54. Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

A n event like a mock-battle and associated revel wasn't something that could be pulled off on short notice. That many people would need to be fed, watered, housed, and acquired, and the battlefield itself needed to be designated and prepared for its invasion.

It also wasn't the sort of event that anyone important should be excluded from, so invites needed to go out to everyone rich or titled who could conceivably get their feathers ruffled from being left off the guest list. All those people needed to be housed, fed, et cetera, too—and they weren't the kinds of people who could get put up in any kind of temporary housing. Some would stay in Taeskana, of course, but the rest of them would need to stay in the palace, which meant a flurry of work for everyone in it, Monarchs included.

The princesses were a trial. Nothing seemed to please Yllana, and though she held her tongue about Cass, she was far too buddy-buddy with Pelleas for my comfort; Tarra was only too delighted to immediately become a spoiled brat, and with a great deal of reluctance Cass gave her a staff, a budget, and the ability to plan events. We didn't have to attend all the events, of course, but it would have been super rude not to go to any of them, so we were subjected to social events again.

The rest of the courtiers seemed to like having more activities, though, and I supposed that was useful. It could only help us if the High Court didn't despise us.

Ace – who'd never ended up putting out any commentary on Cass versus Ithronel, negative or otherwise – arrived in tandem with Talien, a week before the big event. That made me way more nervous than any denouncement of Cass fighting Ithronel would have. Of all the dukes, Talien struck me as the most dangerous; hungrier, more ruthless, and more ambitious. Maybe it took one to know one. Ace wanted Sagebrush Court back, but I suspected that Talien would never be content with merely being the King of Flies. I didn't think he would ever be content with anything.

Vad and Dani were dealing with the fallout of a major blizzard and several avalanches, so they weren't able to come, much to our sorrow. That left us with three troublesome dukes, a crown prince, and two princesses to handle for a week, with zero assistance.

For the first time since the Feast of Willows, it was time to divide and conquer. Tech hadn't declared anything officially, but he was definitely courting Tarra, so those two had to be kept together. Cass and Yllana in the same room was a disaster waiting to happen, while Yllana and Pelleas got along well, so it was good to keep them together. Ace liked me—but Talien wanted me, simply because I wasn't his. Keeping him by my side meant he didn't have as much time for mischief.

It made the divisions for small events easy. Cass got to handle Ace, Tech, and Tarra, and I kept Talien, Pelleas, and Yllana out of trouble.

"I'm surprised I haven't seen you wearing opals," Talien said idly one afternoon, watching me while Pelleas and Yllana used me as a mannequin, working on putting together a formal dress for me to wear to the post-battle revel. Cass had suggested it; to my surprise, Pelleas had been delighted for the chance to try to reproduce some of his glamor-work in actual cloth, and Yllana preened under the attention of the prince.

I breathed a laugh, careful not to move as Yllana made tiny adjustments to the drape of the fabric, trying to imitate the fall of glamor-cloth off of Pelleas' arm. "I thought it would be rude to rob you of the chance to give me some," I said with a flirtatious smirk, glad Cass wasn't in the room. "Besides, when I went shopping in Taeskana, there wasn't anything nearly as fine. The jeweler told me it's all but impossible to get fiery opals for reasonable prices these days. Something about the mines selling to private buyers," I said airily, as if I didn't care. "His Splendor lets me buy whatever I want. Maybe I'll buy a mine of my own."

Yllana made a disgruntled sound, but didn't say anything, holding the brass pins between her lips as she worked.

"Mines are such filthy things, and it wouldn't do for such a lovely woman to wear lesser gems," the duke said with smug expression, his teeth showing as he smiled. He reached into his jacket and pulled out a necklace that flashed in the light with orange and green fire. "Wear these instead."

Black opal cabochons the size of quarters gleamed on the backdrop of his dark fingers. The heavy gold setting of the collar necklace was accented with trillion-cut black stones to fill in the gaps between the opals, but I couldn't peel my eyes off of the fiery gems.

I had stones just like them, buried in the back of my wardrobe .

"Those won't match her revel dress," Pelleas observed. His voice was pleasant and his expression didn't change from one of mild interest, but I caught a glimpse of those tell-tale shadow-wings on the floor beneath him. The glamor-mage didn't like opals any more than Cass did—but, then, all of his clothing was glamor, and not ones stored in talismans. He was casting all the time, too.

"They're too gorgeous to wait two days to wear," I said, still staring at them with what I hoped would read as greed instead of sharp anger. "I'll wear them tonight. I have a little black dress that will look perfect with them."

Talien smirked and tucked them back away. "May I put them on you tonight, your majesty?"

Oh, Cass was going to hate that.

I lowered my lashes and gave him my best smolder. "It would be my pleasure to accept, your grace."

It took Yllana and Pelleas another two hours to declare themselves pleased with the fit of the dress, most of which I spent flirting lightly with Talien or adding small contributions to the dress proceedings. The Duke of Flies bowed over my hand before we parted ways. Pelleas gave me a sidelong look, one full of assessment, and turned away with the tiniest of smirks to offer his arm to Yllana.

Cass was already back in our suite when I returned, sprawled facedown on a backless couch in the sitting room with his wings taking up most of the available floorspace.

"Bad day?" I asked.

