"If I were speaking to the Queen of Air and Darkness, I would worry about a war, or perhaps a personal challenge between monarchs. But I have heard that Princess Meredith NicEssus is a more temperate creature than her aunt, or even her uncle."
"A temperate creature?" I said.
"Temperate woman, then," Hugh said, and gave another low bow. "No insult was meant in my choice of words, Princess. I beg you not to take offense."
"I will do my best not to take offense, except where it is given," I said.
Hugh stood, and his handsome face, with its small neat beard and mustache, fought to not look worried. Hugh had been a god of fire once, and that was not a temperate creature. Many of the elemental deities seemed to take on the aspects of their elements. I had seen that intimately with Mistral, once a god of storms.
"And I," Hugh said, "will endeavor not to give offense."
Nelson's voice came from behind us. "How can you be so calm? Didn't you see what just happened? They took your lovers out on stretchers." Her voice held an edge of hysteria that promised to get worse.
I heard soothing male voices, but didn't try and catch the words. As long as they kept her quiet and away from me, I no longer cared. There would be no charges brought against my men for the supposed attack on Lady Caitrin. Because if the Seelie played hardball, we could bury them with what Taranis had just done. And we had some of the top lawyers in the country as our witnesses. If Doyle and Abe hadn't gotten hurt, it would have been a lovely thing.
The far doors opened, and more EMTs came through. The police were here. I had no idea what had taken them so long to arrive. But maybe my sense of time had been affected. Shock can do that. It wouldn't even do me any good to look at a clock, because I hadn't looked at one before. For all I knew only minutes had passed. It may have just seemed longer.
"What are we to do about this incident, Sir Hugh?" I asked.
"There is no way to keep it quiet," he said. "Too many humans know. More will find out when your men reach the hospital. It will be the greatest scandal the Seelie Court has had in this country."
"Your king will deny that he did this," I said, "He will try and blame us somehow."
"He has not tried his rather human version of the truth since you helped release the wild magic, Princess Meredith."
"What does that mean exactly, Sir Hugh?" I asked.
"It means as much as I dare about my opinion of my king. It means that when you released the wild magic it awakened some..." he seemed to search for a word. "Certain things. Things that do not take well to oathbreakers, or other things." He frowned as if even he wasn't happy with what he'd just said.
"Oathbreakers and liars fear the wild hunt," Frost said.
"I did not say that," Hugh said.
"I haven't heard this much verbal tap-dancing from a Seelie noble in a long time," Rhys said.
Hugh smiled at him. "You haven't been at court in a long time."
"Did you know what Taranis was doing?" I asked.
"We had suspicions that the king was not himself."
"So polite," I said. "So mild."
"But accurate," Hugh said.
"What else has happened for you to be so cautious, firelord?" Rhys asked.
"I think that is a conversation for a more private audience, pale lord."
"I can't argue with that," Rhys said.
I was beginning to get the feeling that Rhys and Hugh knew each other better than I'd realized.
"What do we do about this day, and this moment?" I asked.
"I am but a humble lord of the sidhe," Hugh said. "I do not carry the blood of the royal line in my body."
"What does that mean?" I asked.
"It means that the humans aren't the only ones who have laws." Hugh stared at me with his black-and-orange eyes. He seemed to be trying to tell me something without saying it out loud.
"The Seelie would never go for it," Rhys said.
"Go for what?" I asked, looking from one to the other.
"The king lost his temper with one of the serving wenches," Hugh said. "A huge green dog appeared between him and the target of his anger."
"A Cu Sith," I said.
"Yes, a Cu Sith, after all these long years, a green dog of faerie is among us again, and protects those who need protecting. It would not allow the king to strike the serving girl. She seemed more terrified that he would blame her for the dog, but the king lost his anger in the face of the great dog."
I remembered the dog from the night of the wild hunt. The night when wild magic had been everywhere. Huge black dogs had appeared, and when some touched them, they had changed to other dogs. Dogs out of legend, and a Cu Sith had run out into the night toward the Seelie Court.
"I would be interested to see whose hand the Cu Sith would call master, or mistress," I said.
"If we invoke this law," Rhys said, "it will be civil war in your own court, Hugh."
"Perhaps it is time for a little civil disobedience," Hugh said.
"What law?" I asked.
Rhys turned to me. "If the monarch is unfit to rule, the nobles of the court can vote him, or her, incompetent. They can force him or her to step down. Andais abolished the rule in her court, but Taranis never bothered. He was too confident that his court loved him."
"So, you're saying, what?" I, asked. "That Hugh force a vote among the nobles and they choose a new king?" It had possibilities, depending on whom they chose.
"Not exactly, Merry," Rhys said.