Fortunately, Ellie’s stomach settled and she regained at least the outward appearance of composure by the time another liveried servant came to fetch them. Circled by the Fey, she followed her parents out of the antechamber and down a series of halls until they came to a set of massive, opulent doors manned by two bewigged footmen and a third pinch-nosed man. Four royal guards flanked the doors, spears in hand, swords shining at their hips. They eyed the bristling display of Fey weapons suspiciously, but made no attempt to disarm the warriors.
The massive doors swung inward, and the pinch-nosed man called out in a carrying voice: ‘Master and Madam Sol Baristani. Mistress Ellysetta Baristani.”
Before them, the Celierian throne room loomed large. A wide blue carpet stretched for a very long way down the center of the room, leading to two enormous thrones that ruled over the vaulted space from a raised dais. Hundreds of people stood in crowded masses on either side of the carpet, and balconies up above held another hundred. At least two dozen royal guardsmen stood at attention along the walls of the room. The Baristanis and their Fey escort walked down the long and daunting aisle. The king and queen were seated on their respective thrones, flanked on the king’s right by Dax v’En Solande and his red-shrouded truemate Marissya, the shei’dalin. Two rows of benches, presently empty, sat before the dais. Another small platform surrounded by a semicircular wooden railing stood off to the right between the thrones and the benches, angled so the occupants of the thrones, the benches, and the room at large would be able to see whoever stood behind that railing.
Ellie’s mouth went dry and her stomach took another unpleasant lurch as sudden realization struck. This was the annual gathering of the Celierian Supreme Court of Justice, presided over by the king and queen, who served as judge and jurors, and facilitated by Marissya v’En Solande, whose touch could force the truth from even the most hardened criminal. This was the court that rendered final judgment on disputed or undecided cases from all over Celieria. The verdicts of this court were final and irreversible.
And Ellie had just mouthed off to the queen.
Oh, gods. If there’s any mercy in you, don’t let the queen hold a grudge!
A man in calf-length blue robes met them at the end of the carpet and gestured for them to take seats in the second row of benches to the right. After making their bows and curtseys, Ellie and her parents sat, but the Fey went to stand at the far edge of the benches.
The pinch-nosed man’s voice boomed out again: ‘Master and Madam Gothar Brodson. Goodman Den Brodson.’ Ellie felt her heart sink into her stomach. Sure enough, there they were. Den was once again stuffed into his too-tight suit, pomaded and curled, and wearing his smug klat’s smile, as if he knew something no one else did.
The Steward of the Court, wearing blue robes with gold stripes on the lower half of the sleeves, walked to the king and handed him a parchment. King Dorian scanned the parchment, then handed it back and nodded. The steward turned to the benches. ‘Goodman Brodson,’ he said, ‘yesterday you petitioned the court to validate the betrothal contract between yourself and Mistress Ellysetta Baristani. You were granted the validation and have petitioned the courts for a special license to wed her immediately. Is this correct?”
Den stood, his chest swelling, his strong chin jutting forward. ‘It is, ser.”
‘You have a contract signed by the girl’s father?”
‘I do.”
The steward referred to the parchment. ‘The girl bears your mark?”
‘She does.”
‘Is she in this courtroom?”
‘She is.’ Den pointed towards Ellie. ‘That is my betrothed, Ellie Baristani.”
‘Thank you, Goodman Brodson. You may sit.”
Den shot a gloating look at Ellie and sat.
The steward came to stand before Ellie’s father. ‘Master Baristani, did you sign a betrothal contract promising your daughter in marriage to Den Brodson?”
Sol stood. ‘I did, ser.’ He glanced back at Ellie. ‘But—’
‘Thank you, Master Baristani,’ the steward interrupted.
‘That will be all.’ He turned his cold, dispassionate gaze on Ellysetta and called her name. ‘Ellysetta Baristani.”
With a gasp, she jumped to her feet. ‘Y-yes, ser?’ Her heart was racing, her stomach roiling, giving her cause to regret the pastry and keflee she had consumed.
