Mona Lisa Craving

TWENTY-THREE

THE FIRST ITEM of business we attended to, as it turned out, was the public presentation of me before the other Council members. I entered the large domed chamber on Halcyon’s arm, and all eyes immediately zoomed in on the cameo necklace I wore. And on Halcyon’s protective hand placed at the small of my back as he led me up the tiered steps to my seat. A small collective stirring occurred when he sat, not in his usual place across the room, but in the armchair next to mine. A not-so-subtle political power statement, clearly allying himself with me.

There were over thirty Council members present, filling the chamber almost to capacity. A dozen new Queens numbered among them, and I wondered at the turnout. Wondered if it was because of me. Whether the rumors of the new Mixed Blood Queen and her recent Court antics had drawn them here. Or if it was because of another event unbeknownst to me. The way they were all looking at me, I was laying bet on the former.

The new Queens’ eyes were not all outright hostile like Mona Teresa’s was. I’d mentally dubbed Mona Teresa the Fire Queen for her flame-colored hair and spiteful nature. Nasty would best describe her and most of the Queens I’d met to date, for that matter, all except Mona Carlisse, the only Queen I counted as a friend. Sadly, she was not present.

I was willing to reserve judgment on the other Queens arrayed here. And by the cool reserve in their eyes, they seemed inclined to do the same with me. There were more healers, denoted by their maroon garments, filling out the assemblage, along with a couple more white-robed ladies. All women but for three men: Halcyon, Amber, and Lord Thorane. Amber was new, granted a seat on the Council by his new status as Warrior Lord, one of only two that existed. Lord Thorane, the Council speaker, was the other. Had Gryphon still been alive, he would have sat here among us also.

It was an open session, meaning that guards and other spectators stood back along the walls, watching the proceedings. The Council members were arrayed in rings around a central clearing, the area where the petitioners stood and presented their cases.

Lord Thorane opened the session, and sure enough, I was the first matter of business called. It was actually Halcyon’s name that was pronounced, but since I was the matter he was presenting before everyone, he drew me to my feet and walked me down the steps into the center.

Of everyone present, it was the Queen Mother who dominated over us all. Not just in status but in palpable strength. Hers was a presence I had always felt. But for some reason, I felt her even sharper now. Her power and age tasted acute to my senses, not at all mellow like you would imagine it might be from someone as advanced in years as she was. Unlike everyone else present, the Queen Mother was obviously old. Wrinkles marred her face, testament to the passage of time and her enduring presence through it.

Halcyon bowed and I curtsied before her. Not as graceful as he, but then again, I hadn’t had over six hundred years to perfect the gesture like he had.

“Queen Mother. Honored Queens. Ladies and gentlemen of the Court,” Halcyon said, addressing the others. “It gives me great pleasure to present my chosen mate before you, my royal consort, Queen Mona Lisa.”

Nothing more than that. They were simple words stirring a complex reaction that rippled around the room. The distress caused by the announcement was obvious, but no one dared voice anything out loud in front of the High Prince of Hell. Couldn’t blame them. Never knew when you were suddenly going to find yourself in his realm.

The Queen Mother acknowledged his announcement. “Prince Halcyon, this Monère High Court is pleased for you and your mate, Queen Mona Lisa, High Lady of Hell.” I started a little at that unexpected title. “We wish you joy and happiness,” she said, bestowing the words like a blessing. I bowed my head, accepting it as such, touched by it. Happiness and joy. They were two things that seemed so ephemeral in my life, like precious liquid I could only cup in my hand for a few brief moments before it trickled through my fingers, lost.

“Thank you, Queen Mother, members of the Council.” I inclined my head to the others. No curtseying, you are above them now in rank, Halcyon had told me. Taking my hand, Halcyon led us off the floor, back to our seats.

When the next order of business came up—my petition to have the west Mississippi portion of my land set up as a separate and independent territory, with Warrior Lord Amber recognized as the official ruler there—it passed with not one single opposition.

Halcyon’s amusement whispered in my mind. Why are you so surprised?

I didn’t expect it to be that easy. Not even Mona Teresa opposed it. I think I like being your mate. Everyone is being much nicer to me.

