by AJ Lancaster
Ivy added uncertainly, “Though I don’t really understand why it matters so much who lives in it. It’s on the other side of the lake, after all.”
“Exactly!”
They both turned at the sound of the library door opening. Wyn emerged, looking up towards them curiously. A black kitten trotted at his heels. It was half catshee—fairy cat—and one of three born at midwinter. One or other of the kittens was frequently to be found shadowing Wyn’s footsteps, which he pretended to find exasperating. “Am I interrupting?”
“Not at all!” Hetta said, holding out an arm in invitation. “Ivy’s been digging through old records—we were just checking the family tree.”
He climbed the spiral staircase, the kitten attempting to run under his feet as he did so. It went to butt its head against Ivy’s cane, and Hetta hastily scooped it into her arms to avoid a mishap. The kitten gave an indignant mew.
Wyn gave her a swift, assessing look, and she knew he wanted to ask if there had been any more shocks but couldn’t with Ivy there.
“Good morning,” he said to her cousin instead.
Ivy replied, smothering a yawn. The way she looked at Wyn made Hetta a little uneasy, and Hetta put a deliberate arm around Wyn’s waist. She was going to marry him; her family could jolly well get used to the idea that he was one of them now, fae or not.
Wyn blinked at her in surprise but made no objection, despite the fact that they’d agreed to at least attempt a façade of respectability when in front of an audience. Ivy flushed and looked away.
The kitten wriggled, wanting to get to Wyn, and Hetta held back a laugh as Wyn let it climb onto his shoulders with a long-suffering expression. It curled up and went to sleep there as Hetta told him what she and Ivy had found.
Wyn inspected the tapestry. “There are seven generations between Lord Marius I and your father.”
“Is that significant?” Ivy asked.
“Perhaps,” he said. “Seven is a significant number, in fae magic.” He and Hetta exchanged a glance.
“You don’t know anything else connecting fairies and Valstars?” Ivy asked.
“I was thinking earlier about the timing of the Iron Law coming down. I don’t know for sure, but I wonder…did it end at the moment of your father’s death? Was it bound to the Valstars, somehow?” he said, turning to Hetta.
They all mulled over that. What did it mean, if her family or Stariel had somehow been responsible for the Iron Law in the first place? Hetta shivered. “The timing does seem like too much of a coincidence. But the question is why, isn’t it? I don’t like all these unknowns,” she said.
“Nor do I,” Wyn said.
Ivy stifled another yawn. “Well, would your brother know?”
Hetta was almost tempted to loose Ivy on Rakken for the amusement value, but Wyn was already shaking his head. “I have asked him already, and no.”
Ivy dug about in her pockets and then gave up with a sigh. “Dash it, I left my notebook downstairs. I still think it’s probably worth me quizzing you, if you don’t mind, since you’re the closest we have to an expert on the subject.”
“I have no objection—but, forgive me, I do not think it is so urgent it should keep you from your rest.”
“Ivy, go to bed,” Hetta agreed.
Ivy rubbed at her head. “Oh, all right—but don’t you dare make any important secret discoveries without me.”
She left.
Wyn carefully dislodged the kitten and put it down—it gave itself a shake before going to investigate the bottom shelves. Putting his arm around Hetta’s shoulders, he drew her closer. “Have there been any more shocks?”
She shook her head. “None since last night. This isn’t your fault, Wyn, and you fretting over it isn’t going to solve anything.”
“Are you not worried?”
She sighed against him. “Of course I am, but I’d rather not dwell on it right now. I’d rather dwell on how we’re going to fix it.” She frowned at the tapestry. “If my family is in some way responsible for the Iron Law, is that going to make the High King more or less positively inclined towards me?”
“I suspect that depends very much on the why of it.”
“You mean if my ancestor blackmailed the High Queen into the Iron Law, she’s probably not going to look on any requests from me kindly.”
“He,” he corrected absently, tracing down the lines of the Valstar family tree that ended at Hetta’s grandfather. “And yes. Though I never thought the High King likely to look upon me with kindness in any case, given I disobeyed his last directive.”
