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then we are honor-bound to take blood oath from her, to bind us to her. To
take blood oath, very much as we take on the dueling ground." Miniver looked
up at Andais, and there was something close to pleading on her face. "Don't
you see, my queen, if we take her blood into us and bind ourselves to her
mortal peril, then we could lose our own immortality?
We would cease to be sidhe."
It was Nerys who stood up and said, "We would cease to be anything."
Three, then four others of the noble houses of the Unseelie stood. They stood
and showed their support for what Miniver had said. Six houses out of sixteen
stood against me. That was something we had not foreseen. Or I had not.
Doyle had gone very still under my hand. All my men had gone very still,
except the goblins at my feet and the Red Cap at my back. Either immortality
didn't mean the same thing to them as it did to the sidhe, or other things
were happening with the goblins. Things I had not quite grasped.
"I say who will be my heir," Andais said, "unless you wish to challenge me to
personal combat, Miniver, Nerys, all of you. I will gladly fight you each in
turn, and this arguing will cease."
Miniver shook her head. "Your answer to everything is death and violence,
Andais. It has led us to be childless and near powerless, but our immortality,
you cannot have that."
"Then challenge me, Miniver. Make yourself queen, if you can."
If Miniver's anger could have flown across the room and struck Andais, the
queen would have died where she sat, but Miniver's anger did not have that
kind of power. The day when the fey, any fey, could have killed with simply an
angry thought was centuries past.
Andais looked at Nerys. "You, Nerys, do you wish to be queen? Do you wish it
enough to challenge me to a duel? Defeat me and you can be queen."
Nerys just stood there, staring at her with tri-grey eyes that nearly mirrored
the queen's own. Nerys's long black hair was done in a series of complicated
braids that hung like a heavy cloak at her back. Her
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dress was white with touches of black in the trim, the belt, the lace at her
wrists. She looked cool and collected. There was no sense of outrage that
Miniver vibrated with.
"I would never presume to challenge the Queen of Air and Darkness to a duel.
It would be suicide." Her voice was quiet, and somehow dark. But there was no
anger in it, nothing that could give true offense.
"But attacking me from secret, an assassination attempt, that would not be
suicide, would it?" Andais's smile was not pleasant. "Not if you didn't get
caught."
Nerys just stood there, looking up at the throne, with no hint of fear, no
panic, no anything. If Andais thought she could frighten Nerys into a
confession, she was wrong. Nerys was going to force Andais to produce proof.
Did she not understand that we had proof? Did she think that with Nuline's
death, she was safe?
"Assassination is a pretty business, so long as you are not discovered."
Andais looked down the line of standing nobles, I think so that she did not
single Nerys out, but it was like many things tonight, in trying to do one
thing, another thing was accomplished.
Miniver began to move through her people to the space between her table and
the next. Some of her people touched her arm; she shook her head, and they let
her go. She walked out from between the tables, her back ramrod-straight, like
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something carved of gold and amber.
"Do you have something to say, Miniver?" Andais asked.
"I challenge the princess Meredith to a duel." For someone who had seemed so
angry, she was strangely calm as she said it.
People at her table cried, No, do not do this.
She ignored them, and kept her Seelie face pointed toward the dais. She never
looked at me, only at Andais. She asked for my life, but it was not me she
asked it of.
"No, Miniver, it will not be so easy as all that. The princess has had one
assassination attempt tonight.
We do not need two."
"I would have preferred my spells to work earlier tonight, but if she will not
die from a distance, then I
will do it here, now."
My face gave nothing away, because it took a few seconds for me to realize
what she'd said. Andais looked amused, her eyes glittering.
Doyle had stood, putting himself more in front of me. My other guards moved to
shield me from her sight, and whatever she might do. I had to peer between
them to see that more of the armored guards spilled around her to form a half
circle. She was as tall as any of them, and there was nothing fragile or
fearful about that shining figure. She seemed very sure of herself.
"Are you admitting, before the entire court, that you tried to assassinate
Princess Meredith earlier tonight?" Andais asked.
"I am," Miniver said, and her voice rang through the room, matter-of-fact, as
if now that the worst was happening she didn't need her anger anymore.
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"Take her to the Hallway of Mortality, and leave extra guards."
They began to close around her, but Miniver's voice carried: "I have given
challenge. That challenge must be answered before my punishment begins. That
is our law." I think the guards might have managed to take her away, but there
were other voices.
"Regrettable as it is to agree with such an undeniable criminal," Afagdu said,
"Lady Miniver is correct.
She has challenged the princess, and that challenge must be answered before
any action may be taken about her crime."
Galen spoke from behind me. "So she tries to kill Merry earlier, fails, and
now she gets another try. I
don't think so."
"It is our law." Doyle's hand had reached out, and I took it, resting my face
against the nude line of his hip. Nervous touching.
"No," Andais said, "the young knight is right. To allow her to go forward with
this challenge is to reward her for trying to assassinate a royal heir. Such
treachery will not be rewarded."
"When it was Cel and his allies who challenged the princess over and over, you
did not intercede,"
Nerys said. "You were more than willing that Meredith take the field when it
was your son behind the duels. We all knew that Cel meant her death. Meredith
did her best to give no offense to anyone, yet sidhe after sidhe found an
excuse to challenge her. When you challenge a mortal being to duel after duel
against the immortal sidhe, what is it but an assassination plot by another
name?"
Andais shook her head, not as if she did not agree but as if she didn't want
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