Marissa Day (11 page)

“You already help me. With you I have address and identity, and both are unassailable. If I am to gain entry to Kensington House by day as well as night, this is exactly what I need.”

After her banishment from the Fae court, Fiora had been thrown onto the mercy of the daylight realms. Fortunately, the lovely voice that had brought her to the queen’s notice allowed her to make her way as a singer on the stage, eventually snaring her the son of a wealthy merchant. Money lavishly spent had helped people forget the stains of her past, in the mortal world at least.

“But I can do more,” insisted Fiora, her voice growing shrill with urgency. “I will do more . . .”

“Fiora,” Thomas stopped her. “Be calm. I will tell Her Majesty you repent and are her true servant. I swear it.”

“I am glad to be of use to Her Majesty.” Fiora looked so wretched, huddled on her sofa in her old woman’s cap and shawl. Sir Thomas remembered her dancing before the queen and the court. She’d been infinitely delicate and graceful then, with her red hair floating free about her bare shoulders. She’d had laughter like golden bells, and her singing could stun an entire gathering of Fae to silence.

Now, she lifted her rheumy blue gaze to him, and spoke so softly he could barely hear.

“Does she . . . Is my name ever spoken?”

“You are not forgotten.” This was as close to the truth as Thomas cared to venture. The queen, of course, never forgot her anger. As for the rest of the court, their memories were sharply and purposefully truncated. They all knew it did little good to recall the ones Her Majesty had banished.

“Or else why would you be here?” Fiora finished for him in an attempt at lightness. “But, has she said . . . if all goes well . . . has she said if I might return?”

“If all goes well, you will not need to return. All this”—Thomas waved his hand toward the windows, and the city beyond—“will become our queen’s dominion.”

“Yes. Yes.” Fiora drew in a deep breath. “We must fix our minds on that.”

Before either one of them could speak further, the door opened and the servants entered with the food. Fiora dismissed them as soon as they laid it out on the table and set about fixing Thomas a plate of cold meats and breads, becoming once more the polite human hostess serving her guest. She handed him the pile of sandwiches and he thanked her.

“So tell me,” Fiora went on, opening the silver tea caddy and measuring careful spoonfuls into the pot. Coffee stood ready at hand as well, but Thomas suspected she wanted to keep both mind and hands busy. “How do you find our Lady Jane? Is she as much the ice queen as she is reported around the regent’s court?”

Thomas stared at her as if she had begun speaking Swahili. Who could see intense, passionate Jane as icy?

“Not that I would blame her,” continued Fiora, helping herself to a piece of bread and a paper-thin slice of ham. “Lord Octavius was at least three times her age when she married him, and probably a terrible lover. They never did produce a child, that’s for certain, so he may not have been very capable. A woman in a cold bed cannot help but grow cold herself . . .”

Thomas abruptly found himself on his feet.

“What is the matter?” Fiora exclaimed.

“We should change the subject.” Thomas stalked over to the window before his discomfort could show in his face. Something was not right. Something that nagged at the back of his mind, but as he reached for it, it vanished, leaving only impatience and the beginnings of a headache.

But Fiora persisted. “What have I said?”

“Nothing.” Thomas made himself modulate his voice.
What is the matter with me?
“I’d simply prefer it if you spoke of Jane DeWitte respectfully.”

Fiora sat silent for a long moment. When she did speak again, she was clearly treading quite carefully. “Sir Thomas, it is difficult to return . . . to this world after a long absence. I know. All the motion and constant change can be overwhelming to the senses. Are you sure you are quite well?”

“Yes, yes.” But he wasn’t. Anger simmered just beneath the surface of his mind, but he could find no reason for it. Fiora’s words about Jane . . . they were careless, but nothing to merit this . . . this surge of hard emotion. He stared out at the vans and carriages rattling past on the street. London had changed out of all recognition since he’d lived here as a boy. Then, the city was little more than a ramshackle wooden town clustered about the knees of its stone tower. Now, it was a sprawling metropolis, filled to the brim with the riot and roistering of life. When he’d arrived, he’d been stunned by the unrelenting noise, energy and chaos. Walking abroad its streets filled him with the excitement of discovery that he hadn’t realized he’d missed. He’d even considered a run down to the Thames to see the ships, although moving water was inimical to magic, and it was risky for one of the queen’s servants to walk too near the great river. He was ready to take that risk, for he wanted to lose himself in this city, explore it entirely and experience its myriad facets.

But at this moment he found himself wondering about the one particular facet that was Jane DeWitte. He wondered where she was and if she thought of him now. He felt almost certain she did. Perhaps this was what disordered his thoughts? Perhaps the bond he had begun to build of their mutual desire was already strong enough for her to reach out, all unwitting, and touch him. He had already seen she possessed a remarkable strength of character, as well as passion that matched her physical beauty. It was not impossible that her mind could already be in tune with their bond. He could reach out to her now, brush her thoughts, let her sense that he was there and thinking of her...

“Take care, Thomas Lynne.”

Thomas swung around. Fiora had not moved from her place on the sofa, but the withered little woman had straightened and hardened. The blue eyes he had thought dim a moment before glittered keenly. “One might suspect you were beginning to feel something for the woman.”

“Of course not.” Thomas waved his hand dismissively. “I am Her Majesty’s servant.”

“As was I.”

Thomas’s guts clenched. Yes, she had been, once. But years ago, Fiora had broken the strictest law of the Fae court by daring to fall in love with one of the queen’s chosen knights. Worse, the foolish man had loved her in return. Of course they’d both tried to hide their affair, and of course they’d been found out. In the Fae realms, even the wind reported to Their Glorious Majesties.