Hetta followed the golden line of thread, imagining it updated to include her father, then her, and from that, her children. She swallowed. “Well, blackmail or bribe, if we can find out what my ancestor used, then maybe we can use it again.”
They met Rakken on the threshold of the breakfast parlour. He paused briefly, considering the pair of them with an inscrutable expression, though he seemed less hostile towards Wyn than yesterday.
“If you tell my family anything…” Hetta warned, a hand drifting to her abdomen before she caught herself.
Rakken looked genuinely blank—the first time she’d ever seen that expression—but it cleared after a moment. “Oh, your peculiar mortal customs,” he said dismissively. “I can hold my tongue, Lord Valstar.”
“Well, good then,” she said, unreasonably annoyed. It was all very well for Rakken to wave away the threatening scandal as ‘peculiar mortal customs’, but neither he nor his home faeland had to live with the consequences.
Rakken wasn’t done. “I have no intention of adding to the unflattering mortal reports of our people,” he added, with a pointed glare for Wyn just in case he’d missed the dig. “I am not the one whose name is being bandied about across an entire mortal kingdom.”
Not less hostile, then.
“If you would mind removing yourself from the doorway while you needle me?” Wyn said mildly.
“Yes, you’re between me and the coffee,” Hetta added.
Rakken’s eyes narrowed, but he did get out of the way.
“So you’ve been reading our newspapers, then,” Hetta said after settling herself. Her stomach wasn’t queasy so much as delicate, as if she’d over-indulged the night before, which seemed very unfair.
Rakken poured himself tea. “They will fear us soon enough, if they do not already.” He looked at Wyn again. “You cannot allay those fears by hiding away up here, playing at being human.”
“Well, how can we allay them then, in your princely opinion?” Hetta asked.
Rakken laughed. “What do you think the machinery of a proper court is for, Lord Valstar? Even your mortal one. Boxing at shadows, propaganda and promises. Deals cut in back rooms. Marriages of state.” He emphasised the last, showing teeth.
“Well, I am technically attempting that, brother,” Wyn put in.
“Perhaps the second time will be more successful than the first.”
It was perhaps fortunate that Jack stomped into the room at this point. Jack was usually the first of her family to breakfast, being the only one naturally given to early rising. Often, he’d already have been out on the estate before breakfast, though it was clear today he hadn’t. He bore all the signs of a hangover.
Wyn crouched and pulled a bottle of Lady Philomena’s hangover remedy from the lower shelf of the sideboard, offering it to Jack with an extremely innocent expression. Jack glowered at being so easily read but slouched over anyway to snatch the proffered bottle.
“Nice eye,” he grunted.
Hetta frowned; she’d thought Wyn had glamoured himself. Perhaps he hadn’t bothered yet.
Jack clearly remained in a bad mood, shooting her a disapproving look as he dumped a measure of the remedy into his cup before adding coffee. He opened his mouth to say something, then stopped himself with a dark glance at Rakken.
“Oh, do not refrain on my account, Jonathan Langley-Valstar,” Rakken said sweetly.
Jack colo
ured to the roots of his hair, but fortunately—or perhaps unfortunately—they were joined by several other members of her family. There were more Valstars home than usual right now, thanks to the recent spring equinox celebrations. Hetta’s stepmother, sisters, and several of her cousins breezed into the breakfast room oblivious to the tension—or possibly merely accustomed to it, Hetta thought with a sigh. It wasn’t as if it were the first time she and Jack had been at odds.
No one else noticed Wyn’s black eye though—except her sister Alexandra, who sat down next to him with a frown and said something in a low tone. “I heal very fast,” she heard him reassuring her. Hmmm. Alexandra had the Sight, but perhaps she wasn’t the only one.
Lady Phoebe beamed at Hetta as she seated herself.
“Hetta, dear, I found the most wonderful bridal catalogue! It has several very useful suggestions for summer weddings.” Phoebe dropped this announcement with a hopeful question at the end of it. When Hetta merely smiled, she added, anxiously, “You will marry before midsummer, won’t you? Or we could combine it with the Solstice celebrations, if you liked? That could work very well!”
