Lorcan’s face softened, but only slightly. “Perhaps if you didn’t go rushing into danger headfirst, then you would not be so prone to sleepless nights.”
“I appreciate the advice,” she said with an eye roll. “Now, can you please go back to your post? I’m definitely not going to sleep with you lurking in the doorway like that.”
He shifted into the room and settled into a chair beside the bed, smiling all the while. “I think I will wait right here where I can keep an eye on you.”
Frustration bloomed in Reyna’s gut. “That is ridiculous. You can keep an eye on me just fineoutside.”
“Apparently not. Because you were just speaking to someonein here.”
Reyna’s mouth fell open. “That would require someone else to be here. Go ahead and check beneath the bed if you must.”
The chair creaked beneath him as he leaned back, clearly getting comfortable. “Whoever it was is long gone by now.”
“You came through the only door in this room.”
He gestured at the window.
“The window?” She arched her brows. “You don’t honestly believe that someone managed to scale the walls and come through the window, do you?”
“Why don’t you tell me?” He smiled. “Did someone come through that window?”
Reyna’s mouth snapped shut. And then she opened it again. Whirling toward the window, she stomped over to it and poked her head outside. There were no hidden ladders, no hooks jutting out of the stone. It was a sheer drop down to the cliffs where churning water splashed against the jagged rocks.
Heart thumping, she could not imagine how Mariel had scaled the thing but she had. She pulled her head back inside and twisted toward Lorcan. “Just look outside if you must. How would anyone have done such a thing?”
He made no move toward the window. “Just answer yes or no, Reyna. Did someone come through the window?”
She glared at him, fisted hands trembling by her sides. “In polite society, one never demands the answer to a yes or no question.”
“And one never provides yes or no to such a question.” He stood and stalked toward her, still smiling. “Because then one can never hide her deepest secrets.”
Her heart thumped hard. Lorcan stared deeply into her eyes, darkness swirling through his irises. She itched to back away from him, to turn and flee from his inspection. But she couldn’t even if she truly wanted to—and she wasn’t entirely certain she did. It almost felt as though he could read her very soul, as if he could see every secret that she kept hidden from everyone else. The truth about why she had come here. Her fears that she would be found out, and that Eislyn would take a share of the blame.
Fear that the lands of Tir Na Nog would one day be covered in endless darkness.
Suddenly, he pulled back. She gasped, and hated herself for it.
“I will not answer your question, Lorcan,” she whispered.
“In polite society, fae dismiss yes or no questions because they know that one day they will be asked something that would reveal a deep, dark secret,” he said almost too softly for her to hear. “For you to refuse to answer, to play that game of words, tells me one important thing, Reyna Darragh. You have a secret. A terrible one. Just like the rest of us.”
33
Thane
“Mother.”
The High Queen glanced up from where she sat swirling a golden chalice of wine on her throne. Even in one of her magnificent gowns, she slumped sideways, one leg propped up on the vine seat’s arm. Her eyes were half-lidded. Her cheeks were a blazing pink. Clearly, she was drunk. Thane frowned.
“I thought you did not believe in revelry, Mother.” He had not seen her drink a drop in years. In fact, he was not certain heeverhad. She liked others to believe it was in dedication to the Dagda, but Thane knew that it was tactical. She believed drinking would make her mind too slow, too prone to making errors, too likely to mistake hidden lies for the truth.
“I don’t,” she said, voice strangely clear. “I am not revelling. That would suggest some amount of good cheer.”
He sighed and strode up the dais, gently taking the half-empty chalice from her drooping hand. Settling it onto the floor, he remembered why he had come here, and it was not to take care of a drunken queen.
He glanced at his uncle, who stood by his side, an encouraging presence. Lord Bowen gave a nod.
“Mother,” he said again. And this time, his voice was firmer. “Uncle and I have just gone into the Council Room and found your lover sitting in the head seat.”
