Лорел Гамильтон - A Caress Of Twilight

Galen came to stand at the end of the bed. He was wearing a long-sleeved shirt whose pale green color brought out the green tint in his skin, intensified the darker color of his hair. The pants were just faded blue jeans washed until they were almost white. There was a hole in the middle of his thigh where white threads gave hints of the pale green skin underneath.

I realized he'd said something and I hadn't been paying attention. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

He grinned, flashing white teeth. "Queen Niceven's representative is here. He says he has strict orders to collect the first payment before he tells us the secret of how to cure me."

My gaze went back to the hole in his pants, then traveled up his body until I met those grass green eyes. The heat in his eyes matched the tightening in my body.

Kitto stirred beside me, opened his blue, blue eyes. Talking, doors opening, and my moving hadn't stirred him; but the tightening of my body in response to Galen, that had woken him.

I explained briefly that Niceven's man was here. Kitto had no problem with the demi-fey coming into the room. I'd known he would have no problem. I'd asked for politeness' sake. The queen wouldn't have asked, but I think it was more that she didn't care what someone thought, rather than her knowing they wouldn't mind.

Galen went back to the door and opened it wide. A tiny figure fluttered in. The body was about the size of a small Barbie doll. His wings were larger than the rest of his body, and mostly rich butter yellow with lines and bars of black and spots of blue and orangey-red. He hovered over the bed, above me. His body was a slightly paler version of the rich yellow of his wings. He wore a filmy yellow skirt, or kilt, as his only clothing.

"Greetings to Princess Meredith of the Unseelie from Queen Niceven of the demi-fey. I am known as Sage, most lucky fey to be chosen as our royal majesty's ambassador to the Western Lands." His voice was like the sound of tinkling bells, a laughing sound. It made me smile, and I knew instantly it was glamour.

I tsked at him. "No glamour between us, Sage, for that is a kind of lie."

He pressed tiny perfect hands to his chest, his wings beating faster, sending a breath of air against my face. "Glamour, I? Would a humble demi-fey be able to do glamour to a sidhe of the Unseelie Court?"

He had been careful not to deny the charge; he simply skirted the issue. "You can drop the glamour, or it can be stripped from you. You can put it all back, but for our first meeting I want to see what, or whom, I am truly dealing with."

He flew closer, close enough that the wind from his wings played in the strands of hair around my face. "My lovely maiden, you wound me. I am as fair as you see me here."

"If that is true, then light upon me and let me test the truth of your words. For if you are truly as you appear, then touching my flesh will not change you, but if you play me false, then the mere touch of my skin will show your true self." The very formality of the words was a type of spell. I had spoken truly and believed utterly what I had said; thus it was true. When he touched my skin, he would be forced to appear as he truly was.

I sat up so I could extend a hand. The sheets slipped down, pooling at my waist. Kitto curled himself closer around me, his large eyes staring at the fluttering fey. He watched the tiny figure like a cat fascinated by a bird. I knew that the goblins were not above cannibalizing other fey. The look on Kitto's face said that, perhaps, demi-fey were a delicacy.

"Are you all right, Kitto?"

He blinked and looked up at me. His gaze slid from the fluttering fey, across my bare breasts, and the look of hunger changed but a very little. That one look frightened me. Something must have shown on my face because Kitto hid his own face against my bare hip, snuggling under the sheet.

"The taste of flesh has made our little goblin bold." Doyle was in the doorway.

The little fey turned in midair to give a small bow. "The Queen's Darkness, I am honored."

Doyle gave the barest of bows, a mere nod to courtesy. "Sage, I must say that I am surprised to see you here."

The tiny flying man rose upward so that he could come close to seeing Doyle eye to eye; but he stayed out of reach, like the shy insect he resembled.

"Why surprised, Darkness?" His voice didn't sound so much like joyous bells now.

"I did not know that Niceven could spare her favorite lover."

"No more that, Darkness, and well you know."

"I know that Niceven had child and husband by another, but I didn't think the demi-fey cared so very much for the niceties."

Sage flew a little higher, a touch closer. "You think because we are not sidhe that we do not know the law." The anger could have sounded impotent coming from that tiny chimelike voice, but it didn't. It was the sound of chimes when storm winds strike them, a frightening music.

"So," Doyle said, "no longer queen's lover. Whatever have you been doing with yourself, Sage?" I had never heard Doyle so chiding before. He was deliberately baiting Sage. I'd never seen Doyle do much of anything that didn't have a purpose to it, so I let it go. But it all had a personal feel to it. What could this minute man have done to the Queen's Darkness, to earn such personal attention?

"I have had the whole of our kingdom's women to please me, Darkness." He flew almost into Doyle's face. "And you, one of the queen's eunuchs, what have you been doing with yourself?"

"Look at what lies in the bed, Sage. Tell me that that is not such a bounty as man or fey would sell their soul for."

The fluttering man didn't even bother to turn around. "I did not know that you liked goblins, Doyle. I thought that was Rhys's peculiarity."

"You can be deliberately obtuse, Sage, but well you know the meaning of my words."

"Rumors are swift things, Darkness. They say that you guard the princess but do not share her bed. There has been much speculation as to why you would pass by such a bounty, when the others have partaken of it." The little man flew close enough that his wings almost brushed Doyle's face. "Rumor whispers that perhaps there was more than one reason Queen Andais never took you to her bed. Rumor would have you eunuch in truth and not merely in lack of use."

I couldn't see Doyle's face through the rapidly beating wings of the demi-fey. I realized that though his wings looked like butterfly wings, they beat much faster, and the physical motions weren't identical to the insect he mimicked.

"I give you my most solemn oath," Doyle said, "that I have taken the pleasure of Princess Meredith in the way that a man may take pleasure with a woman."

Sage hovered for a wing beat, then his entire body dipped as if he'd almost forgotten to fly for a second. He regained himself, fluttering up to meet Doyle's eyes again. "So, you are no longer the queen's eunuch, but now the princess's lover." The voice sounded low and evil, a tinny hiss. Whatever was happening was definitely personal.

"As you say, Sage, rumor runs rife, and rumor whispers that Niceven took a page from Andais's book. You were her favorite lover before her one-night tryst with Pol got her with child. When she was forbidden from your bed, you were forbidden from anyone else's. If she could not have her favorite, then no one would."

Sage hissed at him like an angry bee. "Much pleasure must you take in our two places being switched, Darkness."

"Whatever do you mean, Sage?" But Doyle's voice was low and held a note that said he knew exactly what the demi-fey meant.

"I taunted you and yours for centuries. The great sidhe warriors, the great ravens of old, reduced to court eunuchs, oh, yes, I taunted you all. I boasted of my prowess and my queen's delights, like an evil whisper in your ears."