.

  She stopped trying to prepare the midday meal, since the man she’d adored through decades of marriage filled up her kitchen with his temper and body, unable to stand still.

  “Would you have been so angry if Jillian’s moontime hadn’t started moments before you saw her?” she asked quietly.

  No one was ever quite sure if it was psychic scent or physical scent that alerted Warlord Princes to a woman’s moontime, but any female under the protection of a Warlord Prince was protected during the three days when she couldn’t use her own power and was, therefore, vulnerable. The annoying part was that those men were so attuned to the women who were a part of their lives that they usually knew before the women—and reacted violently to anything that might possibly be a threat. The men in Riada had learned long ago to treat her with special care during her moontime whenever she ventured beyond the family eyrie—and Lucivar had learned that nothing more than a snarl from him was needed to have every man backing away. But before he had learned to trust enough, there had been times when even the Eyriens who worked for him had felt his war blade resting just above their skin—a blade honed so sharp that just pressing against it by taking too deep a breath was enough to slice through leather and cloth to reach skin.

  Jillian wasn’t a stranger to her moon cycle. She might have rolled her eyes at the required three days of rest at home, but she had never disobeyed that rule. She hadn’t disobeyed today either. This was just unfortunate timing, but Marian feared the conflict between Lucivar and Jillian would escalate if something wasn’t done. More than that, whatever lines were drawn with Jillian would also apply to Titian when she reached
an age when boys became interesting as a different kind of playmate.

  “I think we should get a second opinion,” she said.

  “Why in the name of Hell should we get a second opinion?” Lucivar demanded. “His hand, her breast. I should have ripped off his damn arm instead of giving him a warning choke.”

  Mother Night. “We need someone on the outside who can look at this young aristo Warlord without prejudice.”

  “Fine. I’ll ask Daemon to come and look at the little prick-ass. Then he can help me bury that whelp in a deep, cold grave.”

  “You’d kill him for—”

  “I didn’t say we’d kill him.”

  Marian swallowed, aware of every muscle that moved in her throat. For everyone’s sake, she needed to jolt Lucivar out of the fury that hadn’t quieted.

  “I think we need someone who would make more of an impression than your brother,” she said.

  That stopped him. He just stared at her for a long moment. “Hell’s fire, Marian. Who makes more of an impression than Daemon Sadi?”

  NINETEEN

  Surreal placed her underwear in a dresser drawer, then turned to face Marian. “Tell me again why I’m here?”

  “Because Lucivar needs a second opinion.”

  “Why doesn’t he ask one of the other Eyriens? They usually have opinions about everything.”

  “In this instance, their opinions are useless, because they’re male, they’re Eyrien, and they work for Lucivar, so of course they will agree with whatever line he draws.”

  “Uh-huh.” She put her nightclothes in another drawer. “You know, sugar, it occurs to me that you were very careful to phrase your message in a way that indicated I needed to visit as soon as I could get here, but you didn’t actually say why you needed me.” She studied Marian. “Is there a problem between you and Lucivar?”

  “No, nothing like that.”

  Thank the Darkness. I’m dealing with a big enough problem of my own.

  “It’s just . . .” Marian hesitated. “Whatever boundaries are drawn now will also apply to Titian.”

  “Exactly what are we talking about?”

  “We’re talking about Jillian and the way Lucivar reacted to catching the scent of moon’s blood the other day. We’re talking about a boy kissing Jillian and putting his hand on her breast.”

  “And Lucivar, being such a calm, mild-tempered man, bounced off the ceiling?”

  “He slammed the boy into the side of a building and choked him a little. At least, I was told it was a little.”

  Shit. “Where did this happen?”

  “In Riada, around the open market.”

  “Where were the boy and Jillian?”

  “In an alleyway between two of the buildings.”

  “Uh-huh. And you don’t see anything wrong with that?”

  “I see a lot of things wrong with that,” Marian snapped. “For one thing, him touching her that way in public was disrespectful. If Lucivar had heard about it from someone else, he wouldn’t have been happy, and he would have let Jillian know in no uncertain terms exactly why he wasn’t happy, but I don’t think he would have gone looking for the Warlord.”

  He might have, if whoever had told him about the incident had known the boy’s name. Lucivar had strict rules about anyone touching the children without his permission, and he didn’t make exceptions just because the person doing the touching was also young. Which didn’t make it easy to indulge in a little romantic exploration.

  Then again, Lucivar’s father had had the same “no permission, no sex” rule when anyone was under his roof.

  “But because Lucivar was the one who walked into that alleyway and saw them, he reacted as if Jillian were under attack,” Marian continued. “I don’t want Jillian or Titian to avoid getting acquainted with boys because they’re afraid Lucivar will seriously injure those boys.” She pulled clothes out of Surreal’s trunk and hung the trousers and dresses in the wardrobe.

  Surreal shook out the blouses and handed them to Marian. “Can you finish unpacking for me? I think I should have a chat with your husband.”

