10. Dukes

Dukes

C ass and I took seats in our respective thrones, with Danica at my right hand and Vaduin to his left hand. The arrangement set me off-kilter until I realized that I was expecting to be at Cass' left hand instead of his right, because he was the King and I was the soulmate. Maybe it didn't work like that here, though. He'd given me the same coronation that he'd gotten, and we had thrones of equals. Maybe it didn't matter that I was the soulmate, at least as far as power went.

A thrill ran through me at the thought. The Court had killed four men for me because I'd wanted them taken care of . Mercy loved me. It caught me with terrifying ease. I was wargs and trees and mountains, and I was Mercy's Queen.

The wind picked up again as we took our seats, the cold promise of rain. I glanced up at the sky almost in synchrony with the high priestess and Vaduin, but aside from the thin white clouds high overhead, there wasn't much in the sky. Darker clouds hazed the air over the mountains far to the southwest, but with any luck we'd be safe from getting drenched.

Cass took a careful breath and turned his dark gaze back to the high priestess. "Let us welcome the High Court," he said, his voice steady and devoid of emotion.

"As you will it," she said, and turned to walk back down the stairway, disappearing from sight.

We had enough time to have an awkward silence before a fae man came up the stairs, followed by four humans. They were all strong-looking, and of mixed races and ages, each holding onto a handle attached to one corner of a heavy box. They were dressed well, but plainly, in the sort of clothing servants in movies about famous royal families wear. The simple colors and clean tailoring made them fade into the background, even on this barren spear of stone.

The effect was enhanced by the fae in front, whose own outfit of heavily-embroidered green silk would have been at home in a museum. He wore a narrow circlet of beaten silver and matching cuffs that covered the points of his ears, and fancy finger-jewelry with long silver claws. His left hand gripped the handle of a cane in the shape of a striking snake, the inside of the mouth enameled red and the eyes inset with glittering emeralds.

The wind yanked at his dark brown hair, tugging curling tendrils out from his pinned-up hair. He didn't seem to notice or care, even when they swept across his face and caught on his lips.

He walked up to the base of the natural stage with the smooth tension of someone moving through pain they'd long since learned to ignore, and knelt on the stone, putting his weight on the cane. "Your majesties, I present myself, Aeskanai Vaylir, the Sagebrush Duke, and I present to you a token of my fealty," he said, without a flicker of surprise at there being two of us.

Maybe the rumor mill had run at lightning speed. Or maybe he just had one hell of a poker face.

The four men carried the wooden box up and set it down next to the duke. They backed up in synchrony, keeping their eyes on the dirt, and took kneeling positions behind their lord.

Ace – because "Aeskanai Vaylir" was a bit much for my personal thoughts – reached over and opened the lid of the box, revealing a lumpy hunk of grayish metal. "Star-iron," he said. "If His Majesty wishes, there is time to have a star-sword made before the Silver Coronation." The duke's eyes flickered over to me, his hazel eyes catching the light for a moment to turn almost honey-gold. "Or perhaps a pair of daggers, or crowns."

Yet another fucking thing I didn't know about. That was getting really old.

"We accept your token of fealty, your grace," Cass said in a level tone. Even though he didn't sound unhappy, I could feel it in the tension of his jaw and set of his spine. My soulmate apparently did not like being the center of attention. "You may go, with our appreciation."

The duke gave us a deep nod and rose to his feet. He gripped the cane so hard that his knuckles went white, and his tense jaw and pinned ears told me that he had to be in agony. The moment I focused on Ace, I could feel it, too, the way the muscles of his right leg pulled against scar tissue and wrenched painfully from having to hold his weight.

" Psst ," I said to Cass, as Ace turned to walk away, his limp more noticeable now that he'd been on his knees.

His dark eyes flicked over to me. He raised one brow, a softer breeze flirting with the dangling strands of his hair.

I jerked my head at the retreating duke as his four mortal servants closed and picked up the box of meteorite iron, hauling it off to the side so it could be observed by the other people who came to give us gifts. "He's hurting," I whispered. "There's a zillion stairs. You can fix that, right?"