Queen Tatiana had been transcendent in her fury. Sexual congress was permitted among the mortals admitted to the Fae court, but never love. They pledged their hearts to her, and her alone.

Fiora was the lucky one. She’d only been banished back to the mortal world. But, the false knight, her lover . . . Thomas clenched his jaw. That man had been sent to much harsher kingdoms to pay his traitor’s debt.

Thomas forced himself to consider his walk with Jane. Had he ever truly been in danger of such betrayal? No, surely not. For one thing, it was far too soon. Love, genuine love, took time. It must. Love required intimacy and respect, and above all trust. He had enjoyed Jane’s smiles and her company, but he would have enjoyed as much with any beautiful woman, especially if he had taken her as a lover. It was the memory of their passion that made him wish Oxford Street had stretched on for miles, and that the inconvenient Madame Levant had set her shop at the far end.

The echo of Jane’s voice came swiftly back to him. He’d felt those words like a blow. No, it wasn’t the words that hit him. It was his wish for them not to be true.

Which was reasonless. What did he care for her friendship? She was nothing but the exploitable weakness of a house to which his queen required entry. Magic worked by the shaping of intent. An invitation carried with intent, backed with genuine desire and need, became a powerful force. He’d fuck Lady Jane for as long as it took to embed desire of him in the depths of her body. Desire would bring as much trust as he needed, and she would invite him into the house. She’d desire him to be with her, and the strength of that desire would make a grappling hook to pull him through the wards around Kensington House. Each time he passed through, he would make a crack, a small leak in the hull created by those wards. Soon that leak would grow large enough to let the Fae queen’s tide flood in.

For that mission, he only needed to inflame Jane’s desire. Her friendship was neither here nor there.

He pictured Jane’s face drawn tight in anger, and his breath caught in his throat. She would not understand that what he did was for the good of her and her people. Their Glorious Majesties would bring the peace of their immortal reign to the isle of Britain, saving it from the fools and fops that now circled the throne. In their single, unchanging rule, there would be no more intrigues over power and money; no wars of succession or religion.

Thomas remembered his mother kneeling in church when he was a boy, tight-lipped and white with fear, her eyes fixed rigidly on the Host, which the priest elevated. They were not there because they believed in the priest and his sonorous Latin chant, but because Queen Mary burned men and women for not paying sufficient attention in church. A few short years later, Thomas knelt beside his mother in a different church. This time the priest spoke the liturgy in English, and his mother added her own in fervent whispers, praying that the new, virgin queen not turn to the stake to settle matters of religious dissent.

Pain throbbed hard in Thomas’s temples. He had forgotten or missed something important. But it was like steering into a fog. He could see nothing clearly.

No, not whore. Jane was no whore, and it struck Thomas in that moment he would have killed any man who made such a comparison.

Thomas felt the blood drain from his cheeks. He turned to look at Fiora. He needed to look at her. He had to be reminded of the fate waiting for him if he permitted his imperfect, mortal heart to fasten onto an imperfect, mortal woman, even one so alluring as Jane DeWitte.

“Tell me how you miss it,” Thomas said, ashamed to hear the tremor in his voice.

“Every day, every moment,” Fiora answered instantly. “When the queen’s regard is withdrawn . . . it becomes winter in your heart and you know it will never be summer again. When I feel the ache and have to creep along on legs that refuse to straighten, but still remember how very beautiful I was when I danced for Her Majesty . . . A dozen times I have almost ended this sham of a life. Only the thought that I might still find a way to return to our queen’s favor has kept me alive.” A tear crept down Fiora’s sunken cheek and she dashed it away. “There. Look at these.” She held up her damp fingertips. “Tears. When did we ever see tears in the Fae realms? Truly, I am become an old woman.” She stood, brushing out her skirts. “I’ll go write that invitation I promised Lady Jane. We’ll bring her here for a so very civilized afternoon at home, and you can tie the knot that much tighter.”

Thomas nodded, for he found he did not trust his voice. Fiora hobbled to the door, but paused on the threshold.

“I cannot die out here, Thomas,” Her voice trembled. “It is too cold. I will do anything to prove I am still Her Majesty’s true servant.”

With that, she left him, presumably to go to the library and take up her pen. Thomas remained where he was, alone now with the untouched food and his troubled thoughts.

Fiora didn’t understand. The point was not to bind Lady Jane, but to lead her to want to be bound. She must come freely or not at all.

Thomas pictured Jane crouched naked before him, bowing her head to his cock. The joyful, unabashed play of her mouth had caught him completely off guard, especially as he suspected she had never performed this act before. She’d made him lose control and he had fucked her wildly, caring for nothing except to hear her scream and find his release in the depths of her heat and her pleasure. She would have to be punished for that. The thought made his cock twitch, and Thomas smiled. Yes, he would bind her, punish and pleasure her, and she would beg for it. She could scream his name and demand his touch.

That was what he wanted from her, that passion, that pure, physical joy. Their walk together in the late April sunshine, the banter and conversation, the way she’d brought herself closer to him when they spoke of friendship, and the sudden yearning that had flooded him with that small tightening of her hand on his arm . . . these were nothing but sentimental echoes of a world he had willingly cast off. For all that, it might be best if he stayed away from her tonight. Yes. That would work well with the plan. He had set before Jane a feast of pleasure. A night without would increase her craving for it.

It would also give him time to right his balance. He should have taken longer to get used to being among mortals again before he ever went to Jane. He had to remember that until the Fae took this place back from the ironmongers and fools, this mortal world could be nothing more than enemy territory to him.

Even while Jane DeWitte walked in it.