  “It’s Jillian who needs your opinion. You’re not going to change Lucivar’s mind.”

  “Wanna bet?”

  Marian paused. “Are you going to call in a crossbow and threaten to shoot him?”

  “Our most productive chats always start with me threatening to pin his balls to the wall. Doesn’t change his opinion about anything. It just makes sure I have his full attention.”

  Marian finished hanging up the blouse and reached for another. “Twenty gold marks and I’ll bake your favorite pie while you’re here.”

  “I can’t bake a pie, but I’ll put up twenty gold marks and a box of that salty dark chocolate that’s made by the best chocolatier in Amdarh.”

  “Deal.”

  Surreal walked out of the guest room. When she reached the eyrie’s main corridor, she found Daemonar waiting for her.

  “Hey, boyo. Why aren’t you out kissing sky?”

  He eased up next to her and whispered, “Something is wrong with Papa and Jillian.”

  “People don’t always see eye to eye.” She brushed a hand over his black hair and realized they were almost the same height. Damn. When had that happened? She’d seen him just a few weeks ago when he’d come to SaDiablo Hall for a visit, and would have sworn he hadn’t been this tall. “I’m sure it’s nothing serious.”

  “I think it is. Papa is really unhappy.” Daemonar paused. “He’s in his study, doing paperwork.”

  Not good. Lucivar often viewed sitting behind a desk doing paperwork as a form of self-punishment.

  “Keep the little beasts occupied, okay? I’ll see what I can do to help your papa.”

  “Thanks, Auntie Surreal.”

  She thought he was going to say something more, but he shied away from it, so she went to the study to tackle the volatile problem.

  “Pretend I brought my crossbow to this meeting,” Surreal said, taking a chair in front of the big blackwood desk. The desk wasn’t as big as Daemon’s back at the Hall, but it was sufficiently expansive. “I’m pointing it at you. Threaten, threaten, blah blah blah.”

  Lucivar eyed her, then put the pen in its holder with an insultingly slow move. “Am I supposed to know what that means?”

  No emotion at all in his voice, which meant he was so unhappy over whatever this was that he wasn’t feeling anything at all or he was holding on to his explosive temper so tightly he couldn’t afford to let anything show. Either way, she had to get him to respond before he would really listen to her.

  “Blah blah blah. An annoying little phrase Jaenelle Saetien picked up at school. I gather it’s supposed to mean ‘we’ve covered this ground before and don’t actually have to say the words again.’ Imagine her surprise when she wanted permission to go on an outing with some friends and rushed into her papa’s study minutes before she was supposed to be meeting those friends and gave him the ‘blah blah blah’ as an explanation of where they were going and who would be the chaperons.”

  “Oh, Hell’s fire.”

  Hearing that tiny bit of interest in his voice, Surreal nodded. “Yeah, it went over as well as you’d expect. And not the way Jaenelle Saetien intended, because Daemon looked at her and said that since ‘blah’ meant dull and uninteresting, the reasonable conclusion to her saying ‘blah blah blah’ was that this outing was going to be exceedingly dull and uninteresting, and since that was the case, he would provide her with the excuse to get out of going by not giving his permission. By the time she convinced him that she was interested, the friends had already left.”

  “Bet that went over well.”

  “It did. There were lots of tears and a few words said in a tone that bordered on pure bitch—which Daemon, surprisingly, didn’t comment on. But when the foolish girl began sla
mming doors to indicate her extreme displeasure, he quietly informed her that since words spoken quickly could be misinterpreted, any requests to visit friends or go on outings in the foreseeable future would have to be submitted in writing, using proper spelling, full sentences that provided the necessary information he would need in order to make a decision, and, of course, good penmanship.”

  Lucivar’s lips twitched.

  “A couple of days later. Another outing. When reminded that requests had to be submitted in writing, she dashed off the note—which Daemon returned with a gentle apology, saying that the note was too illegible for him to decipher and needed to be resubmitted.”

  “She didn’t make it to that outing either, did she?”

  “No. More weeping, more complaints, more slammed doors—and for every slammed door, Daemon added a week to the time when written requests would be required.”

  Lucivar leaned forward. “That’s brat behavior and doesn’t sound like Jaenelle Saetien. Something wrong with the witchling?”

  “Lately she has felt the need to test boundaries and rules.” Surreal sighed. “Her friends continue to be impressed by her Birthright Jewel—and her teachers tend to be indulgent, despite the chats they’ve had with her father about being indulgent. But no one at the Hall is impressed, because they saw the first Twilight’s Dawn, the darker one. And the person who is least impressed by the Jewel itself is Jaenelle Saetien’s papa. I salute Daemon for his patience. He let the girl slam against his will until she finally understood that he would not allow her to become a brat or a bitch, that he would draw the line and hold it as much out of love for her as out of duty to all the people of Dhemlan.”

  “They’re okay?” Lucivar asked.

  Surreal nodded. “She snapped out of her current brat mood, and they’re fine. They don’t need me as a buffer, if that’s what you’re wondering.”