Halcyon’s mental laughter rolled richly through my mind.

And so they should. But it is in their own interests to agree with your proposal. It is only your land being offered up, not theirs. They do not have to give up any of their own territory. Why should they not agree? Likewise, they would see separating a powerful Warrior Lord from your side as to their benefit.

A part of me was saddened by the accuracy of Halcyon’s words. My intent had been to elevate Amber, to align him beside me. But in doing so, I had separated him from me. Put physical distance between us.

Do not be so sad, Hell-cat, Halcyon murmured as he tasted the melancholy lacing my thoughts. Amber knows and appreciates what you have done for him. You have not lost him any more than you have lost me simply because I cannot walk beside you every day or be with you every night. You are our home. We shall always return to you.

His words and the honest emotions behind them—feelings that he could not hide from me when we were linked this way—comforted me. I was blessed despite myself.

High Court adjourned several hours later and the real festivities began. Tents were erected on the sprawling lawn, and trade counselors were inundated with service people seeking new positions in other courts. Men, women, a few families, warriors, and trades-men. The greatest number at this fair, however, was the assemblage of young boys. Eighteen-year-old virgins were gathered like a flock of colorful peacocks at the largest central tent, arrayed in their best finery with hair neatly combed, nails buffed, and shoes polished. They looked like high school boys going out on their prom night. Only the dates they took home tonight would be the Queens who had selected them. And it would not be just a kiss that was taken but their virginity.

“My goodness, why are there so many boys here?” I felt their eager attention hone in on me, a Queen, as I walked by on Halcyon’s arm, the Demon Prince on one side of me, Amber, my giant Warrior Lord, on the other.

“It is the first gathering after winter solstice,” Amber explained. “Most of the boys who are of age seek their Virgin Claiming during this first session of the new year. It’s considered good luck to enter your manhood during this time. Summer solstice is another popular time. I see my two boys near the center there.”

“My two are at the end,” I said softly, finding them easily in the crowd. Quentin and Dante. Their clothes were less gaudily bright than the others. They were dressed in simple attire that enhanced their more developed physiques.

They stood out in other ways. They were older, for one, a striking and obvious difference. The other boys stood on the cusp of manhood, eager and young. Quentin and Dante had taken the step over that line already, denoted by their calm assurance, their more noticeable reserve. Men in maturity of mind and spirit. No longer boys.

They were also far more beautiful in my eyes. The simplicity of their clothes drew attention to the lean, masculine beauty of their faces, to the greater breadth of their shoulders, their more muscular arms and chests. And any Queen who had witnessed the fight between Oswald and Dante knew firsthand what a superb warrior Dante was, so different from the other young lads here. His wounds had been healed by Hannah, probably as soon as she’d been able to lay hands on him, and he seemed none the worse for wear from his earlier challenge.

Quentin served as a bridge, standing between his brother and the other virgin boys. Dante stood at the end, positioned halfway between that tent and the next one, which housed older warriors seeking positions, a more desperate lot. They were quieter, more somber men, less than a handful. It was in this group that Dante technically belonged, because he was not a virgin. Not anymore. Yet neither did he really belong with the older men.

Dante’s apartness seemed to have intrigued the Queens. He had not one but five of them looking him over, perusing him with interest. But even surrounded by Queens, his gaze unerringly found mine.

Instead of looking ecstatic as he should have been at so much interest, he looked…desolate. He answered their questions politely and allowed them to look him over like a stud they were considering buying. He didn’t preen as the other young lads did, he simply endured it, tolerating it with a dispassion that bordered on frank disinterest.

“I will leave you to attend to your matters here,” Halcyon murmured. “There are matters I wish to discuss with the other Council members before the next meeting.” It was a considerate gesture on his part. He had made public his claim on me, and now was allowing us separate time to each attend to our own affairs. Maybe he even thought I wished to choose one of the boys for myself and didn’t wish me to feel constrained by his presence. Drawing my hand up, he kissed the back of it. Then he was gone, gracefully winding his way through the crowd, leaving me in Amber’s care.

