Royal Pawn (Jacky Leon Book 6)

by K. N. Banet

  Cassius tilted his head to the side thoughtfully. “No, not in my memory. He would eat what was presented to him. He was picky about the quality but never choosy about flavors or textures. Only that it was done right.”

  “He’s not that much of a snob,” Fiona said, her jaw tightening.

  “He was,” Cassius whispered.

  “How bad was it?” Rian asked, leaning closer to his brother. “He’s always been really relaxed with us.”

  “He was never bad about it. He just had standards, and that was fine. No one ever thought those standards were too high. He employed the best, and there were young prodigies who would come to test their inventions against my father’s palate, wondering if they could match up. Most of the time, they did not, but sometimes, he would sponsor someone to finish their education in another household or kept them in the palace, gainfully employed while they continued to learn.” Cassius shrugged. “As the king, it was his place to provide those sorts of challenges for his people. Unless someone deeply offended him, there was no harm in losing.” Then Cassius got a strange look. “You didn’t feed him fast food for all these years, did you? How did you even manage?”

  “Like I said, he was always really relaxed with us.” Rian shrugged as well, and I saw the resemblance between the crazy-looking punk and the rich noble with his fine attire.

  Cassius eyed Fiona’s blank face, then turned to me, and I also shrugged.

  “There’s something I’m missing.”

  “Yeah, the King Brion we knew wouldn’t eat most vegetables unless they were grown on his land by his private gardener, who worked closely with the family’s private chef,” Sorcha said, chuckling. “He was really weird about it.”

  “He was picky in the beginning,” Fiona whispered. “But he changed over the years because he loved me.” She truly believed the words, her scent making that clear to me and Heath, at least. I had no idea what sort of nose the two predator sidhe at the table had.

  “My father changed,” Cassius said very carefully.

  “People do that,” Sorcha whispered from her seat. “I did. He was just as capable.”

  “Yes, but…there’s something not being said here,” he murmured. His eyes began to glow. “I know when there are secrets being kept from me in my house.”

  I groaned, unable to resist the sound and feeling that ran through me. I had not yet told Cassius about the promise Brion had made and how it had somehow altered him. I had been hoping Fiona or Rian would bring it up to give Cassius some understanding. Apparently, their afternoon conversation hadn’t gotten that far.

  “A magical promise,” I said, sighing as Cassius kept his eyes on me. Obviously, Fiona wasn’t going to tell him the full truth, even though she believed the promise to be rooted in love. I had no doubt about that, but Cassius had the right to know his father was possibly forever altered by his experience. “From my understanding, Brion made Fiona a promise, and it…changed him. That’s why, when I talk about the fae I met, I say Brin. He was and wasn’t Brion. Brin was probably fine eating whatever you put in front of him.”

  Cassius groaned this time. “Sorcha.”

  “I can fix that sort of thing,” she said, nodding. “He might not like it when it’s happening, but I can fix it.”

  “Fix it?” Fiona said, looking between them. “Nothing needs to be fixed. He’s my husband. He was my husband when he was Brion, and he’s my husband as Brin. There’s—”

  “This Brin can’t rule,” Cassius said softly. “It’s a weakness that can be exploited. I can’t, in good faith, let my father take the throne while he has a second identity created by the wild magic of the fae. It needs to be fixed.”

  “And you’ll just make this decision without him, without anyone putting in their own word. As if you have that right.”

  “I’m the only one who does,” Cassius growled. “You simply don’t understand the forces at play, Fiona. He’s been revealed. He can’t go back into hiding and live out your life with you. If you had passed on and the magic released itself, I would have to ask Sorcha to do this, anyway. It has obviously limited his power immensely. He can’t be broken into two pieces. He can’t rule like that, and if he doesn’t rule, he will be hunted until he is dead. Those are the only two options he has.”

  “If you had just taken the throne he left for you, they wouldn’t have to be!” Fiona screamed, throwing her spoon. She was the only one who left the dessert untouched. “You could have let your father live the life he wanted to live, not the one thrust on him by Oberon and Titania!”

