Jacob wiped the blood off his mouth with the back of his hand, then spat on the floor to get rid of the taste of it, close to Cayden's boots. “I think my Mistress is right. You don't know what love is. And though I don't have your powers, Your Majesty, a vampire's sense of smel is keen. You're afraid of something you don't understand.”

The strike from Cayden was expected, but the magical power added behind it was not. When he hit him in the face with the hilt of his sword, Jacob heard the sickening crunch of his nose and cheekbone, an explosion of pain that blinded him. As he staggered back in reaction, Cayden fol owed. Jacob forced his eyes back open just as Cayden lunged forward and drove his blade into his unprotected abdomen.

A second later, all hell broke loose.

7

ALL the pressure that had been building between two irreconcilable forces detonated. Lyssa snarled like a savage animal, and that net of white fire exploded in a bil ow of orange flame. Even dropped to one knee, holding the blade in his gut, his vision blurry from his shattered nose, Jacob had the satisfaction of seeing the blast impact pick Cayden up and fling him into a cluster of retainers, toppling them like dominoes. Barely in time, Rhoswen threw up an additional protection over herself, a ripple of ice. The flame roared over it, bil owed the few steps up to her throne and swal owed the white wood like a ravenous dragon.

The two guards close to Jacob had not been affected by the blast, evidence that Lyssa had enough control of her reaction to cast a protection on Jacob and his immediate surroundings. However, as they broke out of their shock to start toward her, the element of surprise was now in his camp. Pain didn't stop a vampire. hell , it had rarely stopped him as a human third-mark, because his lady had taught him to embrace and use it in myriad ways.

Now he used the adrenaline and his rage to yank the sword from his midriff. Swinging the bloodstained blade, he tripped one guard with it and then flipped it to hit the other hard in the face with the pommel. He wished he was returning the favor to Cayden, rather than one of his men, but the crunch of bone was stil satisfying. He stomped on the midriff of the tripped one to keep him incapacitated, and then braced himself, sword at the ready, as Cayden charged out of the tangle of fal en court members like an enraged bul . There was no hesitation in his forward charge, despite the fact he'd drawn a short knife and Jacob had his long blade. Jacob felt the sweet anticipation that came right before engaging an opponent as crazy with bloodlust as himself.

“Enough.” Rhoswen's voice reverberated through the room. The shockwave from it rippled across the waterfal s and vibrated through the floor. Jacob held his position, unmoving, as Cayden came to a skidding halt right before the lifted blade. The point pressed into his broad chest, his face flushed with anger above it. The defiant glare the captain of the guard threw his queen was one Jacob knew all too well from situations where his lady had held him back from needed ass-kickings. He would have spared Cayden some empathy if he hadn't obliterated such tender feelings by driving his sword in Jacob's gut. A quick glance showed that Lyssa hadn't moved from the top of the sphere. She stood where the queen thought she'd trapped her, only now it was clear that remaining there had been Lyssa's choice.

Of course, that could be a bluff. She might not have had enough control of the power to cal it until events provoked it from her, but as long as she acted like it had been her plan all along, she had the upper hand. At least for the moment.

His lady made a crooning noise through her fangs, a smal hiss. Stretching her wings again, she descended to the floor in front of the sphere, her toes practical y aligned with the magical barrier Cayden had said would incinerate her. Then she flicked out her talons in a rol of impressive movement and shimmered back into her human form. Though she was entirely naked except for the belt and smal velvet pouch low on her hips, she showed no modesty about that, her hip-length hair simply enhancing the beauty of the curves and cream skin.

Her calm manner showed she knew exactly how good she looked, an ebony and jade mirror of the queen's pale snow. A mutation, indeed.

The fal en retainers had gained their feet, but returned to that silence. all eyes were on the Fae queen, waiting on her next move. It seemed the two females were in a passive deadlock, nothing obvious from either expression. As a result, the sound of footsteps on the marble was loud. Jacob kept the sword raised and trained on Cayden, though the male had stepped back a grudging pace.

However, they both glanced toward Keldwyn as he moved away from the front line of the audience, toward Lyssa. As he did, he shrugged his cloak off his shoulders, the rust brown and dark black fabric gleaming from the flames crackling over Rhoswen's throne. Lyssa didn't acknowledge him, but he slid his hand to her nape, courteously gathering up the fal of dark hair to clear the cloak before he settled it on her shoulders. Then he stepped back, standing no more than a pace or two to her right, which put him at a right angle to the triangle he formed between the two queens. Interestingly, his position put him over that magical barrier, but he seemed unaffected by it.

