A Lick of Frost (Merry Gentry #6)(26)

“Perhaps,” Andais said. She turned her gaze to me. “I will try and find out if Hugh is being honest, or as treacherous as we think. You must have some magic over men that I do not see, Meredith. You have not even fucked Crystall, yet he seems strangely loyal to you. I will break him to my ways again, then I will choose another of the men who would have deserted me for you. Sidhe who would have rathered followed you into exile than stay with me in faerie.” She said the last almost in a thoughtful voice, as if she truly didn’t understand it.
The truth was that it wasn’t faerie they wanted to leave but her sadistic care, but that was a truth better kept to myself.
“If the Seelie offer is a genuine one, Meredith, you might consider taking it.”
“What reason did he give?” she asked in an amazingly calm A thrill of fear ran through me. “Aunt Andais, I don’t understand.”
“Every man who prefers you to me makes me hate you a little more. Soon, my hatred for you may outweigh my desire for you to sit my throne. On the golden throne of the Seelie Court you would be safe from my anger.”
I licked my suddenly dry lips. “I do nothing to anger you on purpose, my queen.” 
“And that is what is so maddening about you, Meredith. I know you do not do it on purpose. You simply are, and somehow by being yourself you part my nobles and my lovers from me. Your Seelie magic wins them away.”
“I carry the hands of flesh and blood. Those are not Seelie hands of power, Aunt.”
“Yes, and Cel’s prophet said that if someone of flesh and blood sat the Unseelie throne he would die. He thought it meant your mortality, but it didn’t.” She looked at me, and there was something other than cruelty, though I wasn’t sure what exactly. “Cel screams your name in the night, Meredith.”
“He means my death if he can manage it.”
She shook her head. “He has convinced himself that if he lay with you, you and he would have a child, and he would be king to your queen.”
My mouth couldn’t get any drier, but my heart rate could get faster. “I do not think that would work, Aunt Andais.”
“Work, work—it is fucking, Meredith. The mechanics of it would work just grand.”
I tried again, while Doyle and Rhys gripped me harder. Even Abe moved in at my back to put his face against my hair. Touching to comfort me.
“I suppose what I meant was that I do not think Cel and I would make a good ruling couple.”
“Do not look so frightened, Meredith. I know that Cel would not make you pregnant, but he has convinced himself of it. I suppose I am warning you. He no longer wants you assassinated, but he would kill every lover you have, if he could.”
“Is he—” I tried to think of a way to say it, “—free to….”
“He is not imprisoned, but he is under guard at all times. I do not want my own guards to kill my only son to protect my heir.” She shook her head. “Go, call the Goblin King back. I will try to find out if Hugh’s offer of the golden throne is true or false.” She was walking back to the bed as she spoke the last few sentences. “But first I will take out my anger and frustration at you on your Crystall. Know that every cut is a cut I would make on your lily-white skin if I didn’t need your body whole.” She crawled onto the bed and reached for Crystall. A knife had appeared in her hand, either by magic or it had been tucked into the sheets.
Frost got to the mirror first and cleared it with a touch. We were left staring at our own images. My eyes were a little too wide, my skin pale.
“Crap,” Rhys said.
That about summed it up.
CHAPTER 13
THE MIRROR RANG AGAIN, A STRIDENT CLASH OF SWORDS, AS IF blades had screamed down the sides of each other. It made me jump.
Rhys looked at Doyle and me. Doyle said, “Let Abe and me get out of sight. The fewer people in faerie who have this rumor the better, I think.” He gave my hand a last squeeze. Then he tried to rise with his usual effortless movement, but paused in mid-motion. It wasn’t a flinch so much as that he simply stopped trying to stand.
I put a hand on his back to steady him. Frost grabbed one of his arms, and it was probably more him than me that helped Doyle stand upright. Doyle tried to move away from Frost’s arm but stumbled. Frost got a firmer grip on his friend. Doyle actually leaned a little on the other man, which meant he was in a lot of pain.
“You didn’t take the pain medication that the hospital gave you, did you?” I asked.
The mirror clanged again, an even angrier sound than before, as if the next sound of swords would break one of the blades.
