“He’s always believed his own magic more than he should,” Sholto said.

“Once his illusions could become real,” Rhys said.

“That was a very long time ago.”

“If the genetic tests come back negative for him, then I think his days as King of the Seelie Court are over,” Rhys said.

“If we can prove that he knew he was infertile a hundred years ago but didn’t step down from the throne, they may execute him,” Galen said, and there was a hardness in his voice that I’d never heard before.

I looked past the other men to my green knight. “You want them to kill him, don’t you?”

“Don’t you?” he asked, and his green eyes held a bleak rage that was so not like him, but truth was truth.

“Yes,” I said.

“Good,” Galen said, and that one word wasn’t good at all. The tone was very bad, very sure of its anger.

“If the ruler of court is infertile, then it condemns the entire court to be childless; no true king would stay on the throne under those circumstances,” Rhys said.

“Or queen,” Galen said.

We all looked at him.

“That’s why she agreed to step down if Merry had a child, because she’d tried all the modern fertility treatments and was still childless.”

“She had a son,” I said, softly. Holding my own child in my arms made it seem like I should add out loud that I’d killed that only son. He’d been trying to kill me and the men I loved, but I’d still killed him, and his death seemed to have driven the last of her sanity away.

“Cel was hundreds of years old, and her only child. She knew she was infertile long before,” Galen said, and again there was a hardness to him that I had never heard or seen in him. People think that becoming a parent will make you soft, more sentimental, and maybe it does for some, but for him it seemed to have helped him find a new strength. I’d wanted him stronger, but I hadn’t understood that perhaps with the extra strength, some softness might be lost, that with every gain, there might be a loss.

I studied his face, and the other men were doing the same thing. We were all looking at my gentle knight and realizing that maybe he wasn’t that anymore. There were other men in my life that I counted on to be harsh and protective; until that moment I hadn’t realized that I’d counted on Galen for softer things. My eyes felt hot, my throat tight; was I going to cry? Not about the rape and the legal mess, but about losing Galen’s softness? Or maybe I was going to cry about it all, about both, about all three, or maybe baby hormones made you more emotional, or maybe, just maybe, I would cry because Galen wouldn’t anymore.

CHAPTER

SIX

DOYLE CAME BACK in while I was still crying, which led to him asking what happened and the other men admitting they’d told me.

“The last orders I gave were for Merry not to be upset.”

“First, we are all fathers of her children,” Rhys said, “so as our captain you can order us, but as just another of Merry’s sweethearts you need to give us all room to decide the parameters of our relationship with her and our children.”

“Are you saying you deliberately went against my orders?” Doyle stalked farther into the room toward Rhys.

“I’m not stupid,” I said. “I could tell something was wrong and I demanded to know what it was.”

Doyle didn’t look back at me but continued to loom over Rhys. Galen still had Alastair in his arms as he moved toward the other men.

“Merry is our princess and crowned by Goddess as our queen; she outranks her own captain of the guard,” Galen said.

Doyle’s head turned, ever so slightly, neck and shoulders so tight it looked painful. His deep voice held anger like it was all he could do to contain it. “Are you saying that none of you will obey my orders?”

“Of course we will,” Galen said, “but Merry is supposed to lead not just us, but all our people. How can we ignore her when she demands something from us?”

Sholto got up from where he was kneeling by Bryluen. He left her in Royal’s arms. The demi-fey looked frightened and didn’t try to hide it. Sholto joined the other sidhe in the middle of the room.

“If you were the only king that Goddess and faerie had crowned for Merry, then we would obey you, Darkness, but you are one of many kings.”

Doyle turned to face the other man. “I have not forgotten that she was crowned to be queen to your king, Sholto.”

Sholto raised his arm and pushed back the sleeve just enough to show the beginnings of the tattoo that he and I shared. It had been real rose vines that night, and had pierced both our arms, entwining like the rope, or thread, that was used for a regular handfasting, but this “rope” had set thorns into our flesh and wedded our hands together more completely than any mere ceremony could have, and the marks of those vines and roses were painted on our arms.

“We were handfasted by Goddess and faerie,” Sholto said.

“And I have no such mark; you have pointed that out more than once over these months,” Doyle said.

That was news to me. Sholto was the only man to whom Goddess had personally handfasted me, but She had crowned Doyle and me as King and Queen of the Unseelie Court.

“Maybe the reason Goddess bound Merry to you was that you were the only one who is king in his own right,” Galen said.

The two men looked at him, as if he’d interrupted a longstanding disagreement. It isn’t always wise to get in the middle of two people who are fighting.

Galen smiled at them and shifted the baby in his arms, just enough to remind them the baby was there. I didn’t think the movement was accidental; Galen understood that the baby was a free pass from any violence. He was right, but I hoped he didn’t push the idea too far, because he wouldn’t be holding a baby forever, and both Sholto and Doyle had long memories.

“Merry had to become your queen; the rest of us had to become her kings.”

“Why should that matter?” Sholto said.

“Merry had to marry you to become your queen; for the rest of us, we had to father a child to become Merry’s kings, or princes. I think for the Unseelie Court, the Goddess and Consort already chose the king.”

“I gave up my crown to save Frost,” Doyle said.

“Barinthus still hasn’t forgiven you, or Merry, for that,” Galen said, with a smile.

“He is a Kingmaker, or a Queenmaker,” Sholto said. “The two of you gave up what Barinthus had worked for decades to accomplish.”

“He dreamed of putting my father on the throne, not me, and certainly not Doyle,” I said.

“True,” Sholto said.

“Very true,” Doyle said.

“I don’t believe we would all have lived to see the babies born,” Rhys said.

“Too many enemies still left in the darkling court,” Doyle agreed.

“Or perhaps the Goddess and God would have protected you,” Royal said.

We all looked at the delicate figure still tucked into the chair with a baby who might, or might not, be his daughter.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“If the Goddess and God crowned the two of you, maybe they would have worked to keep you safe on the throne?”