A Caress Of Twilight   ::   Гамильтон Лорел

I stood there staring at him — that beautiful body that I hadloved since I was a child. Galen had been my first crush. If he was healed, we could cool the heat that had been between us since I hit puberty.

I realized suddenly that I'd been going about this all wrong. Kitto had told me that Doyle thought I was just going to fuck everyone and not use the power I'd gained. He wasn't just referring to the goblins. Was I the future queen of the Unseelie or not? If I was to be queen, what was I doing asking anyone's permission for anything? Who I put myself in debt to was none of Galen's business. Not really.

I turned away from Galen, back into the room. The rest of the men were watching us. If they'd been human, they would have pretended not to watch, been reading magazines, or pretending to, but they were fey. If you did something in front of the fey, they watched. If you wanted privacy, you wouldn't be doing it where they could see you; that was our culture.

Only Kitto was missing, and I knew where he was, in his oversize, fully covered cloth dog bed. It was like a small, snug tent. It sat in the far corner of the living room positioned so he could watch the television, which was one of the few technological wonders that Kitto seemed to appreciate.

"Doyle," I said.

"Yes, Princess." His voice was neutral.

"Contact Queen Niceven for me."

He simply bowed and went for the bedroom. It was the largest mirror in the apartment. He would try to contact the demi-fey first through the mirror as you would contact another sidhe. It might work, it might not. The demi-fey didn't stay inside the faerie mounds very much. They liked the open air. If they weren't near a reflective surface, the mirror spell wouldn't work. There were other spells to try, but he would start with the mirror. We might get lucky and catch the little queen flying by a still pool of water.

"No," Galen said. He took two quick strides, not to me, but to Doyle. He caught the other guard's arm. "No, I won't let her do this."

Doyle met Galen's eyes for a second, and Galen didn't flinch. I'd seen gods flinch from that look on Doyle's face. Either Galen was braver than I'd thought, or stupider. I was betting on the latter. Galen simply didn't understand politics, personal or otherwise. He would grab Doyle's arm, prevent him from leaving the room, even though that might mean a duel between the two of them. I'd seen Doyle fight, and I'd seen Galen fight. I knew who would win, but Galen wasn't thinking. He was reacting, and that, of course, was Galen's great weakness, and why my father had given me to another.