  Am I the only one who sees the irony? She’s really not missing it, is she? I mean, come on.

  “Thrust on him?” Cassius stood up as well, and his magic once again flooded the air, filling my nose with nothing but his fury. “He created the original courts to better manage all the children his parents were having, to give the grandchildren a society to grow up in, and to bring the sidhe together. They didn’t ask him to rule over the other fae. He chose it. He is the one who stood up and said the sidhe shall be the kings and queens, the lords and ladies of all the fae. He made that choice to stop the war between the species.

  “Oberon and Titania were wanderers of immense power who saw no reason to rule from a seat or a castle, but they could have if they had wanted to. The fae loved them, but they never actually took thrones, even though we call them the first king and queen. It was my father who made all of those decisions, with the backing of his most powerful and closest of siblings. Oisin was one of them!” He jabbed a finger at Fiona. “You have either been fed lies or are making an assumption. Let me tell you, both of them are dangerous. Don’t ever try to chastise me again. It will go poorly for you.”

  Fiona grabbed her napkin from her lap and threw it on the table, then stormed out of the dining room without saying another word.

  Rian didn’t follow her.

  “I’m sorry,” the young man said, swallowing and making his Adam’s apple bob. “I think she expected you to be…well, you’re not what she expected.”

  “I know what she expected,” Cassius murmured. “Have since the moment we started talking. She views him from a window of love, which makes her biased. She’s human and mortal. Time and experience haven’t shown her Brion’s flaws, of which there are many. He’s not a perfect man. I’m the bitter son of a previous marriage, who has no loyalty to her or to her idea of my father.”

  “No…I think she wanted you to just be another one of her sons,” Rian whispered.

  Cassius snorted, looking away from his young half-brother to his wife. “What’s your opinion, love?”

  “It’s not fit for guests,” Sorcha replied darkly. Then a switch was flipped, and she was once again a beautiful hostess as she stood. “Why don’t we retire for coffee or wine in the next room? Come. We’ll let Cassius begin teaching Rian while we finally focus on what we can do after we get back to your territory, Jacqueline. Maybe it’s better Fiona isn’t in the conversation.”

  I stood at her invitation, Heath doing the same. Cassius reached out and patted Rian’s shoulder as he stood, and his half-brother followed dutifully.

  “You know, our eldest of brothers would have liked you,” Cassius said softly as we walked into the next room.

  It was cozy with a fire going and a portrait of Cassius and Sorcha over the fireplace. Knick knacks covered the mantle, and sculptures were tucked into the corners. Flowers were at the center of the low coffee table in the middle of more comfortable-looking couches. Beside them, a deck of cards. Everything was once again done in modern furniture with clean lines and bold choices, but frames in naturals woods and stones. That juxtaposition was still as strange but interesting as it had been the first time I saw it.

  “Have a seat,” Sorcha said kindly, pointing to one of the couches. I sank into it, watching her find a couch of her own. She brought her feet up and tucked them underneath her. “And relax. Cassius and I have no reason to tell anyone about your relationship or find it off-putting
. You two keep this…wall between you as if you can’t dare be seen within six inches of each other, but the love radiating off both of you is clear.”

  “Love, don’t meddle,” Cassius chastised softly as he bent down to kiss her.

  I didn’t say anything, but Heath wrapped an arm over the back of the couch, and his fingers gently ran up and down the side of my neck.

  “We’re not used to being in a space where we can be open,” he explained. “Thank you for your reassurances. It doesn’t matter if you see us now, anyway. You know.”

  “We don’t take the risk of PDA,” I said, leaning into him, and his arm wrapped a little tighter, keeping me there.

  “That would break me,” Sorcha murmured, watching us with a sad expression. “Not being able to touch my husband, to hold his hand or to take his arm. I don’t think I could tolerate a relationship like that.”

  “Well, no one would ever tell you that you can’t be with someone,” Cassius said as he stopped in front of the fire. “They have people who will fight to keep them apart.”

