Before I could respond, the twelve-foot-high doors to the house swung open and a brightly dressed man bowed deeply to Lavender. “Greetings and welcome, Your Highness. Your father awaits you and your guests.”
“Thank you, Felix,” she said with a smile. Then she turned and motioned to Seth to get his ass up the stairs. Her fiancé sighed and exchanged a glance with Nicky. They both looked like they were heading to the gallows as they trudged up the stairs.
The opulence of Seelie Manor was truly breathtaking. The marble floors were so polished we could see our reflection in the stone. The crystal chandeliers were delicate and looked more like dew-laden spiderwebs than light fixtures. And the magnificent sculptures that lined the domed foyer were so lifelike, I half expected them to rush forward to greet their beloved princess.
We waited for just a few moments before a towering man with dark hair and a sparkling blue gaze swept into the room and spread his arms wide. “Hello, petal!” he said, his booming voice echoing off the marble. “I am delighted that you could visit us after all!”
“Hi, Dad,” Lavender said, hugging him tightly.
The man then turned his smile to his future son-in-law. “Seth, m’boy—good to see you. Treating my daughter well, I see. She’s absolutely glowing!”
I hadn’t noticed it before, but Lavender had taken on a slight purple glow just under her skin and her eyes were brighter than I’d ever seen them.
“Absolutely, sir,” Seth replied, shaking the king’s hand. “You’ve no worries there.”
“Of course, of course!” He clapped Seth on the back, then turned to Nicky and me. “And who have we here?”
“Dad, you remember Trish Muffet,” Lavender said. “She is to be one of my bridesmaids this spring.”
“Oh yes, yes. Of course. My apologies.” He leaned in and whispered, “I’ve been trying to stay out of all that business. Mab can be very particular, you know.”
“So I’ve heard,” I said with a tight smile.
He chuckled. “Oh, I’m sure you have. I’m sure you have.”
“And, Daddy, this is Nicky Blue,” Lavender told him.
The king’s response to Nicky wasn’t nearly as warm. He looked down his nose at him, sizing him up. “Mr. Blue,” he said, shaking his hand. “I understand you wished to have an audience with me.”
Nicky gave him a terse nod. “Yes, sir, I did. I still do.”
The king regarded him for a moment. “Gideon tells me he owes you a debt of gratitude for assisting him the other night.”
“He hardly needed my help, sir,” Nicky demurred.
The king laughed in a short burst. “I daresay he didn’t. Gideon is a force of nature. But you offered your assistance nonetheless. And for that I am grateful. You have done me a favor, have shown your friendship, and now I will show you mine. I will see you.”
“Thank you,” Nicky said, inclining his head. “I appreciate your generosity.”
The king swept his arm toward the arch that led from the foyer. “Well then, shall we?”
We followed the king into a dining room that held a twenty-foot-long table already laid out for a feast.
“You didn’t have to do all this for us, Dad,” Lavender said, her eyes wide.
The king gave her a somewhat put-upon look. “The girls are visiting.”
I glanced at Lavender. “The girls?”
She rolled her eyes, but before she’d even had a chance to explain, we heard a chorus of giggles and a dozen or so young women came hurrying into the dining room, twittering and chattering like a flock of birds.
“These are my sisters,” Lavender announced on a sigh, as they bounded into their seats at the table and offered up sunshiny waves before pointing at Seth and Nicky and giggling behind their hands.
“I thought Poppy was your only sister,” I said as the king swept an arm and motioned for us to join them at the table.
Nicky and Seth pulled out chairs for us and waited for Lav and me to sit before taking the seat on either side of us. Two of the girls from the other side of the table immediately hopped up and came around to nestle in close to the guys, their cheeks flushed and eyes glowing with amorous intent.
Lavender sent a glare of warning at the one next to Seth, which made her instantly wither and resign herself to batting pretty orange eyelashes at him. “They’re my half sisters,” she ground out as she turned back to me. “Let’s just say Puck comes by his wandering eye honestly.”
“Oh.” I glanced down at the king, who was looking more than a little irritated with the silly brood he had sired. Guess what goes around comes around. . . .
“Lavender,” Seth said, leaning a little away from the doe-eyed gaze of his companion, “would you care to introduce your siblings?”
She huffed. “I guess.” Then she went around the table in rapid fire. “Ivy, Lilly, Daisy, Rose, Pansy, Flora, Blossom, Petunia, Hyacinth, Iris, Dahlia.” Here she paused and sent another look of warning to the woman beside her fiancé. “And your little friend, Seth, is Calla.”
Calla twisted her face into a grimace and stuck out her tongue at her elder sister. She looked like she was about to say something petulant and snotty when she suddenly straightened and snapped to attention, as did all of her sisters. I glanced around to see what had happened to settle them down in an instant, but the reason was immediately evident.
Standing in the doorway in all her imperious glory was Lavender’s mother, Queen Mab, her beauty as stunning and unchanging as the first time I’d seen her. The king rose to his feet and took Mab’s hand to escort her to her seat at the other end of the table, then kissed her fingertips with an adoring gaze before leaving her side. Mab slowly surveyed the king’s brood with barely disguised disgust and then turned her golden eyes upon her own daughter.
“Hello, Lavender, darling,” she said with a hint of a smile. That trace of warmth vanished in an instant when she glanced at Seth and gave him a nod. “Werewolf.”
He forced a strained smile. “Your Majesty,” he replied with a polite nod, although his tone clearly conveyed Bitch.
The queen bristled, but before she could send an angry retort his way, Lavender piped up, “Mother, you remember my friend Trish Muffet, of course.”
Mab narrowed her eyes at me as if she was deciding whether or not she cared to admit it. “Of course.”
“And this is our friend, Nicky Blue,” Lavender introduced.
Mab clucked her tongue. “Perfect. Another nursery rhyme at my table.”
“Mother!” Lavender hissed, her magic sending up a crackle of electrical charge at the insult, a tiny pop of purple spark shooting off and landing on my hand. I winced and sucked in air through my teeth, rubbing at the skin where it had burned me. “Mr. Blue has business with my father.”
Mab lifted her brows at her husband. “Indeed?”
The king lifted his goblet of wine. “Mr. Blue recently did me a courtesy, Mab. He is now a friend of ours.”
She made a little noise but said nothing.
“I welcome all of you to my table,” the king said, looking pointedly at his wife. “Let us feast and then we shall discuss whatever business brings you here. I—”
“Sorry, sorry!” came a cheerful voice from behind me.
I turned to see Lavender’s sister Poppy rushing into the dining room, her bubblegum pink hair a bit disheveled, her clothes not quite in perfect order. And to my amazement, she wasn’t alone. Beside her, looking a great deal better than when last I’d seen him, was J.G. Squiggington, the former publisher of The Daily Tattletale, whose brain had been pretty much turned to mush by a fairy dust overdose courtesy of Sebille Fenwick.
“J.G.?” Lavender gasped.
He gave us a boyish smile in response. “The one and only—thank Christ, most people would say. Am I lyin’?”
“Not in the least,” I heard Mab mumble.