It's hurt. Not anger, not rage, but hurt.
She's not yours to protect. If she wanted your help, she'd ask.
I stare at her as she reaches for the handle on the entrance door, wishing my rage would return, until she opens the door and raucous sounds blast into the shop.
“What's going on?” Lena asks, hesitating over the threshold.
Aurora and I share a grim look as everyone rushes forward, cramming into the doorway to watch the large crowd gathering outside the shop. Seeing so many wondrous faces, feeling their excitement and the sheer size of the gathering itself, I realize this can only mean one thing.
“Looks like Queenie decided to go for a ride,” Kace says, kneeling between mine and Lena’s legs.
“What?!” Aurora shouts. Pushing off our shoulders, her wide-eyed face pops into view. “In her carriage?”
“Her horse,” Griffin says in his deep voice from his spot behind Amara and Tristan.
Kace, Aurora, and I groan in unison.
Shit.
I glance at Aurora. “She's here for you.”
“You don't know that!” she screams. Her expression twists into rage before her eyes widen once again, features shifting into a desperate hope. “She could be looking for you.”
What a delusional female.
“If she was looking for me, she'd go to the Guard Base.” The way people have surged around Rory’s Swords and Daggers, I'm unable to see my mother above the crowd. But when the crowd begins to converge and thicken in front of Aurora’s shop, I know my prediction is correct. “She's definitely here for you. I told you, you should've gone home last night.”
Her lips slash into an angry line. “I'm a grown ass female, I can sleep wherever I please!” she screeches, loud and piercing enough that half of those gathered turn to stare at the crazy person shouting nonsense. Surprisingly, Amara, Tristan, and Lena barely bat an eye.
Kace rolls his eyes and dusts off his knees as he stands. His emerald jewels flicker with irritation as he steps onto the walkway and turns to face us. “Come on, everyone out. Let's go bow and grovel,” he says dryly. “That's what she's here for anyway.”
Muttering a curse, I slip Aurora's arm through mine and drag her out into the throng.
Chapter 10Darius
An electrified excitement crackles the air and murmurs of awe ripple through the gleeful crowd. Rescued from an otherwise monotonous day, Cascadonians revel in the Queen’s unscheduled appearance. Exuberant males wave and shout their devotion while ladies jostle their neighbors as they anxiously balance on the tips of their toes. A fae youth scrabbles to the top of a doused street light, his mother screaming threats at the foot of the iron pole. Latecomers warily step out of shops before quickly rushing to join those on the congested street. Storeowners, shoppers, and families alike clamber and claw to the front of the mob in hopes of attracting the attention of the reclusive Queen.
Spying only woolen dresses and work stained trousers, I'm relieved to find not a lord or lady in sight. I would hope that whatever public chastisement Adelphia intends to inflict on me or Aurora could remain outside the court, but after eventually spotting several familiar females dressed in finer fabrics and laden with boxes, I expect it's more likely the nobility’s personal shoppers will be squealing to their benefactors within the hour.
Griffin and Kace slip between the boisterous crowd, corralling those aware of the royalty in front, but oblivious to the ones behind. Kace lowers his head to speak into the ear of a mother with an infant on her hip and an older child wrapped around her leg. Her gaze snaps to mine and her eyes widen, snatching the hand of the boy and scrambling backwards. Whispers quickly spread through the raucous gathering of our arrival, and as if contrived beforehand, the revelers part on a wave, clearing a path for the Blacksmith Princess and Bastard Prince.
The scent of vanilla, cinnamon, and cherry precedes Lena’s raspy voice as she angles herself towards me. “This is all for the Queen?”
Pivoting towards her, I'm surprised to not only see her walking beside me, but Tristan and Amara following casually behind. She either doesn’t realize it or – much more likely – doesn't care that it’s not appropriate for her to walk beside royalty. Aurora and I may not regularly abide by royal protocol, but it’s unacceptable in the presence of the Queen. I consider mentioning that to her, but instantly decide against it. She can figure it out for herself.
Striding toward Adelphia, I duck my head towards Lena. “Yes,” I reply sharply, glancing past her and trying to avoid being swept up in her disarming beauty and forgetting what she is.
She's a liar. You can't trust her.
“Look at the way they’re fawning over her,” Lena says to her companions, gesturing to the crowd with a flick of her hand. “Do you think they would lick her toes if she asked?”
“Some would,” Amara says with a scowl.
“But most wouldn't be pleased to do so,” Tristan adds.
Not even in the slightest, I think. But they also wouldn’t fight it, either. These aren't the rich lords and ladies of court, desperate for any scrap of the Queen’s attention. Everyone here is either human, or of the middle and lower class. The very same people unhappy and fearful of her rule.
I can already see the novelty of my mother’s appearance wearing off for some. Humans, fae, and some immortals garbed in homespun tunics and holey linen trousers watch the Queen with hate-filled glares and slashed lips, but none express their displeasure in any other way. Not if they wish to see the end of the day.
Lena curls her lip, sweeping her gaze back and forth. “It's sickening how your people worship those in power,” she says to me. “Does the royalty in this realm think of themselves akin to the gods?”
Realm?
“Mother certainly thinks so,” Aurora mumbles.
I tighten my grip around her arm, a warning. “In Cascadonia, she is a goddess and expects to be treated as such,” I say to Lena. Do I think my mother is a goddess? Fuck no, but it’s best for everyone that Lena realizes her place. Adelphia’s tolerance for humans is slim as it is. It’s doubtful she'll allow Lena to live if she hears her speaking about her this way.
“Your mother is no goddess,” Lena says, sneering up at my mother. “And even if she was, I would hope that you wouldn't prostrate yourself at her feet like these fools.”
“How else would someone greet a god?” Griffin asks, hovering behind her.
Lena peeks at him over her shoulder, her expression sobering as she glances at him and then Kace, Aurora, and me in turn. “Word of advice to you all,” she says in a grave tone. “If you ever find yourself in the presence of a god, run fast and run far. For if not, you're already dead.”
Sharing a bewildered look with Griffin, then Kace behind me, I glance back at Lena to ask her what in Azazel's Darkness she's talking about, but she’s already turned away, whispering to her companions in that foreign, lilting tongue.
Why does every conversation with her have to be so strange?
Shoving her and any thoughts of her aside, I notice my mother’s attention fixated on both me and my sister. I tug on Aurora’s arm and lengthen my stride in response to her thinning patience, reaching the edge of the crowd within moments.
