Queen of the Darkness

"Kaeleer had the dominant strength in the last war, too," Jaenelle replied quietly. "And Kaeleer won—barely, but Kaeleer won. But all those males died. And it didn't make any difference. The taint that fed that war is still in the Blood, even stronger now."

"Hekatah and Dorothea can be destroyed."

Jaenelle moved around the table in order to pace. "It wouldn't do any good at this point. Even if they're destroyed, even if Kaeleer wins the initial war, the Shadow Realm won't win. The taint's too widespread now. Terreille will keep sending armies. Will keep sending them and sending them, and the fighting will go on and on, in Terreille as well as in Kaeleer, until the Blood can't remember who they are or that they were supposed to be the caretakers of the Realms."

"We're at war, Jaenelle," Daemon said earnestly. "It doesn't matter if it's been formally declared or not. Weare at war."

"No."

"You have the strength to make the difference. If you unleash—"

"I can't."

"You can."

"I can't."

"WHY NOT?"

She turned on him. "BECAUSE, DAMN YOU, I'M TOO STRONG! If I unleash my strength, it will destroy the Blood.All the Blood. In Terreille. In Kaeleer. In Hell."

Daemon's legs turned to water. Weakly, he pushed aside some books so that he could sit on the table.You had said she was six times stronger than our combined strength. Oh, Father, you were so wrong. Six times? Six hundred times? Six thousandtimes?

Enough power to wipe the Blood out of existence.

With her arms wrapped around herself, Jaenelle paced. "The Keep is the Sanctuary. It wouldn't be affected. But how many could it hold? A few thousand at most? Who chooses, Daemon? What if the wrong choices are made and the taint is still there, hidden because someone is so damn sure she's right?"

She was thinking of Alexandra. Would anyone have considered Alexandra tainted? Misguided, certainly, but unless they were obviously twisted, the Queens would definitely be among the chosen. And what about someone like Vania? Not tainted the way Jaenelle was talking about, but the kind of woman who could sour the males around her and eventually ruin a land. Exactly the kind of woman Dorothea cultivated.

"The Blood are the Blood," Jaenelle continued. "Two feet, four feet, it doesn't matter. The Blood are the Blood. The gift of Craft came from one source, and it binds all of us."

So not even the kindred could be spared. No wonder this had been ripping her apart. "Does Kaeleer win?" Daemon asked quietly. A full minute passed before Jaenelle answered. "Yes. But the price for winning will be all the Kaeleer Queens and all the Warlord Princes."

Daemon thought about the decent people he had met since he'd come to Kaeleer. He thought about the kindred. He thought about the children. Most of all, he thought about Daemonar, Lucivar's son. If, for some reason, they didn't destroy Dorothea and Hekatah, and those two got their hands on Daemonar... "Do it," he said. "Unleash your strength. Destroy the Blood." Jaenelle's mouth fell open. She stared at him. "Do it," he repeated. "If that's the only way to get rid of the taint Dorothea and Hekatah have spread in the Blood, then, by the Darkness, Jaenelle, show some mercy for those you love and do it."

She began pacing again. "There has to be a way to separate Blood from Blood. Therehas to be."

A memory teased him, but he couldn't catch hold of it while her frenzied movement seemed to put everything in motion. "Stand still," he snapped. She came to an abrupt halt and huffed. He raised a hand, commanding silence. The memory continued to tease, but he caught the tail of it. "I think there's a way."

Her eyes widened but she obeyed the command for silence.

"A few centuries ago, there was a Queen called the Gray Lady. When a village she was staying in was about to be attacked by Hayllian warriors, she found a way to separate the villagers from the Hayllians so that when she unleashed her strength, the villagers were spared."

"How did she do it?" Jaenelle asked very quietly.

"I don't know." He hesitated—and wondered why he hesitated. "A man I knew was with her at the time. A few years before his death, he sent a message to me that he had made a written account of the 'adventure' and had left it for me in a safe place. She was a good Queen, the last Queen to hold Dorothea at bay. He wanted her remembered."

Jaenelle leaped at him, grabbed him. "Then youdo know how she did it!"

"No, Idon't know. I never picked up the written account. I decided to leave it where it was, out of Dorothea's reach."

"Do you think you could find it?" Jaenelle asked anxiously.

"That shouldn't be difficult," Daemon replied dryly as he wrapped his arms around her, suddenly needing to touch her. "He left it with the Keep's librarian."

