Page 26 of Broken Veil
Carys looked at Duncan, who shook his head.
Not leaving.The message was clear.
“The rest of your party may stay if they like.” Dru looked to his right, where the unicorn with silver hair was standingat attention. “Setare, tell the kitchens to ready a meal for my guests.”
Duncan huffed. “We can’t eat it, Dru.”
“I think what my Brightkin means,” Lachlan said, “is that your guests are representatives of foreign courts and must be cautious in an unfamiliar place, King Diarmuid.”
The corner of the king’s mouth turned up. “Drinks then. Some mead.”
Cadell growled. “My nêrys will eat no food and drink no mead from the fae king’s table.”
Dru wasn’t pleased. “You reject my hospitality, wyrm?”
“Decidedly yes.”
Laura spoke up. “Okay, but hear me out…”
Cadell angled his head toward Laura but kept his eyes on Dru.
“People have to eat here, right?” Laura continued. “I mean, it’s a city. You have to feed people.” She looked at Lachlan. “How does that work? Is there some diplomatic protocol we don’t know about? How do you eat and drink here without falling under a spell?”
“Setare, bring food for my table.” Dru raised his voice. “And mead.”
“Yes, my lord.” The unicorn bowed and backed out of the room.
Dru heaved a sigh, then stood, took off his blood-red crown, and set it on the throne behind him before he walked down the steps. “The chefs are unicorns. The servers are unicorns. And I pay a mountain of gold and healing herbs to have them here.” He walked up to Cadell and stared. “I don’t trust the fae in this court either—not a single one of them—but I trust the unicorns.” Dru looked at Naida directly. “So eat and drink. I offer it freely. You are under no obligation to me or any other in this city.”
Lachlan stepped forward and spread his hands. “And that’s all we needed.” He smiled. “It’s fine. We’re fine.”
Carys stuck her hand in her pocket and grabbed a handful of trail mix before she looked at Cadell. “You’re still not going to let me eat anything, are you?”
“Absolutely not.”
“The Morrígan is testingthe gates, but we will keep them secure.” Dru picked up a gold goblet and drank. “She’s powerful, but so am I, and every fae in Briton has a vested interest in keeping our gates from breaking.”
They were sitting in a small dining chamber, and unicorns with bright silver sigils on their foreheads came and went silently, serving them giant platters of fruit and bread. Steaming vegetable soups simmered in tureens, and roasted platters of vegetables wafted delicious aromas into the air.
“So the high fae have enough self-interest to keep the Morrígan at bay?” Duncan asked.
“Obviously, we don’t want human technology leaking into the Shadowlands and damaging our refuge.” Dru continued talking with Duncan. “How are things on the other side?”
“Things aren’t chaos,” Duncan said. “Not yet. A little strange, but steady so far. The biggest story in England is that massive barrow she’s raised in Salisbury.”
Dru set down his goblet. His eyes were fixed on Naida even as he spoke to the others. “Do the humans suspect anything supernatural?”
“Not yet,” Godrik said. “A few of the superstitious are making noise, but they’ve trained themselves thoroughly to not believe in magic.” The wolf looked around the chamber with obvious discomfort. “Did Cian eat here?”
“No,” Dru said. “I destroyed most of the parts of the castle that Cian lived or ate in. This was my mother’s chamber. I will rebuild the rest within a year.”
Dru’s brother Cian had hunted the wolves of Ireland to extinction. It was a genocide that still scarred Anglian and Éiran relations.
Cadell spoke silently.It is likely that Godrik is the first wolf in Éire in hundreds of years.
That’s horrible.
That is Temris.
