“I have not harmed a single one,” she said, and she looked entirely too pleased with herself.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“I merely offered the men a chance to serve their queen as a member of my royal guard. I need my Ravens at full strength.”

“Joining your guard means giving up all family loyalties and becoming celibate. Why would they agree to either of those things?” I asked.

She took the blade away from Mistral’s throat. “You were so eager to tattle on me. Tell her now.”

“May I rise, my queen?” he asked.

“Rise, cartwheel — I care not — just tell her.”

Mistral rose cautiously, and when she made no move toward him, he began to ease across the room toward us. His throat was dark in the flickering lights. She’d bled him. Any sidhe could heal such a small cut, but because Mortal Dread had done the damage, he would heal mortal slow; human slow.

Mistral’s eyes were wide, frightened, but he moved easily across the dead ground, as if he weren’t worried that she would do something to him as he walked away from her. I know that my shoulder blades would have been aching with the fear of the blow. Only when he was out of reach of her sword did some of the panic leave his eyes. Even then, they were that shade of tornado green. Anxiety.

“Far enough,” she said. “Meredith can hear you from there.”

He stopped obediently, but he swallowed hard, as if he didn’t like that she’d stopped him before he got back to us. I didn’t blame him. The queen had magic that could destroy from this distance. She’d probably made him stop just so he would worry. She might intend him no more harm, but she wanted him to be afraid. She liked for people to be afraid of her.

“She has put metal chains of binding on all of the house of Nerys, so they can do no magic,” said Mistral.

“I can’t argue with that,” I said. “They attacked us at court, all of them. They should lose their magic for a time.”

“She has given the men the chance to become her Ravens. The women she has offered to the prince’s guard, his Cranes.”

“Cel is in seclusion, locked away. He needs no guard,” I said.

“Most of the women would not agree to it, anyway,” Mistral said. “But the queen had to be seen giving them all a choice.”

“A choice between becoming guards and what?” I asked. I was almost afraid of the answer. She’d been carrying Mortal Dread. I prayed that she hadn’t executed them. She would be forsworn before the entire court. And I needed Andais on the throne until she confirmed me as her heir.

“The queen has bid Ezekiel and his helpers to wall them up alive,” said Mistral.

I blinked at him. I couldn’t quite follow it all. My first thought was to protest that the queen was forsworn; then I realized she wasn’t. “They’re immortal, so they won’t die,” I said, softly.

“They will know terrible hunger and thirst, and they will wish to die,” Mistral said, “but no, they are immortal, and they will not die.”

I looked past him to my aunt. “Tricksy you,” I said. “Very damn clever.”

She gave a little bow from the neck. “So glad you appreciate the delicate reasoning of it.”

“Oh, I do,” and I meant it. “You’ve broken no oath. In fact, technically, you’re doing exactly what Nerys gave her life for. Her clan, her house, her bloodline will live.”

“That is not living,” Mistral said.

“Did you really think that the princess had enough influence with me to save them from their fate?” asked Andais.

“Once I would have gone to Essus, to ask his help with you,” Mistral said. “So I sought the princess.”

“She is not my brother,” Andais snarled.

“No, she is not Essus,” Mistral said, “but she is his child. She is your blood.”

“And what does that mean, Mistral? That she can bargain for Nerys’s people? They have already been bargained for, by Nerys herself.”

“You are pixieing on the spirit of that bargain,” Rhys said.

“But not breaking it,” she said.

“No,” he said, and he looked so sad. “No, the sidhe never lie, and we always keep our word. Except our version of the truth can be more dangerous than any lie, and you’d better think through every word of any oath we give our word to, because we will find a way to make you regret you ever met us.” He sounded more angry than sad.

“Do you dare to criticize your queen?” she asked.

I touched Rhys’s arm, squeezed. He looked first at my hand, then at my face. Whatever he saw there made him take a deep breath and shake his head. “No one would dare to do that, Queen Andais.” His voice was resigned again.

“What would you give for a sign that life was returning to the gardens?” Doyle asked.

“What do you mean by sign ?” she asked, and her voice held all the suspicion of someone who knew us all too well.

“What would you give for some hint of life here in the gardens?” “A little wind is not a sign,” she said.

“But would the beginnings of life here in the gardens be worth nothing to you, my queen?”

“Of course it would be worth something.”

“It could mean that our power was returning,” Doyle said.

She motioned with the sword, silver gleaming dully in the light. “I know what it would mean, Darkness.”

“And a return of our power, what would that be worth to you, Queen?”