“The goblins are not known for their patience, Meredith,” Doyle said in a tight voice. “You must answer the call.” He started off, and didn’t fight Frost from helping him, which meant he was very hurt indeed. More hurt than he’d let on. The thought of my Darkness being this injured made my stomach and chest tight, not just because I loved him, but because he was the greatest warrrior I had. Frost might be as good in battle, but for strategy it was Doyle. I needed him, in so many ways.It must have shown on my face because he said, “I have failed you.”
“Taranis tried to burn your face off,” Rhys said. “You failed no one.”
The evil sound of swords filled the room again.
“Go,” Rhys said. “I’ll stay with her.”
“You don’t like goblins,” Frost said.
Rhys shrugged. “I killed the one that took my eye. That’s got to be good enough revenge. Besides, I won’t let you and Merry down by being a big baby. Go, rest, take your meds.”
“I’ll take Doyle,” Galen said.
We all looked at him. “If Merry can’t have Doyle by her side for this call, then she needs Frost,” he said.
Abe had managed to get off the bed on the other side. “I see that no one cares that I might need help.”
“Do you need help?” Galen asked, as he moved to take Doyle from Frost. He actually held his other hand out to Abe.
Abe looked into his face for a breath, then shook his head, but stopped the movement as if it hurt. “I can walk, boy. The king’s men jumped him before he could do his worst on my back.” He moved toward the door slowly but surely.
Doyle let Galen help him out of sight of the mirror and toward the door. Frost came to stand with me and Rhys. Rhys reached toward the mirror, then hesitated. “I hate that you are going to be with these two tonight.”
“We’ve had this discussion, Rhys. For every half-sidhe goblin whom we bring into his full power, our alliance with the goblins is lengthened by a month. We need their threat to keep us safe,” I said.
The mirror made its ugly sound again. “The goblins do not wait with patience,” Frost said.
“We need them, Rhys,” I said.
“I know. I hate it, but I know,” Rhys said. A look passed over his face too quickly for me to read. “One of these days I’d like you to be able to do things just because you want to do them, not because you’re forced to do them.”
I wasn’t sure what to say to that.
Rhys reached out toward the mirror. The metallic shriek rose to a crescendo. I fought the urge to cover my ears. I couldn’t afford to show weakness in dealing with the goblins. The two high courts of faerie would use weakness to their advantage. Goblin culture simply saw weakness as a reason to abuse you. You were either prey or predator to the goblins. I was working very hard not to be prey.
The mirror was suddenly a perfect window onto the goblin throne room. Their king was not there, though. Ash and Holly stood alone before the empty stone throne. It was Ash’s hand on the glass when we saw them, his magic making the mirror sound like a battle.
He blinked solid green eyes into the mirror. There was no pupil, only a blind expanse of perfect grass green surrounded by a little white. His hair was yellow, cut short, because only the sidhe are allowed long hair on their men, but his skin was gold kissed. Not sparkling with golden bits like Aisling’s, but it was close. Both the twins had Seelie skin, sunlight skin. Moonlight skin like mine and Frost’s was plentiful at both courts. That golden color, almost like a tan, was exclusively Seelie. The eyes were goblin except for the color. Holly strode to the mirror to stand by his brother. He was identical except that his eyes were the color of red holly berries, like his namesake. The red color with no pupil was not just goblin but Red Cap goblin. 
Rhys moved back from the mirror to stand on the other side of me so that I was sandwiched between him and Frost.
“The bargain is over,” Holly said, his handsome face contorted with rage. He was usually the one to lose his temper first.
“To keep us waiting like this is to make us lose respect in front of all,” Ash said. He didn’t sound much more reasonable than his brother, which was bad, since Ash was the voice of reason for the two of them.
“Queen Andais kept us overlong,” Frost said.
Rhys just moved closer to me, as if the twins’ anger alone could hurt me.
Their eyes flicked to him, then back to me. “Is this true, Princess?” Ash asked.
“The queen had much to show us,” I said, and let my voice hold some of the upset I felt about Crystall and his fate in her bed.
“She’s been entertaining the sidhe you left behind,” Ash said.
Holly actually looked uneasy, his anger fading, which was unusual for him.