“How was I supposed to know that Old Stoney couldn’t drink wine?” I grumbled after one such gathering. Old Stoney was the de facto ruler of the earth Elementals, at least until the as yet unknown Inheritor of Earth surfaced. Speaking of surfaces, Old Stoney was of granite, specifically. Apparently, those of earth—or granite, at least—do not ingest liquid refreshment, since it rolls right on out of them like so much rain on asphalt. Little things like those were what I was expected to know, and I managed to come up short more often than not. Exasperated, I flopped down on Micah’s bed. I was still a little weirded out calling it our bed.
“Old Stoney?” Micah repeated, quirking a silver brow.
“I can’t remember all these foolish names,” I muttered. Old Stoney’s actual name was Something Greymalkin, or maybe it was Something Greymountain. “Why isn’t anyone named Todd or Jim?”
“Because we are not denizens of the Mundane World.” Micah crawled onto the bed beside me and smoothed the hair back from my face. It had been done up in one of those elaborate confections that were a silverkin specialty, but by now it looked less like sleek waves and more like a bird’s nest. A ratty, lopsided bird’s nest. “You think those of the Otherworld do not have trouble with Mundane names?”
“There are no Mundanes here, besides me and my family.” I snuggled up to Micah, enjoying a moment’s peace. “I really screwed things up, didn’t I?”
“Between me and Old Stoney?” Micah asked. I laughed, hiding my face against his throat. “Not likely. Remember, we of metal still have the upper hand.” Micah wrapped his arms around me; as I moved to encircle his waist, my hand bumped his sword belt.
“Can you really use a sword?” I asked. I’d seen Micah perform a few incredible feats—such as ripping the head off an iron warrior with his bare hands—but I’d never seen him in a swordfight.
“I can,” he replied.
“I bet you’d look pretty hot chopping someone’s head off,” I murmured. Micah, who struggled with Mundane idioms as much as I struggled with Elemental names, rolled me onto my back.
“Hot is good?”
“Very good,” I affirmed. Micah laughed, the gentle rumbles in his chest once again making everything right in the world. After a fair bit of snuggling, I asked, “Have you heard anything new about the queen?”
Oriana, the Gold Queen, had been captured by Ferra, the Iron Queen (the one we had, um, rusted), and had spent the past few years as a prisoner in the Iron Court. After Ferra’s demise, Oriana had been promptly rescued, but her health was hanging on by a thread.
“She is convalescing,” Micah said, to my relief. If Oriana died, my life would become immensely more complicated. You see, next in line for the metal throne is Micah Silverstrand, the man whose bed I sleep in. And I do not want to be a queen.
2
Once I’d extricated myself from the rest of my formal attire and dragged a brush through my copper-colored hair, I made my way downstairs, intent upon visiting with my family. All these formal events Micah and I had attended of late had really only served to remind me that I was a stranger in this very strange land. Not to mention, very few of the Elementals that I had so far encountered welcomed me as one of their own. Most saw me as a weak mortal, an outsider who should have stayed in her home realm.
And you’re welcome for getting rid of the Iron Queen.
What these haughty Elementals don’t know is that my mother, Maeve Connor Corbeau, was once the Queen of Connacht and had gone on to become Queen of the Seelie Court. Since Mom gave up her fairy ways when she married Dad, we’ve been trying to keep her Irish heritage quiet. Still, I wonder how those snooty jerks would react to learning of my own royal lineage.
As I passed a large window, I spied Mom in the garden, leaning against one of the apple trees. It was in full bloom as well as heavily laden with fruit, as only an Otherworldly tree can be. I debated joining her, but she was wearing that wistful expression that had begun appearing often after Dad disappeared. Mom had originally fought with the government for information about Dad’s fate; she’d screamed at them so loud and often that my ears rang for years. Then the Peacekeepers had arrested Max, and the loss of her husband and her son was just too much for Mom. Within a few weeks of Max’s arrest, she had given up her weekly—sometimes daily—shouting matches with the local Peacekeepers and had taken up vegetable gardening. She doesn’t even like vegetables.
Well, we’d managed to find Max, so finding Dad couldn’t be too difficult. Not that we had any idea of where to look for him, or any leads, but we hadn’t had those with Max, either. Our big break had come when I’d decided to dreamwalk to Max, all by myself. Yeah, that wasn’t the brightest plan. Still, I had found him. Not bad, for my first solo dreamwalk.