Page 42 of Of Brides Of Queens

Raise

Bring

Take

There seemed an importance to that order, but I could hardly make the recipe with all the ingredients and none of the method.

I glimpsed the first signs of daylight in the dawn sky. “Thank you for enlightening me, my pawns. Good morning to you all.”

Gangrel’s call halted me. “Do you not wish to know of Princess Take? You have asked about the other princesses.”

I schooled away the wrinkle of my nose, then turned back to lean over the balustrade again. “But of course, Gangrel. Tell me, what is Princess Take like? I assume she married last.”

Memory upon memory of her body intertwined with King See’s rose in my mind’s eye. The memories had not haunted me so powerfully before, and I should applaud King Bring’s wisdom in showing me them. He had a greater knowledge of how things might chip at a person over time, particularly when my rise to queendom had altered See so much. See had opted to “know himself better” rather than tutor a queen he had once wanted for princess. And did our previous deal still stand? The one where we would not take pleasure from other monsters? He still had not written, and not visited either.

“Princess Take is everything in a drop of rain,” Gangrel answered. “She is a beam of moonlight and all shades of black in a ghastly shadow.”

My fanged pawns thought highly of her beauty and monsterdom. That only served to sour my mood, as by now, Princess Take was the most ancient of female monsters—who had enjoyed many centuries of physical intimacies withtwokings, and also seemed most free and respected of all princesses. Envy was a green, green monster tonight. “She is very beautiful. I have seen something of her. And does she shirk her king’s purpose like Princess Raise?”

They almost fell over each other to reply.

Vassal gasped, “No, Lady Queen, never! She is as married to his purpose as could be. She understands him entirely.”

I tilted my head. “I had heard that Take prefers her flesh, but there was no companionship to their union.”

Vassal smiled. “I said that she understands him best of all, did I not? My liege values such emptiness. How else would those in his fifth be so filled with his whims and amusements and annoyances?”

I had seen and felt this power of King Take’s. A union of the mere flesh seemed very like the cold transactional agreement between King See and me. What a lonely immortality—and apparently a purposely empty one—though at first glance King Take did not seem lonely at all. I supposed that he wasn’t the one emptying himself in an emotional and spiritual sense.

“Is Princess Take fulfilled by their union?” I asked.

Sanguine’s clear voice harbored no uncertainty. “Yes, Lady Queen. She is fulfilled.”

And what of her daylight visits to King See?Had they resumed?

I desperately wished to ask. I believed from watching her interactions with See that the princess was a lively and creative bed partner. Engaging in these activities with See was no hardship on her behalf. He aspired to claim me, but I could not trust his methods in madness.

My mood soured further, and the balustrade cracked under my hands.

“Princess Take visited King See yesterday at dawn,” Gangrel blurted.

I froze in a way that I could not mask from fifteen pawns.

My heart stuttered and coughed, and pain snaked outward from it. Fear had whispered such jealousies in my head, but I had not truly believed See would do such a thing.

Envy seized my vocal chords at last. “For how long did she remain?”

“We know not, Lady Queen.” Vassal bowed. “Our liege did not say.”

My voice was tight. “Did your liege bid you to tell me this?”

Sanguine’s skin wrinkled even more than usual as he frowned. “Yes, but I had decided against doing so, only to then fear you learning the truth from another. So though I have obeyed his order, I have not done so in malice.”

That mollified my feelings greatly, for the actions of the taking princes were those of care.

“I thank you for thinking of my feelings, Gangrel. You were right in connecting that I would wish to know of this from my pawns first.”

Three other princes had nothing to say at all.

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