"I retrieved it from the Terreillean Keep the first time you came to Ebon Askavi with Jaenelle," Geoffrey said as he handed Daemon a carefully wrapped parcel. "I wondered at the time why you didn't ask for it. What made you think of it now?"

The question sounded innocently curious, but there wasn't anything innocent about it.

Looking straight into Geoffrey's black eyes, Daemon smiled. "I just remembered it."

He didn't unwrap it, didn't look at it. He probed it just enough to make sure there weren't any spells hidden in it that would be triggered if someone besides him handled it. Then he gave it to Jaenelle and spent the next several hours denying access to the Queen to just about every member of the First Circle. That had caused hard feelings but was easy enough. No one but the Steward, the Master of the Guard, and the Consort were permitted free access to the Queen's chambers. Lucivar had taken one look at him and had retreated. Stalling Saetan and Andulvar had been much more difficult, and he sensed it wouldn't take many more polite confrontations to erode their trust in him. Considering Jaenelle's behavior lately, he could appreciate their concern. It still hurt.

When he finally returned to her, he found her in her sitting room, her arms wrapped around herself, staring bleakly out the window.

"It didn't help?" he asked softly, resting a hand lightly on her shoulder.

"Actually, it did. I found the answer. I can't do the same thing they did, but I can use it as the foundation for what I need to do."

She turned and kissed him with a desperation that frightened him, but he gave her what she needed. For hours, he gave her what she needed.

When she was finally content just to lie wrapped in his arms, she said, "I love you." And fell asleep.

Despite being physically and emotionally exhausted, Daemon lay awake a long time—and wondered why "I love you" sounded so much like "good-bye."

6 / Kaeleer

"The Lady changed her mind," Saetan said formally to the Territory Queens who made up the coven. "You and the males in the First Circle are to remain at the Keep, but the other Queens in your Territories may stay where they are."

"Why arewe required to stay?" Chaosti demanded. "Our people aredying. We should be home, preparing to fight."

"Why did she change her mind?" Morghann asked. "What did she say when you asked her?"

Saetan hesitated. "The instructions were relayed by the Consort."

He felt their flickers of anger and their growing suspicion about Daemon. Worse, he had those same feelings.

"The Queen commands," he said, knowing how inadequate that sounded when they were all receiving reports of fighting in their homelands.

"That's fine, High Lord," Aaron said coolly. "The Queen commands. But, obviously, no one has informed the kindred of that fact. None ofthem who are members of the First Circle have to stay at the Keep."

They all looked at each other as that realization sank in. But it was Karla who finally asked, "Whereare the kindred?"

Saetan watched the drops of rain trickle down the window.

When Jaenelle had given the order for all the Queens to come to the Keep, he hadn't protested for one reason: Sylvia. He had wanted her in the Keep where she would be safe.

But now that Jaenelle had changed her mind—or had had it changed for her—he would issue his own orders as the Warlord Prince of Dhemlan and summon all the Dhemlan Queens to the Hall. It was a risk. The Hall didn't have the defenses the Keep had.No place had the defenses the Keep had. But it had been designed to withstand attack, and its defenses were better than anywhere else the Queens might be forced to retreat if the fighting escalated. And it was big enough that the Queens could bring their families with them, bring their children.

He wanted her safe. And her boys, too, Mikal and Beron.

Sassy, opinionated, lovely Sylvia. Mother Night, he loved her.

Even after he realized that the potency of Jaenelle's tonic after she had made the Offering to the Darkness had brought back the hunger of a man—and the ability to satisfy it—he might have resisted becoming Sylvia's lover, might have found the strength to remain just a friend if he hadn't sensed the hurt in her that her last Consort had inflicted. She had shut herself away from sexual pleasure, hadn't been intrigued enough by any man to try again— until she had become friends with him.

They weren't acknowledged lovers. At his insistence, they maintained the illusion in public of being just friends. Oh, his reasons had been very logical, very considerate. He knew Luthvian would be enraged if he openly became another woman's lover, and he hadn't wanted her to take her anger out on the rest of the family—or on Sylvia. And he hadn't wanted people backing away from her because she had chosen a Guardian for a lover.

At first, she had gone along with him, mostly because she was rediscovering the pleasures of the bed, and had been able to accept that he was a lover in the bedroom and a friend outside of it. But gradually, over the past year, she had become more and more unhappy with the secrecy, had wanted an acknowledged relationship.