His skin shone translucent, paleas moonlight and nearly as luminous. No human male had ever borne such sculpted cheekbones, like shards of glass that would cut you to touch. His winged brows and the hair waving over his collar was black, but iridescent under the dim forest light. He’d garbed himself in leaves—no, it was a prince’s cotehardie and hose, snug enough to conceal little of his lean, athletic form. Somehow, his attire was both, and this suited him very, very well. Though he wore no crown, this figure was so glorious, I knew at once who he must be: Faery’s own King.
I fell to my knees in awe. “My liege.”
He lowered the pipe from his lips and laughed. Though bell-like and as charming as his tune had been, the laughter was also pitying and cruel. “Oh, you have been long away, little changeling, if you would name me so.”
I straightened, uncomprehending. “My lord?” For he must be a nobleman, the highest among those who dwell in the sith. And yet something about him was unsavory: the harsh set to his arching brows, perhaps, or the pale cast to his skin. If he was a Seelie lord, there was something Unseelie about him, too.
A chill ran over my flesh.
The elf lord eyed me lazily, a smirk curving his sensuous lips. “Little half fae.”
I flushed, ashamed of my impure blood, misliking that he could sense it right away. I lifted my chin and pretended not to be bothered. “I am called Bess.”
His lips curled. “Bess.” A susurration, the barest whisper, as if this simple, briefest of Christian names nevertheless filled him with awe. “Not Bess Grieve, is it? Mairi’s daughter?”
I gulped, startled into the unvarnished truth. “So I am known.”
His hand came towards my face, and I flinched away, caught in the vision I’d just had of Mairi. But he cupped my chin, and turned my face from one side to another, grimacing at the birthmark on my throat. “What an unexpected pleasure.”
How could he insult me one moment and flatter me the next? I edged away from him, and his fingers dropped to his side. But now my skin longed for his touch, and if his hands should encircle my throat and squeeze the life out of me, I knew I would die in ecstasy, crying out for more.
I was not experienced with the charms of the other fae. I misliked this greatly. I needed to gather my pennyroyal and be on my way.
Yet somehow, I stayed rooted to the spot. “Who are you, then?”
“Amadan.”
My face grew hot as I translated. “You call me ‘fool.’”
“I call myself thus, or rather, thus I am called.” There was an amused twist to his lips, and his overlong fingers danced in the air. “Of late, I was the King’s Fool and the Queen’s, and I am second only to Faery’s monarch in power. With one touch I bring pleasure, with another, paralysis, madness, or death, yet my victims will crave it all in the end. In short, I am called the Amadan Dubh, the Dark Fool, and I come and go at will.”
My eyes narrowed as I assessed him. By appearances, I would name him the noblest and fairest of our kind, assuming this handsome face was truly his own. Yet he spoke of kings and queens with hardly any deference at all.
Such liberties are granted to Fools. They say things as other fae would not dare.
Like telling their mortal love about the midwife to the Queen of Faery herself?
My face twisted with disapproval. “Trickster.”
He made no denial. “And wanderer.”
“Deflowerer of innocent maids.” I nearly spat it out. Human thoughts, these were, full of human sympathy, the part of me that felt for Glenna because, in appearances only, we were much the same.
“Now there’s an idea.” Amadan’s eyes moved all down my body, then he sniffed. “Or maybe not. You reek of mortality.”
“Not me,” I gritted out. “You did father Glenna Baker’s bairn.”
He leaned against a tree, crossing his fine legs in their snug hose. “You must refresh my memory. There have been so many—”
“Imbolc,” I cut in. “Auburn waves, big brown eyes. . .”
“You sound as if you might have deflowered her yourself.”
My mouth dropped open, and my cheeks warmed again.
Amadan furrowed his brow, stroked his chin as if deep in thought. “Pretty, but dumb as a newborn calf? Mayhap I do remember her after all.”
I balled my fists, hating to defend someone I had always considered a daft git. Yet Mairi Grieve’s influence and openheartedness overcame me. “You sell her short.”