“Dante and Quentin seem to be quite popular,” I observed, eyeing the two Queens who were circling Quentin; he had his admirers as well. “I can understand Quentin, but why the interest in Dante when he is no longer a virgin?”

“But who did he lose his virginity to?” Amber asked. “You. Very few unclaimed males have that distinction. And with his lightly tanned skin, they cannot help but wonder if he has acquired some of your gifts, such as your rare gift of walking under the sun without burning. Can he do that now?”

“I don’t know,” I answered in a muted voice. “My best guess is probably not. Dontaine gained nothing from lying with me. My gifts don’t seem to transfer so easily anymore.” Not since I had taken the demon essence into me. Perhaps it was better that way. It would have been a disaster if I had been able to pass the demon taint as easily as I had passed on my other abilities before.

A Queen, one of the new ones I didn’t know, stroked a bold hand down Dante’s backside. Seeing him being fondled ignited a maelstrom of unpleasant emotion within me. She was either daring or stupid. Or simply arrogant, as all Queens naturally seemed to be, sure that her touch would be welcomed. With Dante, none of the other Queens had dared that liberal stroking and caressing that the other boys not only encouraged but preened beneath. There was a dangerous stillness to Dante’s reserve that the other Queens had sensed and respected. All but this one.

Dante’s gaze broke away from me to focus on that other Queen, the one who had dared touch him. His expression, one that I could not see, made her hand fall away. Though she didn’t back up or do anything so obvious, her arrogant, inspecting saunter around him increased the distance between them.

His attention drifted away from her like an annoying gnat already forgotten and returned to me. The other Queens saw where his eyes wandered, and gazed speculatively at me.

Hope had flared in Dante’s eyes at the sight of me. Hope that he had quickly hidden. But I had sensed it still.

Don’t make me go, those eyes cried. Keep me. No words spoken aloud or heard in the mind. Just that look. Those burning embers of hope.

Something twisted painfully inside of me.

I can’t…I can’t keep you. You’re too dangerous. You killed everyone I ever loved before.

Reading the answer in my eyes, he gazed at me like a thirsty man looks at a fountain of water he knows he will never drink from again. Desolation filled the pale blue depths, extinguishing that last wild hope. And with it gone, it was as if a flame had been snuffed out, leaving them cold, dead, and empty. His eyes dropped away from mine.

“You should come away,” Amber urged, a silent witness to our byplay.

I almost did, even started to turn away, but stopped when I caught sight of another Queen. This one I knew and hated bitterly. Mona Teresa. Her flame-colored hair glinted beneath the moonlight as she sauntered her way down the line of virgin boys, her six guards following behind her. The guard closest to her I recognized as the man who had raped Tersa on his Queen’s order. Guilt and hatred burned in me at the sight of him.

With a careless caress here, an intimate handling there, Mona Teresa sampled the virgin lads. The boys quivered beneath her touch, just like the horseflesh she casually treated them like. Disappointment was keen in their eyes as she passed them all by, to stop and linger before Quentin, drinking in his perfect male beauty. With a smirk aimed my way, she continued on down the line to Dante, whose beauty was more harsh like a natural gemstone. Less refined, more primitive. Knowledge was in her eyes, and purpose.

“She knows,” Amber murmured, oddly echoing my thoughts. “She knows his history. And yours.”

What he was really saying was: She knows he killed you before, and wants him because of that. Gossip about his past and mine must have spread like wildfire after the challenge and his unexpected win. If news of my pregnancy had been whispered of as well, Dante would become a hotly desired acquisition for any Queen. Especially one who hated me.

“I’ve already offered for him, Mona Teresa,” said the Queen circling Dante.

“And has he accepted it, Mona Annabella?” Mona Teresa asked with a mocking smile.

“He has not given his answer yet to any of us,” Mona Annabella returned, her dark eyes flashing with spite. “You’re welcome to tender your offer and see how you fare.”

I was a little shocked to hear he had had offers. More than one. What was he waiting for?

“Come away,” Amber urged again, but I could not. I had to watch. Had to know to whom he would go.

