She felt a warmth at her heels.
“Hello, Ain,” she said with more affection for her black cat than she had ever felt for another being. She stooped over, and the cat gracefully leapt into her arms. The cat did more for her than any other being had.
“There she is,” Liadan said, pointing out their enemy. The ‘Queen’ walked out of the cottage with a dumb smile on her face, holding Cian’s hand as they walked toward the barn.
It would be simple if she could just kill the bitch, but she was certain that yesterday Cian had destroyed that plan as well. According to the gossip from the party the night before, Cian had fully bonded with the human. If Liadan killed her, there was the distinct possibility her victim would be able to send the image to her husband.
It was too risky. She couldn’t change forms again, and she didn’t intend to be revealed as the hag she was when a lynch mob came.
She watched the outcast prince teach his second-rate mate how to milk a cow. She had played a very careful game. It would be stupid to risk it now. The game had changed with the insertion of the human. What she needed was a new plan.
Liadan smiled as she thought about all the vampires Beck had fought in the arena for the right to mate with that ridiculous human. He’d probably made them very angry. It was the one decent move Torin had managed on his own. Limiting the vampires’ access to consorts had made them more amenable to certain negotiations. There were still vampire families that were loyal to the outcast King, but others were much more reasonable. Perhaps it was time get in touch with one or two.
“I didn’t mean yes that way, Ci!” The human’s squeal carried across the field as she playfully avoided Cian’s hands.
Cian would be sad when the human was dead or gone. Liadan didn’t care which. The vampires would probably rather take the girl. They had their uses for one with her unique talents. With Beck off the plane, she might find some vampires desperate or arrogant enough to think they could kidnap a consort. Or some might just look for revenge and kill the bitch.
Either way would lead to Cian’s fading and Beckett’s death. Once they were gone, Torin could reopen Tir na nÒg, and she would march back into the homeland a conquering hero. She would take her place beside her sisters as the King’s counselor. Their place would be assured.
Liadan turned toward home, her familiar nestled firmly in her arms. She could hear the newlywed couple playing. Let them have fun now. Theirs would be a short marriage if she had anything to say about it.
Chapter Fourteen
“What is it?” Cian sat in the kitchen looking at the small, flat cake-thing his wife had been working on for days now. Meg had been working on other things as well, but this odd bit of food was her labor of love.
Cian had been busy laboring in the fields that fed the village. He spent the day working on his irrigation system with the gnomes. At night, he’d been entertaining the Fae who had come from all over the plane to welcome the new Queen. They were setting up large tents on the land around the village. It was like a great fair had come to town. Cian was happy with the coin that was now flowing around the village as visitors spent money and traded goods with the locals. It had been a long time since his people had anything resembling prosperity.
Meg seemed to think she had something to trade, too—this odd-looking thing she was prepared to force on him. She looked so cute with an apron over her day clothes and flour in her hair. She looked good enough to eat, and the now familiar ache started in his groin. He was going to die if she didn’t say yes soon.
“It’s a cookie,” his wife proclaimed as though that meant something.
Cian was rapidly discovering that even with the bond, his mind still wandered. It was his wife’s fault. She had a smile that tended to melt his insides. Cian forced himself to concentrate on her words and not how creamy her skin looked.
Meg continued, “I had to figure out how to substitute honey for sugar, but I think I have it. It’s an oatmeal cookie. It’s better with chocolate chips, but we don’t have any. Try one.”
That wasn’t what he wanted to try. He wanted to get his mouth on her breasts and that sweet, soft pussy of hers, but he was playing a long game. Still, he couldn’t disappoint her. He took the “cookie” and prayed it tasted better than the other meals she had attempted to cook him. His bride was beautiful and possessed a sharp mind, but she was crap when it came to cooking. He’d had to choke down dinner all week and smile and tell her how edible it was. Flanna was attempting to teach her a few tricks to Fae cooking. So far, it wasn’t working.
Her hand was on her hip, and there was an offended look on her pretty face. “It’s not going to kill you, Ci.”
He was pretty sure it wouldn’t. He quickly calculated his odds of surviving Meg’s cookie experiment. He was confident, when applying the laws of rational deduction, that his odds were in the 99.783% range. Meg’s foot tapped impatiently on the floor. He had a 100% chance of pissing off his wife if he didn’t eat the damn thing and manage to smile. Cian shoved the cookie in his mouth. He gamely chewed.
It was not half-bad. “It’s good.”
The smiled that quirked up her lips was wry. “You don’t have to sound so surprised, Cian. I never was a very good cook, but I always could bake. I didn’t get these hips from following the Atkins Diet.”
Cian would have asked her what she meant, but he was eating a second cookie. It wasn’t just good. It was great. He had never really liked oats. They tasted like paper, but Meggie’s cookie was soft and sweet. He reached for a third.
Meg pulled the platter back. “Hey, I need those for the goblins. Flanna said they’ve set up camp on the other side of the village in the caves.”
Cian shook his head. He knew all about the goblins. It was expected that they would show up. In a way, it was a good thing. They were good for the trade they brought. The goblins lived on the plane and had chosen to do business with the village, but they were not here to pay court to the kings and their queen. They were Unseelie. They were potentially very dangerous. “You aren’t meeting the goblins, my lover.”
“Why not? I’ve met everyone else,” Meg pointed out with a breezy lack of concern.
It was a huge change from the worried girl he’d met a few days ago. Meg had settled in nicely. She was growing in confidence and proving herself a good partner. She was polite when she needed to be, and she had good instincts as to when a little show of temper was required. Patience and gentleness worked with the brownies and gnomes, but he’d been proud when Meg slapped one of the cave dwarves silly. The dwarf been downright rude about humans being a bit lacking in the brain department. Meg had smacked his little head. “Sorry,” she had said with an innocent smile. “I’m not smart enough to control my impulses.”
The dwarves had all watched their tongues since. It was now being said that the queen could be viciously brutal when she wanted to be. It was a compliment coming from the dwarves.
Cian watched the cookies go into a basket. There were a whole lot of cookies. The goblins might not even like them. His wife certainly wouldn’t be wandering into a goblin cave with her pretty smile and basket of treats. The goblins would just as likely eat her. “The goblins aren’t here to meet you, lover. They come because of all the trade that goes on at gatherings like this.”
Meg looked thoughtful for a moment. “What would goblins trade?”
He loved her questions. She was the most curious woman he’d ever met. “All manner of things. They tend to scavenge, so you can bet they have items from other planes. If we had anything to trade, I’m sure we could find something to intrigue you. The only thing they make themselves is a strange form of liquor. It’s a brown drink they brew from beans they find in the mountains. It gets goblins drunk, but it just makes me jittery.”