House of Pounding Hearts (The Kingdom of Crows #2)(58)

“What a change you’ve brought upon our world, Mademoiselle Rossi.” Pierre’s gaze flicks between Imogen and the giant black birds dotting the stone veranda. “I’m surprised, though, not to find Ríhbiadh at your side.”

“He’s a busy man.”

“We are all busy men.”

I’ve hit a nerve. Finally. I persevere on my streak. “Except you, sire, haven’t been dead to the world for five centuries and twenty some years.”

I expect the male to scowl and hoist his chin as the high and pointy so love to do, but instead, Pierre grins again, teeth as white as his ship’s hull. “Lucin women are so delightfully spirited in contrast to the proper dullards we raise in Nebba. Apologies, Dante. I did try my best with Eponine, but her mother, rest her soul, tried harder.”

My head rears back at how he’s just insulted his daughter and dead wife in the same sentence. Granted, Eponine has yet to say a word, so she could very well be dull, but Pierre’s her father. Fathers have a genetic obligation to find their offspring extraordinary.

He turns toward Dante and nods. “You were right.”

My attention volleys between the two kings. “About?”

He tips me a smile that makes me want to scrub my skin raw with salt. “That I’d enjoy meeting you, my dear.”

“Why in the world would you enjoy meeting a scazza like me?”

“Because Nebba needs a queen.”

My heart misses a beat. Is he saying what I believe he’s saying?

“If you stopped murdering your queens, Pierre, you’d have no need for a new one.”

I whip my head in the direction of the deep voice that’s just spoken.

Lorcan stands at the head of the table, directly across from Dante, strapped to the gills in iron armor. “You invite me to lunch yet don’t save me a seat, then attempt to marry off one of my Crows to an enemy king? Where are your manners, Regio?”

Dante holds himself as stiffly as the collar on his gold tunic. “I was told you were in Glace.”

“I was. Vladimir’s daughter sends her love.”

As he gestures for a seat to be brought out for the third king, Dante’s cheeks hollow. “Have you selected a date and place for your nuptials?”

“Vlad and I are still ironing out the terms of our alliance.” Lore sinks into the seat between Syb and me, the air dark with the shadows of the extra guards he’s brought with him. “Have you and Eponine set a date for your nuptials?”

Dante works his jaw from side to side. Since he’s yet to touch the flaky roll on his bread plate, I imagine it isn’t food but annoyance that bastes his tongue.

“They’ll be wed within a fortnight.” It’s Pierre who answers.

“How wonderful. I’ll be sure to keep that week wide open in order to attend the festivities. Faerie weddings are oh so joyous. And speaking of weddings.” Lore leans back in his chair. “You will have to hunt for a wife elsewhere, Pierre, for Miss Báeinach’s hand is not up for grabs.”

Pierre’s eyes slant. “Whyever not, Lore?” The man is decidedly afraid of nothing. “Is she spoken for?”

The Sky King’s pupils shrink. “Until the wards fall, Fallon’s place is at my side.”

“And once they’ve fallen?” he asks.

I stare at Lore so hard that I manage to slip into his mind and hear him hiss, So will you. Since he’s looking at Pierre, I imagine his thoughts are directed at the Nebban King and not at me.

“Once they’ve fallen, she’ll be free to choose her fate.”

“Wonderful.” Pierre is making buds bloom and wilt in the floral centerpiece.

I stare around the table, pulse swelling my tongue and chest, and am about to blurt out that I’ve no desire to marry anyone, especially not the man known as the Butcher of Nebba, not even if he flings a trussed Meriam at my feet. But then I take a second to actually reflect upon it.

A trussed Meriam would be the answer to most of my prayers and all of Lore’s.

Don’t you dare, Behach ?an.

But I do. “Deliver Meriam to Lorcan and my hand is yours for the taking, Pierre Roy of Nebba.”

The silence that follows my declaration is so complete that I can hear the breeze ruffle the feathers of my Crow guards and the grinding of Lore’s molars.

Or is it his talons curling against his armrests that emit the sound?





Thirty





Pierre is the first to move, glancing at his upper arm with a furrow between his brows. Since I doubt he’s checking for lint on the green velour jacket that he wears over his high-collared black shirt, I assume he’s wondering why my bargain didn’t bind to his skin.

Fallon, Lore growls.

I pretend not to hear the seething monarch beside me, who is heaving more smoke than the bonfire I attended back in Rax the night Bronwen sent me on my wild-goose—pardon—crow chase.

“Why didn’t your bargain prick my skin?”

“Because I’m not a Faerie?”

“Crows and Shabbins are capable of bargaining,” he says. “Any magical being is.”

Huh. Well, that answers one of my many, many questions. “Then it’s because my magic is bound. But you’ve my word.”