On Azul’s other side, Dy snorted.Oh yeah,shecould be amused.She wasn’t marked as the human pet of some potentially cruel fae serial killer.
“Now behave,” he said before she could say anything else.“Follow my lead.It shouldn’t be difficult, even for you, as the Citrine royalty don’t expect humans to be intelligent or articulate anyway.”
She glared at him for that jibe, but laughter sparkled in his eyes.Probably getting her back for asking about the slaughter thing, but how is a girl supposed to know these things if she doesn’t ask?Mass-murdering her race would be a definite red flag.
They entered the ballroom, saving her thinking up a clever retort.Which was good as she didn’t have a very good one and she really hated to prove his point.
Following the overall circular theme, the throne room didn’t have the royals at one end of a long hall presiding over others.Instead, a raised dais sat in the middle of the domed space, tier upon tier rising like an elaborate wedding cake, with a couple standing on top.If not for their large and fanciful butterfly wings, they’d look an awful lot like the little spouse figurines that typically occupied that position on that kind of cake.
All the way around the dais-cake, more figures perched, stood, hovered, or sat with legs dangling.All of them beautiful to look upon, all gorgeously turned out in whatever state of dress or undress they’d chosen.Belong, more exquisitely dressed fae milled about, in small groups and bigger clusters, conversing quietly and clearly keeping an eye on the elevated fae.Some approached fae on the lower tiers, who either spoke with them or ignored them completely.Occasionally someone was allowed to pass up the obvious hierarchy to move up the ramp to the next fae.
Cha really hoped they weren’t going to have to go through that tedious process.Besides which, it looked like it might take a very long time and she was getting seriously hungry.Never mind the thirst drying her throat to a crackle.
Azul led them in a circuit around the crowded room, sparing her that immediate worry.The throng parted before them, giving them wide berth, though Cha wasn’t certain if that was out of respect for Azul or concern for catching mortality from the humans.The wrinkled noses and compressed lips pointed to the latter.Cha simply smiled, tempted to produce a hacking cough or a little snot.
“Don’t,” Azul said under his breath, managing to pack a world of amusement into the one, barely audible word.
“Stop reading my… feelings.”He’d promised her that he couldn’t exactly hear her actual thoughts, but that the life debt between them allowed him to feel her very strong emotions, particularly related to her life being threatened.That’s how he’d found her in the Moonstone jail, by following her, well, fear of torture and death, she supposed.Possibly she was worried enough about this royal audience that she was sending upmy life is in dangersignal flares, but that seemed unlikely.That’s why she’d assumed he wasn’t really talking to her before on the journey to Citrine and that she’d dreamed it.Except it he’d indicated that conversation had been real.But why had it happened only in Obsidian?
“I don’t have to read your heart or mind,” he replied, voice rippling with that amusement.“Your face shows everything you’re thinking.”
“Then you have amazing peripheral vision,” she shot back.She was sure he hadn’t looked directly at her.
“I do, actually.”
“How nice for you.”
“I think so.”
“You two are so damn much alike, it’s scary,” Dy said, still quietly, but enough for at least them to hear.“Do you have to do this now?”
“Yes,” they answered at the same time.Cha snorted.
“It’s a tension reliever,” Cha explained to Dy, “but we will stop.”She squeezed Azul’s arm to emphasize the decision and he slid her a slight smile, eyes sparkling with violet light.Then he abruptly sobered, gaze going ahead to the first tier of the dais-cake as they rounded the far side.“There.Is that your ‘Sunshine’?”
Indeed, there she lolled in all her glamoured, naked splendor.She took up extra room on her space of the ramp, having set up what appeared to be a velvet loveseat.Draped lasciviously over it, she lay with heavy-lidded eyes as a petitioner spoke to her.As they watched, she yawned elaborately and flicked her fingers at him to go away.Clearly taking advantage of the dismissal, the fae sidestepped the loveseat and headed up-ramp to the next station.Good to know that one could be passed up the chain of command, too, Cha supposed.
“That’s the one,” Dy answered for them both, for which Cha was grateful.
Although, it turned out, Azul didn’t really need a reply from either of them.Sunshine spotted them in that moment and sat bolt upright on her settee, face a picture of alarm, doe-like eyes wide and scanning for available avenues of escape.
“Don’t even consider it,” Azul instructed icily.“You will explain.”
“Your Highness.”Sunshine sank to her knees, bowing deeply, then lifting an already tear-stained face.
That was quick.Cha also noticed that Sunshine drew her shoulders back when she sat up, so her chest popped out ostentatiously.Because they were standing a level below her, that put her tits pretty much right at eye level.They looked bigger and rounder than before, the nipples darker and more prominent, her waist narrower in contrast.Wondering if Dy had observed the same glamour-tweaking, she glanced at her partner, who rolled her eyes in disgust.That was a yes.
“I didn’t know, Your Highness,” Sunshine babbled.“I didn’t realize she was your pet.I would never have played with her otherwise.”
“You somehow entirely missed my mark on her?”Azul inquired in patent disbelief.
Dy’s eyebrows flew up and she gave Cha an incredulous look.Yeah, she’d neglected to mention that part.
She shook her head a little in ano big dealgesture.
Dy glared indon’t give me that shit.
Cha shrugged inwhat can you do, they’re fae.