Mona Teresa tilted her head. “Join my service, Dante, and I will promise you ten years in my bed.”

She made it sound like a generous offer, making me wonder how long virgin boys usually lasted in a Queen’s bed before she tired of them and moved on to new untried flesh.

“I will consider it,” Dante said in a voice that held no eagerness, no joy. No word of thanks.

The other Queens tittered and Mona Teresa’s eyes flashed. But her voice stayed slitheringly calm, like a snake just before it pumped venom into its prey. “Fifteen years in my bed if you accept my offer now.”

He looked at her with no change in expression, and repeated his words from before. “I will consider it.”

Denial of her offer by his very lack of acceptance.

If he saw Mona Teresa’s dark flush of anger, it concerned him not. All caring seemed to have left him.

“How dare you!” Mona Teresa hissed, fury lacing her words. Lunging at him, she raked her nails down the side of his face.

The apathy left Dante. His features hardened, and his eyes flashed to dangerous silver. Amber and I were both moving forward together as she lunged at Dante again.

A normal young Monère male would have fallen back beneath a Queen’s attack, nothing more than that. Dante was not a typical Monère guy. He had been raised among the humans. He had lived countless lifetimes. And in another time, he had been a warlord of such feared renown that songs had been sung about him and legends told.

Dante didn’t step back or cower under Mona Teresa’s attack. He stood there, and with a simple block of his arm, he swept aside her clawed hands with insulting ease.

The other boys watching gasped as if he had done the unthinkable. And perhaps he had, I don’t know. Maybe there was some stupid law saying that you couldn’t defend yourself against a Queen.

Mona Teresa’s six guards drew their swords and advanced with lethal intent on Dante.

“Stay here,” Amber said urgently, grabbing my arm and dragging me to a halt. “For his sake. And for yours.”

Oh yeah, I’m pregnant, carrying his child…a precious life that he believes to be his chance at breaking the curse. It stopped me as nothing else could have. Satisfied that I was staying put, Amber left me and rushed to Dante’s aid.

I wasn’t used to that. Staying back and being safe when my men were in danger. I cursed myself now for not bringing Tomas, Aquila, and Dontaine along. I had thought to spare Dante’s pride and my own raw nerves.

“Kill him!” Mona Teresa ordered her men. They rushed him and everyone scattered back away from them, all but Quentin. He stayed at his brother’s side. A noble gesture, I thought, but a useless one. Both of them were unarmed.

“Stop,” I yelled, fighting the only way left to me—with words. “You attacked him, Mona Teresa. He merely defended himself.”

“He dared raise his hand against me. Everyone here is witness to that,” Mona Teresa said, almost spitting with outrage. “It is my right to demand his head for that. Kill him! I want him dead.”

“No! He is still mine, under my protection.” But my words did nothing as mere words often did. Only might mattered here.

Amber dived into the melee, his sword drawn, and three of Mona Teresa’s men turned to meet him. The sound of clashing metal filled the air. And it was not just the sound of sword striking against sword, but sword scraping against Dante and Quentin’s bracelet guards. It puzzled the warriors who attacked them for a moment because the metal bands were hidden beneath their shirts. A few block and strikes later, though, the cut cloth gaped open, revealing the wide bracelets hugging Dante’s and Quentin’s wrists.

The two brothers fought one guard apiece. They dodged and twisted lightly on their feet, and the swords either slashed empty air or came up against those deflecting wrist guards. It would have been a mesmerizing thing to see, almost like a graceful, twisting ballet, were it not so deadly in intent, and so unmatched. One sword against six, with Dante and Quentin fighting without weapons. But that I could do something about.

Walking closer to the crowd, I scanned the gathering onlookers, searching specifically for other Queens and their guards. With my strong affinity for silver, I could call any silver dagger to my hand. I could do the same with a sword, though not as easily since swords were rarely silver. No need to be when the main purpose was to cut off your opponent’s head with them—simple steel did that easily enough. For nonsilver weapons, I usually had to familiarize myself first with the taste and smell of them. Amber’s blade had smelled like ancient battle and had tasted like spilled blood. The remembered scent and flavor of it rushed back into my mind, and I focused on two older, more powerful guards, reasoning that their swords would be most like Amber’s.