  “Yes. They’re not Kaliya and Raphael either.” Sorcha nodded, her eyes still on us. “These two want to be together and are doing their best. Neither of them is running in the opposite direction and pretending as though they feel nothing.”

  “This Kaliya ran?” I asked, trying to shift the topic off Heath and me. I knew the name. Kaliya had been trained by Hisao. Learning about her felt like a way to connect with my brother.

  Sorcha rolled her eyes. “As fast as she could. She was confronted with a man who would love her for eternity, and she ran.”

  “To protect him,” Cassius said softly, his hands on Rian’s shoulders, adjusting the younger fae to the spot he wanted. “Not that you or Raphael cared, but I understood what she was doing.”

  “Well, they’re happy together now, so it all worked out.” Sorcha lifted her hands and smiled.

  “You keep bringing them up. You two must know them well.”

  “They’re our best friends,” Sorcha explained. “I adore those two. Now, Cassius, what are you about to do?”

  “Before we can leave tomorrow, Rian needs a crash course in his magic. We’ll do that tonight, so he can sleep on it. Tomorrow, you will make a portal home, so you really need to understand how your magic feels, how to bend it to your will.” He was talking most to Rian. “I’m going to remove your glamour, then you’ll remake it. Generally, every fae has one glamour that is most natural for them to do, one appearance that naturally lays over our fae appearance. Your natural look will always be the strongest. Trying to do other appearances, say if I tried to look like Heath Everson, would be more difficult and more likely to break or be seen through.”

  “The best glamours are ones you barely have to think about doing,” Sorcha added.

  Rian nodded. “Hit me.”

  Cassius chuckled and put the palm of his hand on Rian’s forehead. The magic of the room snapped like a whip cracking, but it wasn’t painful, just the breaking of a strange tension I hadn’t realized was there, done quickly. When the noble pulled his hand away, Rian’s face was different yet the same. His cheekbones were more angular, his eyes a little bigger, more unnatural. His jawline, once rougher like a human’s, was now perfectly sculpted as if someone had carved him out of marble. His body was leaner and longer, and his hair didn’t change color, which was still an insane red with blue added. His eyes were the same unearthly blue as Cassius’, and his ears were long like his brother’s and severely pointed.

  “Red hair and blue eyes,” Sorcha said, sighing happily. “One day, I’m just going to make a collection out of you and your brothers, Cassius. I might hate your father, but those lovely colors he passed onto you are just…”

  “I don’t share,” he replied, smiling over his shoulder at her. She stuck her tongue out at him. He turned his attention back to Rian, looking him over. “Yeah, exactly what I thought. Father just tapped into your natural glamour. Now, touch your magic and ask for it to wrap around you. Give it purpose to shift your appearance.”

  Rian frowned and closed his eyes, looking very concentrated. I watched in fascination as the scent of magic filled the room again, shifted, and pulled into Rian, morphing him back to the very human-looking young man I knew.

  “Good!” Cassius grinned, patting Rian’s shoulder. “Now, your magic feels like mine. You’ll notice when you get upset or angry, it’ll lash out. You’ll lose your glamour, which is probably why our father put it on you instead of teaching you. Foolish because holding my glamour is one of the best ways I have found to keep my power in check.” He shrugged. “Our father…”

  “You really don’t like him, do you?” Rian lowered his head, his expression thoughtful. “I thought it was just me.”

  “What?” Cassius eyed him with intense scrutiny, I was glad wasn’t directed at me. “You don’t like our father?”

  “I think he’s…selfish. I mean…” Rian sighed. “It’s always about him. He decided where we lived, how we lived, what we had to do. He decided what businesses he wanted us to manage. We couldn’t go out on our own and live our own lives. I met a girl once, and our father moved us away from her. He’s always been that way. Mom thinks it’s to keep us safe, and as long as she has him, she doesn’t care, but I always wanted more. I wanted my own life, and until all of this happened, I was worried I would never get it. That’s why I think he dumped me with them.” He threw a hand at me and Heath. “He knew I would protect Mom more than I would fight for him.”

