I extended my arm outward, my hand cupping slightly upward. Niceven landed on my forearm. She was heavier than she appeared, but still light and strangely brittle, as if her tiny bare feet were made of dried bones. She wrapped both her hands around my index finger, then lowered her face toward my fingertip as if she meant to bestow a kiss. Tiny razor teeth bit into my finger. The pain was sharp and immediate. Her tiny petal tongue began to lap the blood tickling against my skin. She curved her body around my hand until every inch of her small being was insinuated against my skin. It was a strangely sexual movement, as if she gained more than mere blood from the feeding.
The rest of the demi-fey hovered in the air around me like colored wind, moving gently. Their tiny mouths were blood-stained, miniature hands red with Galen's blood. Niceven caressed my hand with her hands, her bare feet; a tiny knee beat against my palm.
She raised her head and took a breath. "I am full of flesh and blood from your lover. I can hold no more." She sat up in my hand, her head resting against my finger. "I would give much for a longer drink someday, Princess Meredith. You taste of high magic, and sex." She stood and slowly lifted herself from my hand with slow beats of her wings. She hovered near my face just looking at me, as if she saw something I did not, or was trying to find something in me that was not there. Finally, she nodded, and said, "We will see you at the banquet, Princess." With that she rose higher into the air, the others following her in a multicolored cloud. The huge doors at the end of the room opened without anyone touching them, and once the bright flying crowd had vanished inside, the doors closed slowly behind them.
A small sound brought my attention back to the room. Galen was leaning up against the far wall, his pants in place though not fastened. Rhys was dabbing at the small bites with a bottle of clear liquid, until Galen's na**d upper body gleamed in the lights.
He gazed up at me. "Is it true about the celibacy being lifted?"
"It's true," I said, and crouched on my heels by him.
He smiled, but it left his eyes pain-filled. "I won't be much use to you tonight."
"There will be other nights," I said.
The smile widened, but he winced as Rhys cleaned more of the wounds. "Why did Cel care if I in particular came to your bed?"
"I think Cel believes that if I cannot sleep with you tonight, that I will sleep alone."
Galen looked at me.
I didn't wait for him to say something that would make all this even more uncomfortable. "I don't know if you heard what I told the others, but if I don't have sex tonight with someone of my choosing, tomorrow I entertain the court with a group of the queen's choosing."
"You'll have to take someone to your bed tonight, Merry."
"I know." I touched his face and found it cool to the touch and lightly dewed with sweat. He'd lost a lot of blood, nothing fatal for a sidhe, but he would be weak tonight for many things, not just for sex.
"If this was your punishment for disobeying Cel, then what was Barinthus's punishment?"
"He was forbidden to attend tonight's banquet," Frost said.
I raised my eyebrows at that. "Galen gets cut up and Barinthus just misses supper?"
"Cel is afraid of Barinthus, but he does not fear Galen," Frost said.
"I'm just too nice a guy."
"Yes," Frost said, "you are."
"That was supposed to be a joke," Galen said.
"Unfortunately," Doyle said, "it isn't funny."
"We can't keep the queen waiting," Rhys said. "Can you walk?"
"Get me on my feet and I'll walk." Doyle and Frost helped him stand.
He moved slowly, arthritically, as if things hurt a great deal, but by the time they'd helped him to the far doors, he was moving on his own power. He was healing before our eyes, his skin absorbing the bites. It was like watching reverse film of flowers blooming.
The oil helped speed the process, but mostly it was just his own body. The amazing flesh machine of a sidhe warrior. Within hours the bites would be healed; within days the rest of the damage would be gone as well. In a few days Galen and I could finally quench the heat between us. But for tonight there would have to be someone else. I looked at the other three guards in an almost proprietary way, like going into your kitchen and knowing the shelves are well stocked with your favorite things. None of them was a fate worse than torture. It was just a question of which one. How do you decide between one perfect flower and another if love is not an issue? I didn't have the faintest idea. Maybe I could toss a coin.
Chapter 30
THE DOORS THAT OPEN FROM THE FOUNTAIN OF PAIN LEAD TO A LARGE antechamber. It is a dark room. The sourceless white light seemed very dim and very grey here. Something crunched under my feet, and I looked down to find leaves. Dried leaves everywhere. I looked up and found that the vines that entwined above our heads were dry and lifeless. The leaves had folded in upon themselves or dropped completely.
I touched the vines near the door and there was no sense of life to them. I turned to Doyle.
"The roses are dead." I whispered it as if it were some great secret.
He nodded.
"They have been dying for years, Meredith," Frost said.
"Dying, Frost, but not dead." The roses were a last defense for the court. If enemies penetrated this far, the roses would come to life and kill them, or try to, either by strangling or by the thorns. The newer, lower growth had thorns like any other climbing rose, but there were vines deep in the tangle that held thorns the size of small daggers. But they weren't merely a defense. They were a symbol that there had once been magical gardens under the ground. The fruiting vines and trees had died first, so I'm told, then the herbs, and now the last of the flowers.