Page 20 of Beauty

If the evidence of our vampire half bothers the Seelies,they don’t show it.

“Save our sister,” Cian requests.

A wild thrill goes through me. Yes, the time has come. Forthe Seelies to face their fate and for me to meet my mate.

Chapter Five

Bronwyn

Night falls, creeping across the fields like a mouseedging away from a predator. The shadows grow across the wheat until all isdarkness, with only the silvery moonlight to illuminate the swaying crops.

I sit in my tower, overlooking what is left of my kingdom.

“We’ve been in tougher spots, you know.” Gillian walks intothe room, a fresh quilt in her hands. The days are still hot, the sun brandingeverything in its path, but the nights are beginning to cool.

I will be so warm between my Dark Ones. They never allow thecold to seep into my bones. I stare at my bed. It’s almost time to sink intosleep and a world where I am loved.

“I know.” I answer Gillian, not wanting the older woman tounderstand my impatience to be abed.

Gillian places the quilt down and stares for a moment asthough assessing the situation. “Do you want to run now?”

It’s a kindness to even offer. I force my attention to thehere and now. I owe Gillian much more than my life. “We have to have coin. Iknow that. I can handle Micha. He’s a nasty old man, but I can manipulate him.”

Gillian sits on the edge of the bed, her hands in her lap.“I tried to turn his eye to me so you wouldn’t have to.”

I rush to her side. “Gilly, don’t. I can handle him.”

Gillian is so still, I’m almost certain she won’t sayanother word. “He didn’t even look at me. Not that I wanted him to, but still.I know I’m not a youngling anymore, but I thought I had some charm.”

Too, too often I sink into my own grief and forget how muchGillian gave up for me. Gillian lost her own kingdom. She was cut off from itas surely as if someone took it. All doors closed because Gillian didn’t leaveme behind. She gave up her youth. What would have happened if she was safe onthe Unseelie plane when Torin started his nasty game? Would she be married bynow? Have a child?

I let my hand drift over Gillian’s, feeling the calluses andscars that didn’t exist before she saved a dead princess. My voice chokes withemotion. “I think you’re the most beautiful woman in all the planes.”

Unshed tears make Gillian’s dark eyes shine. “You haven’tseen much, little one.”

I shake my head. “I’ve seen enough to know I love you.”

Gillian hugs me, a tight embrace. “And I love you. Youunderstand that whatever I did, whatever reason I did it, I have come to loveyou, Bronwyn. I would place you first now.”

“Why did you do it?”

Gillian sits back, taking a long breath. “I thought if Isaved you, you could bring the kingdoms together. I intended to talk to myfather and marry you off to my brothers.”

A part of me is offended, but it’s the childish bit thatclings to shadowy vestiges of my former life. I’m more practical now. “I wasonly fourteen at the time. I’m not sure I would have made a decent wife.”

“Had I gotten you off the plane, you would have been broughtup to be an Unseelie princess. I would have seen to it, and your brothers wouldhave been welcomed. They would have had a place until such time as an army wasready. We weren’t always two tribes, you know.”

It’s radical what Gillian is proposing. “That was thousandsof years ago.”

“I know. I wasn’t trying to unite the crowns, merely to havea closer relationship. We fight far too often. In the end, it will make usvulnerable. I’ve studied this plane called Earth. They are much like thevampires, though they’ve been closed off for so long, they don’t understand theway the planes work anymore. I don’t know they ever did. They do understandwhat it means to conquer. When the humans discover the secrets of the planes, Idoubt they’ll be content to leave us be. We will need each other. Whether it’stomorrow or a thousand years from now, we will need to stand together if we’reto survive.”

Gillian always thinks ahead. It is, she claims, the mark ofa true leader.

“The humans could certainly take us now,” I acknowledge witha sigh. “Is that why you were here in the first place? To negotiate amarriage?”

“I tried to negotiate a marriage between myself and yourbrothers,” Gillian admits. “I am capable of bonding, just as you are. I couldhave bridged the kings. But your father had already selected a bondmate.”

My nose wrinkles at the thought. “I think if Cian had knownyou were trying to push Maris out, he would have sent her over the edge of themoat. He couldn’t stand her, and she hated him. I always wondered what Fatherwas thinking selecting a mate who hated one of her proposed husbands. You wouldhave been a better choice. Do you think they bonded?”