  “Ah…” Cassius nodded slowly. “Yes, that sounds very much like our father. I lived the same way until…”

  Rian leaned toward him, wanting to hear Cassius’ secrets, and I felt it lance my heart once again. Rian had looked like the outcast of his family, but it seemed he found a kindred spirit, someone who had lived a life like his own, beholden to the idea of the family.

  It hit me in the gut. To lose the chance at happiness because of a powerful father figure. It would be so easy for me to walk that path. Instead, I was still standing at the crossroads. Seeing these brothers only made me more resolved to make a plan with Heath to reveal our relationship.

  “We had two eldest brothers,” Cassius said softly, looking into the fire. “And I lived the same way you do until they died, both trying to fight in a war that had already claimed our mother.”

  “Do you think fate will repeat itself, love?”

  He turned to his wife and shook his head. “No, not if I have anything to say about it. Already, this is different. That war was between us and the natural species of the fae. This is between two sidhe. The trolls, the goblins, the redcaps, and the rest of them, I don’t see them getting involved en masse. Maybe one or two, here or there, but I don’t see their armies marching this time. The assassins Jacqueline and Heath went against were sidhe. That’s a good thing. We’re not dealing with Clionadh this time.”

  “Who?” I asked softly. “I’m sorry, I don’t know much about fae.”

  “Clionadh was the queen of the banshees, and her stories make her seem much more…tragic than she really was. Banshees are a specific powerful clan of sidhe who always objected to rule,” Cassius explained, crossing his arms and leaning on the mantle over the fire as he explained. “She was one of the few banshees who could sing the song of death and bring death with it. It was how she killed my mother. My mother was brilliant and powerful, but it caught her off guard. There was no saving my mother from the song that stopped her heart. Thankfully, Clionadh is dead, and the banshees haven’t had a new member as powerful since.”

  “He killed her, my Cassius,” Sorcha whispered. “I wasn’t around for that. I’m fairly young when it comes to the fae.”

  “It’s said to never ask a fae how old he or she is,” Heath said, diverting us to a lighter topic. “Is it because it’s rude?”

  I elbowed him. “You should never ask how old a woman is,” I reminded him, getting a chuckle. He leaned in to kiss me without an ounce of hesitation in f
ront of the others. Once he was done with me, he looked at Sorcha expectantly, who was watching us with a twinkle in her gaze.

  “It’s because of how time passes. Hard to judge age when I can go to another area of the realms and pass through hundreds of years, but for Cassius, I could only be gone for a couple of weeks,” Sorcha said with a smile. “So, we track who was born in what order. Beyond that, what is age but a number? We’re all immortal, and many of us are powerful.”

  “Let’s get back to work with Rian,” Cassius said. “Jacqueline, Heath, feel free to retire.”

  We decided to watch and talked late into the evening, enjoying a glass of wine with Sorcha. She had so many stories about the fae. By the time she was through, I had a clearer understanding of it all. The fae realm and the mortal realm had always sat side by side, close to each other in a way other planes of existence didn’t. Each had entire cultures and species. The fae had never been uninhabited. It had existed right beyond the barrier of what humanity understood. The sidhe had bridged the two worlds in a way other species never could.

  It was bigger than I could have imagined. Humans had the terminology all sorts of confused from what Heath added. Like sidhe, sidhe was used by humans to describe the mounds of earth or stone circles once used as doors to the fae realms, and banshees were called the bean sidhe. It was an accidental misuse of terminology that stuck. The word made its way to humanity because the fae had said it so often. Humans created their own understanding.

  “It’s a lot,” Heath said softly as we went back to our room. He yawned as he stripped off his clothing. “Thank goodness we’re only dealing with this momentarily.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed. Sorcha had laughed toward the end of our conversation, saying most fae didn’t care what outsiders dared to say. Calling them all fae was just fine. I was going to stick with that because I would rather use the blanket term than risk offending someone by guessing the wrong type of fae.