Cass' brows pulled together. "The stairs?" he asked softly, sounding baffled.

"No, dumbass," I hissed back. "The pain . "

He blinked, ears dropping in surprise, then turned forward. "Your grace," he called, as Ace turned to descend the stairs again.

The duke's spine went stiff. He turned back towards us, his expression stern. "Yes, your majesty?"

Cass licked his lips. "May I have your permission to ease your pain while you're on the palace grounds?" he asked, sounding uncomfortable.

Dark brows pulled together. "May I ask why, your majesty?"

"Because my soulmate requested it of me," Cass said, looking sidelong at me. "I offer not as a favor, gift, or insult, but to please her."

Ace relaxed, and I realized why Cass hadn't offered before. They were fae . Gifts and kindness weren't part of their lexicon. Everything had to be a bargain. If Ace had come to Cass as a healer, it probably would have been different, but in this context…?

His eyes turned towards me, and he offered a slight smile. "If I might also ask why you desire such a thing, your majesty?" he asked.

The more time he spends here, the better he looks to the people waiting, I thought, keeping the smirk off my face. Aloud, I said, "I understand the symbolism of making people walk all the way up here, but there's no reason to punish you on the way down. My grandmother would hit me with her cane for being so rude to an honored guest."

The corner of his mouth lifted higher. "If it pleases the Queen to treat me as an honored guest instead of a tolerated enemy, I'm pleased to accept." He put his right hand over his heart and bowed, putting weight on his snakehead cane.

I could see the moment Cass intervened. Ace let out a tiny gasp, his eyes going unfocused, then lifted his gaze to his King's with momentary shock. All the tension dropped out of him, and he wobbled as he stood again, his political mask in tatters.

The duke pulled it together, his polite expression returning before he bowed again and turned to descend the staircase. His four men darted looks in our direction, but performed their own bows and followed him.

Danica leaned towards me. "The dukes are each the last remnant of a fallen royal line," she murmured as the next one came into view. "Mercy's an empire. They don't have a lot of reason to like the Monarchs."

That explained the evil crowns.

The next man knelt, a lean, deadly-looking fae with a pale scar on his left cheek and storm-gray hair cut short. One curl fell down across his forehead, Superman-style, and a series of silver chains hung in arcs from his constantly-shifting ears. "Your majesties, I present myself, Kettekh Alair, the Misted Duke, and I present to you a token of my fealty," he said in a strong voice, like an orator.

Oh, no , I realized with dawning horror. It's going to be the exact same thing for hours .

The fae woman behind the duke stepped forward and knelt, holding up a sheathed sword. The thing was huge, and definitely meant to be wielded with two hands. Though the black sheath was plain, the handle was anything but, with the horizontal metal bars made in the shape of leaping lions and a roaring lion head for a pommel, clutching a huge uncut black garnet in its jaws.

"A sword fit for a King, and suited for your hand," the duke said, casting his eyes towards the ground. He glanced towards my feet. "Perhaps a matching dagger could be made to suit Her Majesty."

Thunder rumbled in the distance. I risked a glance to see that the dark clouds over the mountains were approaching faster than I preferred. We're going to get fucking rained on , I thought, dour. Wasn't that just grand.

"We accept your token of fealty, your grace," Cass said in the same level voice he'd used for Ace. "You may go, with our appreciation."

Tech stood and bowed. The lady with him set the sword in front of Ace's meteorite box, and the two of them descended down the stairs.

Fuck, I was going to have to remember these people's names, wasn't I? "Your grace" would only get me so far, and I'd be damned if I was going to use my mental shorthands for people without their explicit permission. It was all well and good to picture the Sagebrush Duke with his serpent cane as the ace of clubs, or the lean Misted Duke as a bundle of wires, but calling them "Ace" and "Tech" to their faces would probably cause a diplomatic incident.

I didn't have a mental image for Cass. He was just Cass.

"If people keep giving me swords, I'm going to need an armory," he muttered, his expression flat.

Next to him, Danica's winged soulmate smirked. "Think of how upset they'll be when they discover battle-trained healers fight with wooden staves. Or when their pretty iron gets soaked from that storm."