My palms stretched out, my moles tingled and pulsed. Nothing.

A second throbbing pulse with a deeper, pulling power, and yes! The two swords slid from their scabbards and flew into my hands, hilt-first.

What do you know? It worked.

“Dante! Quentin!” I called, and tossed the swords to them when they turned their faces to me. They leaped, caught the weapons in the air, and landed lightly, spinning back to face their opponents.

Now they were evenly matched, three swords against six. Okay, actually overmatched, with the advantage ours now. But I wasn’t too concerned about being fair, not when Mona Teresa hadn’t sweated it. And talking about that redheaded bitch. She’d drawn her dagger and looked as if she was considering hurling it into Dante’s back, a coward’s blow.

Eyes narrowed, I extended my hand again. Her dagger—it was silver, wasn’t that nice? — flew to me like a bird, coming to rest neatly in my palm.

I tsked. “Nuh-uh-uh. No backstabbing allowed.”

“You unholy mongrel bitch.” Drawing her other dagger, nonsilver, she came at me quickly. I barely had time to think—Should I run? — before she was on me. Okay. I had time to think about it, and do it. But, goddamn it, I didn’t want to run from her. What if I ran and she turned back and buried her blade in one of my men’s backs like the treacherous bitch she was? And she might. Because she knew, as I did, by Dante’s and Quentin’s deft handling of their swords, that her men were outclassed. I, on the other hand, could fight her with impunity by our laws, Queen against Queen. I could even kill her if I needed to, though that was not my intent. I’d caused enough uproar as it was at High Court already. No need to add another Queen’s death to the mess, especially coming so quickly on top of the other one I’d been involved in. Two of them, I think, would be stretching even the Council’s tolerance, Halcyon’s new High Lady of Hell or not. To be on the safe side, I tossed away the silver dagger I’d snatched from Mona Teresa and faced her unarmed. My blade might accidentally-on-purpose bury itself in her black, cowardly heart if I faced her with a tempting weapon in my hand.

She slashed at me quick, like a serpent striking. I twisted to the side and grabbed her hand as it came flying by.

“Mona Lisa, no!” Amber cried, catching sight of us. He quickly cut down the two remaining men he fought—the third one he had already dispatched—and ran toward us, dropping his sword, coming at us unarmed.

I was distracted by the sight, concerned with Amber coming between us, two Queens. Because even though he was a Warrior Lord, our supposed equal, he still was not really equal in the Council’s eyes. If anything happened to Mona Teresa, Amber would be blamed and punished. Maybe even killed.

I froze, my attention drawn away from my opponent, which is never a smart thing to do. She kneed me in the stomach. It was a blow I could have easily blocked had I been paying attention, but I wasn’t. It caught me with full, stunning force, and I felt something delicate, something fragile, tear inside of me. Then I felt pain. Stunning, incapacitating pain as I crumpled to the ground.

“Noooo!” someone roared. A man’s voice—Dante’s—but sounding as I’d never heard him before. Amber reached us and pulled Mona Teresa off me, unarmed her. He held her a safe distance away from me, letting her kick and punch and claw at him as he turned his eyes to me. “Mona Lisa.”

Then Dante was there. If his voice had sounded frightening, the look on his face was even more so.

“Get that bitch away from her,” he told Amber in a voice so nakedly vicious that I shivered. “Quentin, find Mother. Bring her quickly.”

His hands when they touched me, though, were gentle. So gentle they brought tears to my eyes. A horrible fear gripped me as I smelled blood and felt wetness pool beneath me, flowing out between my legs.

“Oh God, Dante. Our baby…I’m so sorry.” Wet tears stung my eyes, streaming out almost as quickly as the blood gushing from my womb. I writhed painfully in his arms as a terrible cramp seized me, hardening my belly.

“Easy, dulcaeta,” he soothed. His eyes, turned that ferocious, glittering silver, left mine and speared someone in the crowd. “Go find a healer,” he growled, and the man quickly ran to do his bidding. When the spasm passed, he eased me gently onto his lap and laid his hands over mine, two sets of hands protectively covering my belly.