‘Do you bear Den Brodson’s mark on your person?”
‘I had no idea what he was doing!’ she blurted. ‘I tried to stop him!’ Guffaws and raucous jeers sounded in the gallery, and her face flamed with embarrassment. The bailiff banged his gavel and called for silence.
‘Answer the question, Mistress Baristani. Do you bear Den Brodson’s mark on your person?”
Her head drooped. ‘Yes.”
‘You may sit.”
She sank down on the bench, her shoulders slumped. She and her father had just confirmed before the king and queen that Den had a valid and binding claim to her. That was the same as clapping a collar round her neck and giving Den the leash. She glanced at Bel, but his face was inscrutable. Not even Kieran was smiling.
‘Goodman Brodson.’ This time it was the king who spoke. Den leapt to his feet again as the king leaned forward. ‘Celierian laws and customs regarding betrothals and betrothal contracts are clear and immutable, as we are certain you are well aware. So clear and immutable, in fact, that you should not have found it necessary to file your petition. But your case has extenuating circumstances, does it not? Circumstances that we see you excluded from your petition.’ A little of the smugness faded from Den’s face. ‘It has been brought to our attention that these circumstances alter the very nature of your case from a simple civil dispute to a potentially explosive situation that could adversely affect Celieria’s foreign policy, our diplomatic relations, and even our national security. Did you not think those considerations were important enough to include in the statement you filed?”
‘I—’ Den went pale around the mouth. ‘But … Your Majesty, I—”
‘Take your seat, Goodman. There is another who would address this court.’ The king gestured and the massive doors at the back of the room swung open again.
In deep, ringing tones, the tempo slowed so that each word sounded clear as a bell, the king’s man called out, ‘His Esteemed Majesty, Rainier vel’En Daris Feyreisen, the Tairen Soul, King of the Fading Lands, Defender of the Fey.”
Ellie’s heart, which had been in her stomach, leapt up into her throat. She jumped to her feet and turned, like every other person in the room, to watch the Fey king make his entrance.
‘Dear gods,’ she heard one woman whisper. ‘He is magnificent.”
Tall, lean, and searingly handsome, Rainier vel’En Dari exuded the dark, dangerous beauty and mystery of the Fey race as he strode down the blue carpet. His black leather tunic and snug leggings seemed to absorb light, while his bristling collection of Fey blades were so highly polished that they reflected light back with almost blinding intensity. Black boots, tooled with scarlet and purple tairen, crossed the length of the throne room in smooth, ground-eating strides. A scarlet sash embroidered with tairen worked in gold thread draped from his left shoulder to his right hip, just below one of the two crossed bands of Fey’cha daggers, while a chain made of fist-sized squares of gold, each set with large Tairen’s Eye crystals, hung from one shoulder to the other. A golden crown circled his head, each of its six points topped with a small globe of priceless Tairen’s Eye crystal. Even without the crown, no one who saw him could fail to recognize he was a king. He carried power as effortlessly as his broad shoulders carried the purple-lined black cape that billowed out behind him.
He reached the end of the carpet and condescended to bend his spine in the almost bow made by one king to another. He didn’t look at Ellie, but his emotions reached out to her and his voice whispered in her mind, «Shei’tani.» She shivered at the liquid caress of the Fey word that meant true- mate, wife, and beloved all wrapped up in one. Every nerve in her body was aware of him as he stood only feet away, and when a warm breeze of Air brushed across the back of her neck and swirled around her ear, she almost cried out at the pleasure of it.
The crack of the bailiff’s gavel brought silence to the court. ‘The king of the Fading Lands has approached us with a petition of his own,’ King Dorian announced. ‘One that has made us reconsider the validation and license granted to Goodman Brodson yesterday. We have invited the Feyreisen to give testimony.’ King Dorian gestured to the platform beside him. ‘If you would step into the testimony box, My Lord Feyreisen.”
