Are they, though?
I didn’t say anything but Shara’s eyes focused on me and tugged. Insisting I say my thought aloud. “You have acquired new powers, my queen. From the oldest living queen to my knowledge, though certainly others could be hidden from even the sphinx. With new power…”
“Comes new hunger.” She swallowed hard, her gaze flickering over to Sekh. “I thought I’d never feel that kind of hunger again with you and the legion.”
“I can feed you endlessly, Your Majesty.” His eyes blazed like the molten gold of Heliopolis. “Though if you tap me hardenough, I’ll need to feed too, which won’t allow your reserves to build.”
“I do have at least one more Blood waiting. I may also reach out to Houses Valois and Ceresa to see if the former Isador Blood want to come home.”
:They will without question,:Lew replied in our bonds, even though he wasn’t present.:But they’ll bring other queens’ blood into your circle.:
Shara’s lips curved into a smile very much like her secretive mother’s. “I may be able to do something about that. But let’s watch the rest of Thierry’s memory first and then come up with a plan for helping Leonie.”
Of course my tender-hearted queen wanted to help if she could. Though I didn’t imagine a queen trapped in the Dauphine’s power had been able to retain much of her sanity. Especially after so long. Thierry had gone to New Orleans before Shara was even born, so Leonie had been trapped for over twenty years. Festering beneath her own house. Feeding the other, stronger queen.
In her bond, we watched the rest of Thierry’s memories play out. He couldn’t say how long he’d been trapped with Leonie in the pit of mud and leeches. Even when they drove him out to the swamp, his mind wasn’t right. The Dauphine’s first leech had already been warping him.
But I wasn’t prepared for my queen’s sharp inhale or Rik’s muttered curse. She paused the memory again, focused on the other thrall released from the tree before they stuffed him inside.
“Greyson,” she whispered. “Mom’s former alpha. When was this?”
:I’m sorry, my queen,:Thierry replied.:I have no idea how long I was in the pit. It could have been years.:
“This changes everything I thought I knew about those earlyyears. The monsters hunting me. All long, it washer. I… hated him. I was terrified of him.”
“As you should,” I replied firmly. “He would have killed you simply to end his torment.”
“But it wasn’t his fault. All this time, I thought he was just… evil. A weak willed, selfish man who couldn’t get over Mom falling in love with someone else. But maybe…” She looked over at Sekh. “What do you See of him before this?”
The general’s eyes darkened to bronze, and he started back through time, searching for Greyson’s face. “I See him visiting Selena Isador in Kansas City. Watching, waiting, secretly meeting away from the house. Then… he’s gone. I’m guessing you would have been around three years old or so, Your Majesty.”
“So when he said Mom still loved him, it was true. Goddess. I feel bad that I burned him alive now. His spirit would have been trapped inside him, just like Thierry’s.”
“You still saved his soul by releasing it from the rotting corpse,” I said.
“What about all the lies he told me? Like Leviathan being my father?”
:While I was festering in the tree, her voice whispered in my head constantly,:Thierry said.:It drove me mad. I’m sure she planted all kinds of lies in his head, hoping to throw you off your game, or send you on a wild goose chase until she could find another way to eliminate you.:
Festering. That was an appropriately descriptive word for the hell he’d endured in the tree. Shara played the rest of the memory for us, watching them plant more leeches in him, this time tainted with human blood. Then walling him up alive in a tree to rot. For years.
We gasped and panted with him out in the sunlight when they freed him. Even in a memory, his brain felt scrambled, his thoughts disjointed. Rotting fabric, stretched beyond recognitionand falling apart with gaping holes. They put him into a vehicle and drove him to Kansas City.
“Wait, wait,” she said out loud, shaking her head. “That can’t be. Xin followed your footprints back to the swampy island.”
:They had to drive me,:Thierry said.:They didn’t think I’d be able to walk all the way to Kansas City.:
Yet he’d somehow found the strength to drag himself all the way to New York City to find our queen.
She touched Xin’s bond.:The trail you followed back to the Dauphine’s island was Thierry, wasn’t it?:
:It was the same stench of death,:he replied.:Though perhaps it was Greyson’s trail. I would assume he smelled the same way.:
:But that was years ago.:
:It wouldn’t have mattered, my queen. The taint was incredibly strong with a unique signature. I assumed it was Thierry’s scent but perhaps it was simply the Dauphine’s signature all along. I could only say for sure if I’d been able to smell Greyson’s trail and compare them.:
“What are the odds?” She shook her head, her eyes shimmering with tears. “If Greyson hadn’t been freed to hunt me, then we wouldn’t have been able to find the location using what we thought was Thierry’s trail at all.”