“Easy, sweetheart,” he murmured. “Don’t cry. It’s okay.”

But it wasn’t okay. And I couldn’t stop crying, couldn’t stop cramping. I cried and bled as he rocked me, and felt his own tears splash down to mingle with mine.

“I’m sorry, so sorry,” I whispered feverishly against him, over and over again, stopping only when another spasm gripped me.

Soft hands pushed our hands aside. I looked up, and through my pain, saw Hannah kneeling at our side, Quentin and Nolan standing behind her.

“Let me see, milady,” Hannah said urgently. I stopped fighting her and she ripped open my dress at the waist and laid her healing hands quickly over my bared belly. I felt her seeking warmth sink down into my flesh, and like that, the pain, the cramping eased. The bleeding slowed.

“My baby?” I asked, voice trembling.

“I’m sorry,” Hannah said in a bare whisper. “It’s gone already. I could not save it.”

Gone already. Her words echoed hollowly within me as she finished the healing. When it was complete, Dante gently eased out from beneath me, laid me back down. When he stood, I saw that he was drenched in my blood. In our baby’s blood. He turned those fearsome eyes on Mona Teresa. She stood about thirty feet away where Amber had dragged her. The look in those silver eyes held the same awful expression I had seen once before in my dreams—that look of vengeance, of terrible retribution.

“You killed my unborn child.” His words rang out loudly like a death knell. “I will take the lives of your men in return. Be grateful it is not your own life I will seek this retribution on. But I promise you this: If I am to remain cursed, I shall see to it that you share in it with me.”

He turned toward her guards, and long hooking claws almost eight inches in length unfurled from his fingertips with a hiss of energy—twice as long as they had been when he had fought in the challenge against Oswald. He had been holding back, it seemed.

A few of Mona Teresa’s guards had risen to their feet, helping their more severely injured comrades. The six warriors took one look at those claws, that maddened face, those silver gleaming eyes, and scrambled hastily for their swords. Some of them even grabbed it up in their hands before Dante reached them. He walked to them slowly, surely. In no seeming hurry to deliver the death he had pronounced upon them.

Two of them rushed at Dante, with sword and dagger in hand.

I said urgently to his father, “Give him your sword.”

“He doesn’t need it,” Nolan said, watching his son.

Dante turned their blades away like a careless afterthought, deflecting the blows with his wrist guards. Then in a move so fast you weren’t able to track it with your eyes, he sliced them open.

Splashing blood. Tearing cries.

Their intestines were still spilling out from their opened bellies when he sliced down again with those claws and took off their hands. Swords dropped down, daggers clattered to the ground with bleeding limbs still attached.

Turning his back on one eviscerated warrior, Dante concentrated his attention on the taller one, the guard who had raped Tersa. Another slice, aimed higher, and the man’s head came flying off. A flash of light, a puff of dust, followed almost immediately by a second shower of light and ashes as Dante spun around and took off the first warrior’s head, so that they were like two strobe lights going off in quick succession.

The coldness of his execution, his deadly accuracy with those claws, and the lethal consequences of them, struck pure terror in the remaining four men. They fled, or tried to.

“Stop,” Dante commanded. His silver eyes were glowing now, and even standing where I was, distant from where they fought, I felt the power that flared out with that command. They froze, all four of them unable to move, unable to fight against that compulsion. And everyone watching him—Queens, powerful warriors—gasped in fear and realization at what he was able to do.

The four guards stood captured by his will as Dante walked to them. When he stood before them, he said, “You are free.”

They moved. All four going in different directions, trying to escape him. Not one of them tried to attack him.

Dante moved even quicker. Nothing but a blur, then four more flashes of light. Ashes puffed over him, coating him gray, so that he looked like a ghostly specter. A horrifying creature drawn from your darkest nightmare.

For a long moment there was nothing but awful silence. Then the silence was torn apart as Dante threw back his head and screamed. A terrible roar of grief and heartbreak howled up to the heavens. To the distant moon.

One loud, trembling moment…then he was gone. Vanished before our eyes.