The Fey king strode to the platform on the right and stepped behind the railing, facing the court. Marissya came to stand close, but she did not touch him.
The steward stepped forward. ‘Rainier vel’En Daris, you have stated that you have a claim to Ellysetta Baristani that supersedes our laws and you have petitioned this court to dissolve the betrothal contract between Den Brodson and Ellysetta Baristani. Is this correct?”
‘It is.’ His voice was deep and sure, his face proud and uncompromising.
‘What is the nature of this claim that supersedes our laws?”
‘Ellysetta Baristani is my shei’tani.’ His eyes found hers. ‘My truemate.’ A murmur of voices rippled through the crowd.
‘Please tell the court what a truemate is.”
‘A truemate is the person who holds the other half of a Fey’s soul.’ His gaze never left hers, and Ellie felt the magic of his voice wrapping her in imperceptible weaves of longing. ‘It is the most sacred bond known to any Fey, more sacred than that between a king and his subjects, more sacred even than that between a mother and a child.”
‘Ellysetta Baristani is a Celierian, not subject to your laws or customs but rather to ours,’ the king interjected. ‘Though she may indeed be your shei’tani, she is also legally betrothed to Den Brodson according to our laws. He has a prior claim, which he is obviously unwilling to renounce.”
Rainier met the king’s gaze impassively. ‘I am the Feyreisen, she is my shei’tani. The betrothal to the Celierian must be dissolved. I understand your ways. I will pay Den Brodson and his family restitution for their loss. I do not ask that you break your laws, only that you understand and recognize that there is a higher law at work here. The gods created one woman whose soul could call mine. She sits there. Her betrothal to the Celierian must be dissolved.”
‘And if it is not dissolved?”
The sudden biting coldness of the Fey’s expression chilled the room. ‘I am the only living Tairen Soul. Any harm to me is harm to the Fey. I have recognized her as my shei’tani, and the bond must be fulfilled. If you deny her to me, you do me irreparable harm. The Fey will consider it an act of war.”
An audible gasp rose from the gallery.
The Tairen Soul’s face smoothed. ‘But let us hope it does not come to that. As I have said, I will pay the young man’s family restitution for their loss.”
He gestured and the doors at the back of the throne room opened. Two Fey entered, bearing a huge chest between them. They brought it to the front of the room and at Rain’s signal placed it before the Brodsons and opened the lid to reveal a dazzling display of gold and jewels, wealth enough to dower a princess several times over. Gothar Brodson’s eyes nearly popped out of his head, while his wife fell back in her seat in a half swoon.
‘I know enough of your Celierian laws to know that if the parents accept restitution, the betrothal contract is void.’ He pinned the Brodsons with a hard, haughty look. ‘Do you accept?”
‘Yes!’ Den’s parents cried, even as their son shouted, ‘No!’ Gothar cuffed his son on the side of the head. ‘Quiet, boy. That’s a flaming fortune before you. More money than you’ll see in a lifetime. No girl’s worth losing that.’ The butcher nodded. ‘We agree.”
‘I don’t!’ shouted Den. When his father would have hit him again, Den deflected the blow and glared ferociously at his sire. ‘Why do you think he’s offering you that money? Because she’s worth twenty times that, and he knows it! I won’t give up my claim to her. I—”
With a snarl of rage, Rain faced him, and Den’s voice suddenly went silent even though his mouth was still shouting words. It didn’t take anyone very long to realize what had happened.
‘My Lord Feyreisen!’ the king snapped. ‘Release our subject at once. You will not use Fey sorcery to silence a Celierian subject in a Celierian court of law.”
Though he had the power to destroy Den Brodson with a flick of an eyelash—and despite the fact that the tairen in him was eager to take the burden of this rultshart’s death upon his soul—Rain knew it would be unwise. Ellysetta had not yet entered into the matebond. She and her family were Celierian. They honored Celierian laws, not Fey ones. Besides, a Fey did not call tairen to hunt mice. With a narrow-eyed look at the king that plainly said he released the boy because he wished to, not because Dorian commanded it, Rain dissolved the bonds of Air he had woven over Den’s larynx to prevent speech.
