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Noah spoke again. “Choose your next words, carefully if you wish to make it out of this alive.”
No one else in the room made a sound. My gaze shifted to Nicole who was watching the situation intently. Gabriel stood as still as a statue to the side of the throne, and I wondered why he was at so many more things now.
Nicole and I locked eyes, and she widened hers a little. Communicating her shock as I shook my head back to her.
“I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Please, have mercy.”
The Queen laughed, humorlessly. “So you are aware of what the accusation is? Enough of these games.”
The woman’s demur demeanor shifted and a force seemed to strengthen within her. She rose from her knee, though still in chained cuffs.
“I’m an honest immigrant,” she laid her hands on the floor, bowing lower as she spoke. “Yes, yes I’m Seelie. But I’m not here for harm. I swear it. I wanted to escape that land and start fresh.”
“Seelie are not allowed here,” the Queen answered.
The woman’s head snapped up, showing a wicked, excited sort of gleam in her eyes. “Oh all right then, Eleanor.”.
Gabriel stepped forward, pulling his sword and holding it toward the woman.
The tension rose at the quick shift in her attitude.
“You dare address the Queen in such a way?” A council member stepped forward, looking like he was ready to attack until the other grabbed his arm.
The woman laughed. “She’s no Queen of mine.”
“So you are Seelie?” Noah’s rage was barely contained now as he spat out the name in disgust.
Gabriel stepped forward, inching the blade closer to her.
“Better Seelie than your filth.”
“You’ll watch your mouth as you address our royal family,” Gabriel said in a commanding tone.
The Queen showed no fear, not like the council members who hung back. Even the guards were uneasy. Like they had somehow caught a snake they couldn’t control.
I’d been with this woman though. If she had any abilities they needed to worry about she would have taken me down. She barely got a hit on me until I was on the dirt in the alley and was an easier target.
“The Seelie can’t get across our borders. How did you come to be so close to the castle?” The Queen demanded.
The woman laughed again. “Wouldn’t you love to know.”
This time when Gabriel lunged closer to the woman, the tip of his blade touched her throat. Noah squatted down in front of her.
“We’d like to know very much. You can tell us what we want to know, or it can be taken from you in a more painful way.”
I shivered at the cold way he spoke to her. The way of a Prince who had to do the dirty work for the King and Queen. Though I had no doubt the Queen had dirty work herself.
And probably the King.
This side of the fae was not one I’d seen often.
“How did you get here?” The Queen asked again.
Gabriel’s blade drew a small amount of blood at the base of the woman’s throat.
“Dukesburg was a mere test,” she said. Her gaze shot around the room, her mouth widening into a grin as she saw me. Then looked back to Noah and the Queen. Between the two. Back and forth. “Many border towns have been infiltrated in fact. The UNseelie are closer to demise than you realize.”
“Impossible,” Gabriel said.