Jacob wondered if it was spel ed only for Lyssa and himself.

The queen stared at him, but spoke to Lyssa. “He is no friend to you, you know. That dryad was left trapped in your world by my decree. She was sentenced to the consequences of her actions for her fraternization with humans, her defiance when I told her to desist.”

“She was a will ful child, experiencing her first infatuation.” Keldwyn's voice was flat. Jacob wondered if Keldwyn had learned impassivity so well his softer emotions were permanently locked away somewhere, so deep he might have lost the key. Or maybe he'd never had such emotions to hide.

“She is a child no more, is she? So both our problems are solved. Or yours may be just beginning.” Rhoswen shifted her attention back to Lyssa. “The dryad is the child of a Fae he loved, a Fae murdered in your world. To watch over this impetuous child, the great Lord Keldwyn exiled himself from us, choosing to live in the dwindling old forests of the human world.”

“We all make choices, Your Majesty. You choose to imprison yourself in this world, trapped by your hatred of the humans and vampires. Everything that is not pure Fae.”

Rhoswen lashed out with those sparking fingertips again, too fast for Jacob to do anything more than tighten his grip on the sword hilt, but his lady was not the target. Slashes opened up across Keldwn's face, though the queen made no obvious physical contact. Blood seeped from the wounds as Jacob noted the glitter of ice crystals in the wound. She glowered at Keldwyn. “I can imprison you in that same tree, Kel.”

The male had not moved from the blow, not even to flinch. “Yes, you can. It does not change truth. It never does.”

Obviously, there was something happening here, another chapter in an ongoing story. Unfortunately, from the way Rhoswen's attention now lasered back in on Lyssa, Jacob suspected it was tangled with their presence here. The Fae queen lifted her opposite hand, only this time she was pointing toward her throne. A cold wind rose, swirled around the wood and vanquished the flames with frost.

Though blackened in places by the smoke, the throne had otherwise not been affected.

“Do not be deceived,” Rhoswen repeated.

“Keldwyn is no friend.”

Lyssa bared her canines in a sharp smile. “Friend does not mean what the storybooks say. It is simply someone whose needs align with your own for a certain period of time.”

“Too true.” Moving back to her throne, Rhoswen perched on the edge of it. Bringing one knee up, she curved her bare, bejeweled toes over the edge of the seat. In the glittering white outfit, the corset's hold shifting on her breasts and the skirt splitting to show more leg, it was a provocative picture. “This display of power tel s me a few things, but raises far more questions. Is it the transfer of your vampire powers that initiated the expansion of your Fae ones? You stil carry the blood of a vampire, but in terms of characteristics, you are perhaps now more Fae than the other species, no matter your classification among us.”

It was as if the violent confrontation had never occurred, and Jacob wasn't holding a sword in an offensive position toward Cayden, his two men back on their feet and surrounding him. However, they stood at a cautious distance, waiting for direction from their captain or an indication from the queen.

That aside, Jacob knew the Fae queen wasn't the only one who'd mul ed the unanswerable questions.

Lyssa had sired a very smal handful of vampires in her long life, but none had taken her powers from her as a result of the turning, the way it had happened with Jacob. Lord Brian had concluded that it might have been a combination of factors—the Delilah virus that was now wiped from her blood, the stress of that terrible moment, or the exceptional third-mark bond she and Jacob had. But his tests proved nothing conclusive.

“Fae blood does not mean you know what it is to be Fae,” Rhoswen said. “You have no history with us, no understanding of our world.”

“I know that my mother had to seek refuge with the Vampire Council to escape the Fae assassins sent to destroy her. As a result, for ten centuries, I've had no desire to be part of the Fae world. Until I showed myself capable of exercising Fae abilities, you were fine with that.”

“I did not invite you to be a part of this world,” Rhoswen said, her blue eyes chil ing even further. “I summoned you to determine if I should destroy you, or if you have a value to this court.” Lyssa looked pointedly toward the throne, the blackened tile. “Which one have I proven?” Rhoswen's lips curved, showing a grim appreciation of Lyssa's caustic tone. “You've proven that you have enough Fae power that I cannot all ow you to leave my court. Despite your tantrum, you and I both know I have the ability to bind you as a consort to a Fae Lord of my choosing. You are outnumbered here, you cannot leave the Fae world without me opening a gateway for you, and there are other, quite politic ways of burning your bridges behind you.” Rhoswen shifted to cross her legs. “Thanks to careful y placed bits of information, the Vampire Council already suspects you only have Fae powers.