“We’ll think about it,” Hetta said diplomatically.
“Anyone would think you were nervous about taking up married life, what with all this indecisiveness over the wedding date,” her cousin Cecily said with a knowing smile. She had taken up the seat next to Hetta. She lowered her voice: “And I wouldn’t fret over the wedding night, you know.”
Hetta choked on her coffee and met Wyn’s eyes. He grinned.
Her cousin Caroline, who was sitting on Cecily’s other side and who had once stumbled upon Hetta and Wyn embracing in the map room, rolled her eyes and said loudly, “I’m pretty sure Hetta’s not worried about that, Cess.”
“Worried about what?” Alexandra piped up from the other end of the table.
“Lady Cecily may be concerned about Lord Valstar developing an ill-timed allergy to feathers,” Rakken said, earning a glare from all parties.
“My brother is being ill-mannered. How are your waterway maps progressing?” Wyn said, firmly changing the subject as Alexandra flushed a brilliant red.
“Oh, um, good.”
Hetta threw Wyn a look of gratitude as he did his best to keep the conversation from veering into inappropriate or inflammatory territory, not helped by Jack continuing to glare as if he were considering strangling her, Wyn, and Rakken all; nor by the silk-covered darts Rakken kept throwing out to enliven things whenever he grew bored.
If they never freed the Spires, where would Rakken go? He was too sharp for Stariel, a pike in a trout pond; this could never be home for him the way it was for Wyn. Would it be petty to inflict him on Queen Matilda? Rakken was right; there should be a fae ambassador in the mortal court, and Hetta didn’t want to part with Wyn. But sending Rakken to Meridon would only be a good idea if they could persuade Rakken to act in Stariel’s interests rather than his own—about as likely as Starwater freezing over at midsummer.
She reached once more for her cup and winced at the static. Taking a steadying sip of coffee, she looked up to meet Wyn’s worried gaze. There was a fae edge to his face, and she wondered that no one else had noticed.
She shook her head subtly—it was fine, and there was nothing either of them could do right now about it in any case. Rakken was watching them both, the green of his eyes like a cat’s.
The housemaid entered then, one of the kittens at her heels.
“There’s a phonecall for you, my lord. From Mr Marius.”
Hetta rested her fingertips on the white tablecloth, winding in a long, slow breath. “Thank you, Lottie,” she said, rising.
Four days until full moon.
12
Older Brothers
Hetta couldn’t help giving herself a small mental self-congratulation as she picked up the receiver in her study; the phoneline direct to the house had only just been installed. The rest of the lineswork for the estate remained a work in progress, but this small bit of modernity was nevertheless a heartening milestone.
“Hetta?” Marius’s voice scratched down the phoneline. “Is that you?”
“Indeed it is, brother mine. You sound like you swallowed a bottle of scotch. If so, I hope it was worth it!
A weary chuckle. “Sadly not. You don’t sound terribly chipper yourself.”
“A side effect of insufficient coffee and watching Wyn try not to strangle his brother over the breakfast table.”
Marius made a sympathetic noise.
“How are the headaches?” she asked.
“Fine, fine.” He didn’t sound fine. He sounded like someone trying to cut short a thread of inquiry before it began.
Hetta pulled on the thread. “That’s not very convincing. When does ‘fine’ ever actually mean ‘fine’?”
“Improving, then. But I didn’t call to discuss my health.”
“What does improving mean?” she pressed. She wished Marius hadn’t returned to Knoxbridge so quickly after Aroset’s attack. What if Aroset had damaged him in some way they’d yet to realise? And what about the telepathy? Guilt knotted in her stomach. If Marius hadn’t left so quickly, would she have had time to rethink the decision to keep him in the dark about his own ability? Was Rakken right about the risks? But she couldn’t tell Marius about it now, at the impersonal end of a phoneline.
“It means stop pestering me and remember which one of us is the elder, Mother.” There was a bite in the last word, and she knew Marius was rolling his eyes.