Cass lifted his lip. A moment later, the next nobleman climbed into view.

Unlike elegant Ace and hardass Tech, he looked like he could have been a main character in a medieval fantasy TV show, one of the ones where you get loving shots of ripped dudes sprawling in bathtubs and wiping blood off of their mouths. His narrow dreadlocks were tipped in brass and pulled back into a half-pony, long enough to brush his collarbones. He had an easy smile, and deep brown skin and broad features that reminded me of the Ghanaian man who ran my favorite corner kebab stand.

He moved with feline grace, almost sauntering, the sunlight flashing off of the gold embroidery of his deep violet clothing. When he caught me looking, he flashed me a wink and sank to one knee. "Your majesties," he said in a low purr, "I present myself, Talien Shamais, the Duke of Flies, and I present to you a token of my fealty."

Flies. The Duke of Flies . We'd been sending the opals south to somewhere called Flies—to him .

In my imagination, whoever had okayed the opal mine had to be some eminently-punchable trust fund baby, or the fae equivalent of it. Ivy league haircut, square chin, surgically-perfected nose, arched brows over soulless eyes—billionaire chic. I'd been stolen from my world and made into a slave at an illegal mine, for fuck's sake.

And here he was, with the gall to be hot .

Lion, I decided, trying not to snarl at him. I'd remember him as a lion.

He hadn't brought any people with him. The duke pulled out a gleaming wooden box about the size of a paperback and opened it, tilting it so the sunlight fell across the contents.

Color flashed. The fire of a pair of enormous black opal cabochons shone, orange and green and red, set on bed of embossed black leather. Fingerless gloves, I realized, staring, color rising to my cheeks as anger settled under my ribs. There were people buried alive for those stones, and more dead. He'd stolen those stones – stolen them from Cass – and now here he was, presenting them like a gift.

A gust of wind hit us so hard that the duke's dreadlocks whipped to the side, the metal tips chiming against each other. I could hear gasps and murmurs from down below. For one moment, a feral expression of pleasure flashed across Talien's face, as bright as lightning, before vanishing behind his flirtatious smirk.

"I have heard Your Majesty's touch is more powerful than most," the duke said with easy warmth, pitching his voice to carry even with the wind whistling across the barren stone. "These gloves are designed to scatter power. Perhaps you will find them useful." He glanced towards the storm, amusement playing across his expression.

My breathing dropped into regimented calm as Cass stared at the gloves. Lightning flashed in the distance, with the thunder rumbling behind. The sense of electricity played across my scalp and prickled along my arms.

It was him. It was all him. Land-tied , I thought, trying not to let the shock show on my face.

"We accept your token of fealty, your grace. You may go, with our appreciation," I said, because Cass was sitting there with his fingers digging into his rose-thorned throne and wind dragging his storm towards us, and I wanted Talien to close the box.

The Duke of Flies bowed from his kneeling position, but he did close the box. He got up, backed away three steps, then turned and sauntered away as the first heavy drops of rain hit the stone.

"Cass," Vaduin said in a low voice. "Lean into the storm. Send it south of us."

Cass started breathing harder, some of the quiet tension leaving his frame as the Duke of Flies vanished down the steps. He closed his eyes and nodded. A faint line appeared between his brows. The wind shifted, menacing rain turning over the valley instead of riding up the edge of the mountains on top of us.

I glanced over at him, taking in the tension of his hands where he gripped the arms of the throne and the way his wings were half-cocked, the feathers slicked down into a single deadly blade. Dark spots marked the ground around us, and thunder rumbled deep in the storm. "Not a fan of opals?" I murmured to him.

His jaw clenched. "I don't want to talk about it."

I wanted to wad the interaction up and chuck it in the proverbial dumpster, but I was bound to Cass and to his Court. There was no running away. So, instead of deciding not to give a shit, I tucked it in the "deal with it later" column, right alongside the Deathless thing, the soulmate thing, the land-tied thing, and the fact that there was a man hundreds of miles south of us with his hand sticking out of the bedrock.

And then I smiled at the next dignitary in line, and pretended I didn't want to scream.