‘You see!’ Den cried, pointing an accusing finger at Rain. ‘How do you know he hasn’t used his sorcery to steal my bride?”
‘Goodman Brodson,’ King Dorian said, ‘you are beginning to annoy me.”
‘But, Your Majesty—”
‘Be silent. You marked a girl under questionable circumstances, forced a betrothal contract out of her parents based on that mark, and now you object because another man may have laid claim to the same girl using his own superior brand of force? Little boys shouldn’t throw torches at tairen, Goodman. The tairen may get a burn, but the boys will be roasted and eaten for dinner.’ The king turned to Rain. ‘As for you, My Lord Feyreisen, regardless of whether or not the Brodsons accept your payment, there are still lawful procedures this court must follow—”
‘There are no procedures to govern the bond between a Tairen Soul and his mate,’ Rain interrupted. ‘I have stated my case before you. She is my shei’tani. You have seen the Brodsons accept my payment to them. Dorian vel Serranis Torreval, King of Celieria, son of the line of Marikah vol Serranis of the Fey, do you dissolve the betrothal between Ellysetta Baristani and Den Brodson, holding the Baristani family blameless of any wrongdoing in this matter?”
‘My Lord Feyreisen.’ Queen Annoura leaned forward in her throne before her husband could reply. ‘You have indeed stated your case.’ Her blue eyes were narrowed, and there was a snap in her voice. ‘The Brodsons have accepted your payment, and yet I don’t recall hearing Master Baristani grant you the right to break the betrothal on his behalf.’ She met Sol Baristani’s bespectacled brown eyes. ‘Have you given this right to the Tairen Soul, Master Baristani?”
Sol rose to his feet. He gave Rain a long, hard look. ‘No, Your Majesty,’ he said very clearly. ‘I have not.”
‘Ah. So it seems, Rainier vel’En Daris, you are incorrect in your assumption that the betrothal is broken merely because the groom’s family accepts your very large bribe’ The queen smiled sweetly. ‘Perhaps you are not so familiar with Celierian laws as you thought.”
Rain’s eyes blazed a furious command at the woodcarver. ‘You will grant me this right”
‘Sol …’ The woodcarver’s wife tugged at her husband’s sleeve. Her voice was an urgent whisper that Rain brought easily to his ears on a waft of Air. ‘Don’t do it. Think of Ellie, of what’s best for her. You can’t mean to cede her over to these … these godless sorcerers.”
Sol shrugged her off, muttering, ‘Hush, Laurie. I am thinking of what’s best for her. She never wanted Den, you know that, but she’s dreamed of the Fey—this Fey—all her life.”
‘You’ve always given her everything she wanted, but not this, Sol. They’ll destroy her. They’ll corrupt her soul. Everything we’ve ever done to keep her safe will be lost.”
‘Maybe, Laurie, the Bright Lord sent these Fey to help her, to protect her from the things we can’t.”
‘And maybe they’re the very thing we were meant to protect her against!”
Sol took a deep breath, stiffened his spine, and struck an aggressive, challenging stance that any male of any species would have recognized. He turned to Rain. ‘I don’t know you, my lord, and you don’t know me. But lest you think it has escaped my notice, for all this talk of souls and mating, not once have I heard the word marriage fall from your lips. I did not raise my daughter to be any man’s concubine, even if he is a king. If you want the right to break Ellysetta’s betrothal, Tairen Soul, rest assured you will wed her. And I mean by Celierian custom, in a Celierian church, with her family in attendance and a binding marriage contract in my hand!”
‘Sol!’ his wife gasped. ‘No!”
‘Papa!’ Incredulity and hope warred with fear and pride on Ellysetta’s face.
Rain’s expression lost its fury. A man protecting his daughter was something any Fey understood all too well. ‘Agreed.’ He turned back to the queen. ‘I believe now your Celierian laws are satisfied. Ellysetta’s father has given me the right to offer payment on his behalf. The Brodsons have accepted it. The betrothal is broken.”