He groaned, not moving. "I might threaten to jump off a building if I have to hear my sister refer to Kettekh as 'Kitty' one more time, except that I do that routinely."

I snorted and shook my head. "Well, I'm afraid that's going to be the least of your worries tonight."

He stilled, then pushed himself up, frowning at me. "What makes you say that?"

"Don't be mad," I started.

A pained look took up residence on his face. "That's not a promising start."

"Yeah, I know." I chewed on my lower lip. "Are you going to freeze up if you see a bunch of opals?"

His ears pinned back, and my chest went tight. "I don't think so," he said cautiously. "Not if I have warning."

"Okay." I blew out a breath. "Give me a second. I'm going to go grab them."

If anything, all my muscles got tighter, but Cass didn't protest. It didn't take me more than a couple of seconds to dig out my little collection of opals from its home in the back of the drawer. I left the towel around it and came back out into the room, taking a seat across from where Cass was still lying .

I set the towel on the table between us. "Are you ready?"

Cass grimaced and pushed himself into a sitting position, folding his wings behind him. "You were keeping opals in your room?" he asked in a small voice.

I hated hearing that—the fear. "I didn't know where else to put them," I said, keeping my voice soft and gentle, trying to soothe the anxiety tightening my ribs and tying my gut into knots. "It wasn't for nefarious reasons. These are opals from the mine I was at before everything happened."

He nodded, his ears not moving from their fearful position. "Alright," he said. "Show me?"

My shoulders went tighter as I unwrapped the towel from around the opals, to the point where I winced. Cass' cheeks darkened, and a moment later the strain eased.

"Is this okay?" he asked, his eyes searching my expression. "I know I shouldn't be controlling my reactions, but is dampening the physical effect on you alright? It seems foolish to make you suffer when I can do this without smearing my emotions across the Court."

A smile touched my mouth. "Yeah," I said, relaxing away from my own stress. "This is great, actually. Good compromise, Cassie."

His chin came up and ears perked forward in an expression of pleasure. "Truly?"

"Truly. It's perfect." I tapped one of the opals. "Are you ready for the bad part?"

"This isn't it?" he asked, eyeing the rough-cut gems like they might jump up and bite him.

"I would've left them in the wardrobe if this was it," I told him. I shook my head. "No, the issue is that I know exactly how many quarter-sized black opals with this kind of fire came out of that mine, and after talking with every jeweler in Taeskana over the past couple months, I'm aware that nobody's been able to get opals of this size or quality for the past fifty years at least, unless they're importing them from halfway across the continent. The local mines are all played out, or private." I took a deep breath. "Those two cabochons on the gloves he gave you could maybe have been from the mine I was at, but while we pulled out a bunch of these smaller gems, we only found five others big enough to get inch-wide circle cabochons out of."

"And that's bad?" Cass asked, his eyes fixed on the opals and his ears pinning back again.

I draped the towel back over them. There was no reason to keep making him look at them. "Talien's got a necklace with a dozen of them that he's putting on my neck tonight," I told him grimly. "The mine was sending their gems south, even the shitty ones. If he's got enough really high-class opals to drape them on me just to fuck with you…"

"He must have access to other mines. Maybe many other mines," he said faintly. His eyes lifted to mine. "You're wearing them tonight?"

I wrinkled my nose at him and nodded.

Cass heaved a sigh, dropping his head back. "Well, fuck. What the fuck is he doing with that many opals?" His brow furrowed. "What the fuck can be done with that many opals?"

"Fuck if I know," I said. I leaned back on my hands. "I was hoping you did."

He grimaced and shook his head. "No fucking clue. They're sometimes used to make cells for temporarily holding mages, but iron's usually better for that. Anti-magic shields during warfare, so that people can't simply glamor their way into your camp." Cass shuffled his wings, looking uncomfortable. "Sometimes as 'moats' around castles or manors, especially in the deeper wilds. If you have amplifiers built, you can temporarily cut off a small area to shield from wild magic surges, or attacks from certain kinds of monsters, but if you leave them up for too long, everything faery inside the barrier starts getting sick. That takes a lot of gem-quality opals."

"Well, we can think about it." I sighed. "It's not like he can get up to trouble while he's busy flirting with me."

"Ugh." Cass shoved himself up with a dark expression. "I fucking hate that."

"Jealous, splendor?" I asked in an innocent voice.

He started pacing. "Jealous, possessive, greedy…" Cass growled and swiped a hand through his hair. "He looks at you like you're some sort of object to collect. I want to punish him for it every gods-damned time, even while the damn soulmate bond is snarling that you're mine ." Cass rubbed the back of his neck, looking self-conscious. "Vad and Dani might not be the only people with avalanches to manage after tonight. I don't know that I'm going to handle him putting opals on you all that well."

"What if I promise that you get to be the one to take them off?" I offered, watching him pace.

Cass paused in his motion, ears shifting as he considered. "That might actually help," he said with surprise. "Knowing that it's temporary, and that I get to discard his claim on you."

"Then you get the honors. Cross my heart," I said, drawing an X over my chest. "Want to pick out a little black number for me to wear?"

His ears perked. "Anything I want?"

I grinned at him. "As long as it's black and smoking hot."

Wickedness curled his mouth and darkened his eyes, the gold gleaming against the black. "Deal," he crooned.