Her stomach fluttered. “Um, actually, that’s a rather apt bit of phrasing. I have something to tell you.” She twined the phone cord around her wrist and extended her senses. No housefae or staff lurked near her study, and no one had lifted the other receiver in the house, which sat in a small room off the main entranceway. She let out a breath and said in a rush, “You’re going to be an uncle.”
A sharp crack made her wince away from the receiver. It was followed by a clatter and muffled swearing.
“Did you drop the phone?”
“What did you say?”
“I’m pregnant.”
There was a long, fraught silence at the other end of the line. Marius didn’t react well to surprises. Was he gathering momentum to rail at her?
“Who else knows?” His voice had taken on a strange clinical detachment.
Really, that was his immediate thought?
“You’re the first person I’ve actually told apart from Wyn. I didn’t tell Rakken and Jack, but they each guessed it, separately. Apparently my swooning at the wrong moment gave me away.”
“Swooning?! That’s—have you seen a physician?”
“Normal amounts of swooning,” she emphasised, despite not knowing if this was entirely true. “And don’t you start—Wyn’s already taken to asking me if I’m all right approximately four dozen times per day.” She wasn’t going to mention the shocks, not until they’d at least heard back from Lamorkin.
“Oh.” He lapsed back into silence. What kind of scandalised brotherly reaction was this? Didn’t he care?
“Well?” she prompted when the silence threatened to go on without end. “Aren’t you going to rail at me for failing to uphold the family honour and so forth?”
What was she doing? It was nonsensical to be annoyed that he wasn’t yelling at her!
“You’re pregnant,” he said slowly. “Hells.” There was another long pause, as if the wheels of his mind were creaking only glacially back into motion. Then—“Please tell me you’ve got the High King’s permission to marry?”
This at least was closer to the reaction she’d expected. “It’s a work in progress.”
“Hetta.” Her name held a history of echoes, of half-fond, half-exasperated older-brother complaint stretching over years, right back to when they were children, before their father had remarried.
“I’ve recruited Ivy to the cause.” She told him about what they’d found. “I don’t suppose you’ve found anything useful d
own there?”
Marius made a frustrated sound she knew wasn’t aimed at her. “All I’ve been able to get hold of from the time period is a slightly disturbing set of folk tales—waterhorses drowning people, fae women murdering their lovers, that sort of thing—and a criminally boring thesis on the drivers behind the Northern Treaty that absolutely fails to mention fae in any capacity.” Marius had been the one to find the Addendum to the Northern Treaty that said Stariel could make its own treaties with fae courts, separate from the rest of Prydein.
“Maybe you should give me the highlights of that,” she said, only half-joking. Stariel had its own copy of the treaty, which she’d struggled through recently to refresh her memory. It wasn’t a particularly exciting document. She hadn’t found a copy of the Addendum. Or was it too buried somewhere in the chaos of Stariel’s library?
“No one needs the highlights of that thesis,” he said darkly. “How long have you got until…I mean, when…?”
“A while yet. November, we think.” She swallowed as well; mentioning a date made it feel somehow more real.
This time the pause held considerable awkwardness.
“Meridon,” he said grimly. “We’re rubbish chaperones, aren’t we?”
“It wasn’t actually only you and Aunt Sybil standing between me and my virtue. I’m not virtuous, Marius, and haven’t been for years.” But she couldn’t help the flush rising in her cheeks, despite herself.
“Yes, I know—but you don’t have to remind me.” He sounded so pained that she couldn’t help a huff of laughter escaping. He went quiet again, and when he next spoke it didn’t surprise her to find that his thoughts, now that he’d gotten past the initial shock, had begun to spin rapidly towards the wider implications. “The Conclave’s, what, end of May? It won’t be, er, obvious by then, will it?”
“No, but I’m not an idiot. I’ve no intention of making this news public before then regardless—or at all, before we’re married.” The injustice of it burned and made her add, “But it’s ridiculous that it should matter to them, given I know at least one of them has a child out of wedlock—and very likely more!”