“I know where you are going, Darkness. Do not try to play such games with me. I invented these games.”

“Then I will not play. I will state plainly. If we can bring some hint of life to these underground worlds, then you will wait to punish, in any way, Nerys’s people. Or anyone else.”

A smile as cruel and cold as a winter morning curved her lips. “Good catch, Darkness, good catch.”

My throat was tight with the realization that if he’d forgotten the last phrase, others would have paid for her anger. Someone who would have mattered to Doyle, or me, or both, if she could have found them. Rhys was right: This was a dangerous game, this game of words.

“For what shall I wait?” she asked.

“For us to bring life to the dead gardens, of course,” he said.

“And if you do not bring life to the dead gardens, then what?”

“Then when we are all convinced that the princess and her men cannot bring life back to the gardens, you are free to do with Nerys’s people as you intended.”

“And if you do bring life to the gardens, what then?” she asked.

“If we bring even a hint of life back to the gardens, you will let Princess Meredith choose the punishment of those who tried to have her assassinated.”

She shook her head. “Clever, Darkness, but not clever enough. If you bring a hint of life back to the gardens, then I will allow Meredith to punish Nerys’s people.”

It was his turn to shake his head. “If the Princess Meredith and some of her men bring even a hint of life back to these gardens, then Meredith alone decides what punishment shall be meted out to Nerys’s people.”

She seemed to think about that for a moment or two, then nodded. “Agreed.”

“You give your word, the word of the queen of the Unseelie Court?” he asked.

She nodded. “I do.”

“Witnessed,” Rhys said.

She waved her hand dismissively. “Fine, fine, you have your promise. But remember, I have to agree that there is at least a hint of life. It better be some evidence impressive enough that I can’t pixie out of it, Darkness, because you know I will, if I can.”

“I know,” he said.

She looked at me, then. It was not a friendly look. “Enjoy Mistral, Meredith. Enjoy him and know that he comes back to me when this is done.”

“Thank you for loaning him to me,” I said, and kept my voice absolutely empty.

She made a face at me. “Don’t thank me, Meredith — not yet. You’ve only bedded him once.” She motioned at me with the sword. “Though I see that you have found what he considers pleasure: He likes to cause pain.”

“I would have thought that he would be your ideal lover then, Aunt Andais.”

“I like to cause pain, niece Meredith, not be on the receiving end.”

I swallowed hard, so I wouldn’t say what I was thinking. I finally managed, “I did not know that you were a pure sadist, Aunt Andais.”

She frowned at me. “Pure sadist — that’s an odd phrase.”

“I meant only that I didn’t know you didn’t like pain on your own body at all.”

“Oh, I like a little teeth, a little nails, but not like that.” Again she motioned at my breast. It ached where he’d bitten me, and I had a near-perfect imprint of his teeth, though he hadn’t broken the skin. I would be bruised, but nothing more.

She shook her head, as if to chase away a thought, then turned, and the motion caused her black robe to swirl wide. She grabbed the edge of it, to pull it around herself. She looked back over her shoulder one last time before she stepped into the darkness and traveled back the way she’d come. Her last words were not a comfort. “After Mistral’s had his way with her, do not come crying to me that he’s broken your little princess.” And the piece of darkness where she had been was empty.

So many of us let out a sigh of relief at the same time that it was like the sound of wind in the trees. Someone gave a nervous laugh.

“She is right about one thing,” Mistral said, and his eyes held regret. “I like causing a little pain. I am sorry if I hurt you, but it has been so long since…” He spread his hands wide. “I forgot myself. I am sorry for that.”

Rhys laughed, and Doyle joined him, and finally even Galen and Frost joined in that soft masculine sound.

“Why do you laugh?” Mistral asked.

Rhys turned to me, his face still shining with laughter. “Do you want to tell him, or do we?”

I actually blushed, which I almost never do. I kept Abe’s hand in mine and drew us both across the dry, brittle grass until I stood in front of Mistral. I looked at the blood that trickled dark across his pale neck and gazed up into his eyes, so anxious. I had to smile. “I like what you did to my breast. That’s just about as hard as I like it, just this side of drawing blood with teeth.”

He frowned at me.

“You like the nail work to be harder than the teeth,” Rhys said. “You don’t mind bleeding a little from nails.”

“But only if you’ve done the preliminaries,” I said.

“Preliminaries?” Mistral said, and sounded puzzled.

“Foreplay,” Abeloec said.

The puzzled look faded, and something else entirely filled his eyes. Something warm and sure of itself, something that made me shiver just from him looking at me. “I can do that,” he said.