Seeing Ellysetta about to slip from his grasp, Den jumped to his feet and shouted, ‘She’s mine! She bears my mark! She accepted it willingly! Ask her parents! She never tried to stop me, never called out for help.”
A feral growl rumbled ominously from the Feyreisen’s throat. He bared his teeth, his eyes flashing hot with power and rage. The guards along the walls snapped to tense alertness. ‘She called to me. I felt her terror, her fear, her outrage across hundreds of miles. Willing? You attacked her in her own home, took advantage of her innocence and her ignorance of your mating rituals to put your filthy mark on her and lay claim to her against her will. You did not know she was my shei’tani. It is the only reason you still draw breath.”
‘My Lord Feyreisen!’ The king snapped. ‘You will not threaten Our subjects in Our presence.”
Rain’s head whipped around. The torches on the wall flared violently, making the crowd gasp. ‘Then your subjects had best not lay claim to the Tairen Soul’s mate,’ he hissed. It was not a ruler, not a man of peace, who looked out from Rain’s face, but a fierce predator, barely caged. No one in Celieria had seen a Tairen Soul in a thousand years, and no one—not even the king, with his Fey blood—had understood what they were dealing with. Ellie couldn’t help feeling both fear and a thrill of excitement at the display of primitive possessiveness. His savagery, which should have frightened her witless, made her feel protected instead. She had never known what it was to be wanted so badly by anyone, had never dreamed such a thing could happen to her. A tide of longing swept over her, drowning out her fear of magic, her nightmares, even Selianne’s warning not to let the Fey control her mind.
She looked at Rain’s hands, now clenched into tight fists. She remembered the feel of them sliding into her hair, remembered the closeness of his arms pulling her tight, the way his voice had poured over her like honeyed cream as he spoke the Fey words of shei’tanitsa claiming, Ver reisa ku’chae. Kern surah, shei’tani. Your soul calls out. Mine answers, beloved. She remembered the warmth and security she had felt with the sound of his heart beating in her ear. Heat bloomed in her breasts and belly, a tingling heat that made her skin feel two sizes too small.
Rain drew a hissing breath, and his eyes, glowing like beacons, fastened on her face. Need, hot and urgent, rolled over her, scorching her, bringing every nerve in her body to quivering life. She could almost feel his desire, like hands, stroking her through the fabric of her gown, touching the aching tightness of her breasts, the liquid heat gathering in her loins. Her breath came very fast, and a fine trembling started in her belly, radiating outward. ‘Dear gods,’ she whispered, her eyes starting to lose focus. What was happening to her? ‘Dear gods.”
Then he was there, his strong hands drawing her up against his chest, his arms enfolding her. His cape swirled about her, hiding her from the hundreds of prying eyes surrounding them. She leaned into his strength, pressing her hot face against his throat. Her arms linked around his waist and clung tight, as his head bent to her and his lips rained searing kisses and a storm of passionate Feyan words in her hair.
‘You are mine.”
The fierce claim sent another bout of shudders rippled through her. All she could do was cling to him and whisper brokenly, ‘Yes. Yes.”
Rain’s head shot up in savage triumph. ‘She is mine,’ he growled, his narrowed gaze spearing the onlookers with naked threat, a lethal promise of death to anyone fool enough IF to try to take Ellysetta Baristani from him.
The scorching heat of the Tairen Soul’s desire for his mate was palpable, and his primitive claiming of her raised the temperature of the room several degrees higher. In the gallery, breathless, corseted ladies swooned by the dozens. On the dais, the king swallowed and ran a finger under the suddenly too-tight neck of his tunic, while the queen shifted restlessly on her throne and fanned her face, muttering, ‘Good sweet Lord of Light”
King Dorian cleared his throat. ‘It would indeed seem that you and Mistress Baristani are in accord on the subject, My Lord Feyreisen, and this court has heard all it needs to hear.’ His face settled into a stern expression and he leveled a hard gaze on the butcher’s son. ‘Den Brodson, you claimed the girl by marking her without her consent or knowledge, and when the king of the Fey also claimed her, you filed a petition in the hopes that our court administrators would not yet have heard the name of Ellysetta Baristani and would make your claim binding before anyone was the wiser. You sought to deny the Tairen Soul his truemate through legal maneuvering.”
Den opened his mouth to object, but the king’s hand slashed up in a curt gesture that silenced the objection before Den gave it voice.
‘If Ellysetta Baristani were being claimed by the Feyreisen against her will—if he threatened her in any way—then I might very well refuse the Fey king his mate and face the consequences of that decision, whatever those might be. But you, Den Brodson, not the Tairen Soul, are the one who has molested the girl, claimed her against her will, threatened her family, and tried to manipulate this court in order to force her to your will. I will not—now or ever—plunge Celieria into war in order to support the questionable claim of an unquestionable bully.”
‘She is mine!’ Den shouted. ‘She bears my mark. Everything she says is being manipulated by these Fey sorcerers, and you are falling prey to their magic!”
‘Goodman Brodson, you will be silent!’ The king gripped the arms of his throne and glared at the butcher’s son. ‘As my queen correctly noted earlier, the betrothal agreement is between Master Baristani and your father. You have no say in the matter. Your father has accepted payment in lieu of your bride. The betrothal is dissolved. The Baristanis are free of all obligations—material or honorable—entailed by the agreement or the circumstances leading up to it. Ellysetta Baristani may bear your mark, but she is no longer yours to claim. Is that clear?”
‘It’s clear, Your Majesty!’ Gothar replied quickly, grabbing his son up in his arms and clamping one huge hand over the younger man’s mouth. ‘Very clear! Thank you for your time and patience. Den won’t be bothering these people.”
‘See that he does not,’ the king warned. Then he took a deep breath and leaned back in his throne. ‘In light of the obviously strong feelings this case has … er … aroused’—a weak, dazed laughter rippled through the audience—’I call a one-bell recess to allow passions to cool.’ He nodded and the steward’s gavel cracked out the call for dismissal. The king immediately rose to his feet and thrust out an imperious hand to his queen. ‘Annoura, you will attend me.”
The queen eyed the passion-dark eyes of her husband, the flaring nostrils, the ruddy color of his face, and took his hand, allowing him to drag her off her throne and into the privacy of the antechambers beyond.
Only a few paces away, Ellie’s Fey protectors watched the throne room empty with astonishing quickness, the majority of observers leaving by twos with flushed faces and dazed eyes. The few dozen who remained were mostly women who stayed behind to ogle the Fey Tairen Soul and his Celierian truemate. ‘Any bets on the number of Celierian babies born in nine months’ time?’ Kiel vel Tomar murmured dryly as he watched the rush of departing couples.
Rowan vel Arquinas ran a hand through his black hair and shook his thighs to ease the tightness of his leathers. ‘And I thought the keflee thing was stimulating.’ Beside him his younger brother Adrial gave a bark of laughter that he tried to disguise with a fit of coughing.
Kieran grinned and obligingly thumped him on the back. ‘What do you think, Bel?”
‘She is a fine mate for our king,’ Belliard replied in a distracted voice. The watchful eyes of Ellysetta’s blood-sworn champion were focused on the enraged face of Den Brodson as his father dragged him from the courtroom.
‘Bel?’ Losing his grin, Kieran followed the older Fey’s gaze. ‘You think the little sausage still hopes to make trouble? Surely even he would not be so stupid.”
‘Not stupid, no. He was wise enough to see in our Feyreisa what these other Celierian fools did not. What even she does not see in herself.’ Belliard fingered one of the red-handled Fey’cha sheathed in his crisscrossed chest straps. ‘A man who has laid claim to such wealth will not let it slip from his hands without a fight.’
