Maybe that was what Lucifer had intended all along. Maybe he had intended that the negotiations fail. If I was killed, then he could openly make a move for Amarantha’s kingdom. At the very least he’d probably considered it as a potential outcome that benefited him. Lucifer, I was discovering, thought about things differently than everyone else. He comprehended dimensions, options and outcomes I would never have even considered.
Amarantha narrowed her eyes at me. The whole room seemed to take a breath and hold it. Then she did something surprising. She stepped back.
“Perhaps this conversation is best continued in my private receiving room.”
I stepped back, too, about a centimeter. Just to show that I could compromise. “An excellent idea.”
I was keen to get away from the audience. Amarantha would likely be more reasonable away from the staring eyes of her courtiers.
She gestured imperiously to Violet, who quickly came forward to lead the way. There was a door just to the left of the throne and we all filed in behind Violet. I didn’t look at J.B. or Nathaniel. I didn’t want to see the disapproval that was definitely on Nathaniel’s face, and probably on J.B.’s. We’d only been here a half an hour and I’d already managed to bring the negotiations to the brink of total collapse.
Just before entering the receiving room, I noticed five individuals who stood out among the staring crowd. They were all male, dressed in leather, flannel and denim instead of silks and jewels. As we entered the receiving room, Tyrone Wade winked at me. Jude and James both gave me hostile stares. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I definitely did not want to run into either of them in the hallway in the middle of the night.
So the wolves were here, too. I wondered if they had discovered who had slaughtered their pack mates. It seemed like a million years ago since I’d fallen out of the sky and discovered the body of the first wolf.
The receiving room was just as plush as I’d expected, with red velvet pillows scattered everywhere and a profusion of gleaming wood. As soon as the door closed behind J.B., Amarantha turned on me.
“Tell me what happened.”
I bristled a little at her peremptory tone but decided it was best to just give her what she wanted. The sooner this was resolved, the sooner we could get on with the negotiations and the sooner I could go home. I still had Gabriel burning in the back of my mind, and I needed to figure out what to do about Focalor and Samiel.
As succinctly as I could, I summarized Beezle’s kidnap, the hidden portal, our accidental arrival in the outlands, the abandonment of her warriors and my reasons for burning the leviathan and the spider. Amarantha listened with an impassive face. I did not attempt to apologize or make excuses. I simply presented the events as they had happened and waited. She would either accept it or not.
Long minutes passed. I was amazed at Beezle’s restraint. He did not make a single smart comment.
“Very well,” Amarantha said. “I will verify the presence of this mysterious portal, and have the warriors questioned more closely.”
The look in her eye was a little bloodthirsty as she said this, and I thought that the questioning would probably involve pain for the warriors.
She continued. “I accept that wrong has been done to you when they abandoned you in the woods, and in the course of the kidnapping of your gargoyle. I also accept that any offense, if given, has been accidental. However, the fact remains that restitution is owed for the loss of my creatures and my forest.”
“What kind of restitution?” I asked warily. I wasn’t keen on using Azazel’s money, but if Amarantha wanted repayment, I would definitely be sending the bill to Daddy dearest.
She looked at me, and again I could see the careful crafting going on behind her green eyes.
“I wish for you and your party to stay in my court for three days,” she said.
Three days?
I thought. How would I ever find Gabriel and prevent a demon uprising if I was trapped in Amarantha’s court for three days? Plus, I wasn’t sure I had enough food to last that long, and I wasn’t about to be tricked into drinking or eating anything from Amarantha’s kitchen.
“May I ask why you would like us to stay an extra three days?” I asked.
“Perhaps I am interested in you, Ambassador Black,” Amarantha said, and showed her teeth. “Perhaps I simply wish to enjoy the company of my son, whom I see so rarely.”
As she said this, I realized that this was the first time she’d acknowledged J.B. since we had entered her court. Not exactly a paragon of motherly love, our Amarantha.
I would have liked to have had a quick consult with Beezle to be sure I wasn’t missing anything important—and I was sure that I was. There was no way Amarantha would make such a proposal unless it benefited her first and foremost.
Three days was a long time for me to try to avoid putting my foot in the trap I was sure she as setting for me. On the other hand, I was unlikely to be presented with another form of repayment that would be as relatively easy and cheap as this one.
“Very well,” I said. “We will remain in court for three days.”
“I could not be more pleased,” Amarantha said.
I wished I could say the same.
Amarantha dismissed us shortly after that, saying there was no point in rushing to negotiate, now that our stay had been extended. I hoped she wasn’t going to keep giving me the brush-off until it was time to leave. I didn’t want to have to rememorize Lucifer’s stupid speech every morning.
We were shown to our rooms by more of the silently appearing servants. J.B.’s rooms were in the royal wing, of course, and he left us at the junction of the stairs to go right while we went left. He gave me a little wave but his face was troubled. I wondered if he knew, or suspected, what his mother was up to.
The room was decorated like something from
Amadeus
, of course—frilly and velvety and not very comfortable looking. Beezle stuck out his tongue in distaste while the servant plumped up the pillows and drew down the covers on the bed.
To my chagrin, I discovered that there was a connecting door between my room and Nathaniel’s. I made a mental note to put a heavy chair in front of that door.
As soon as the servants were dismissed, Beezle began a flying circuit of the room.
“Looking for bugs?” I asked, putting my clothes away in a closet the size of my entire bedroom at home.
My off-the-rack suits looked sad and wrinkled in such palatial splendor. Even the closets in Amarantha’s castle were designed to intimidate.
“Looking for ways to get in,” Beezle said. “I know there’s a door here somewhere.”
After a few moments he stopped and hovered in front of a rather ugly carving of a cherub. The cherub had creepy, staring blue eyes. I’d have to put a sweatshirt over that thing or I would never be able to sleep.
“Here,” he said, and pointed to the minute crack in the wall, slender as a fishing line. I would never have found it without him to point it out to me.
“Impressive,” I said, and he nodded at the acknowledgment of his superiority. “Now, how to open it?”
“It’s probably got something to do with this ugly-ass statue,” he said. “Don’t you ever pay attention when we watch old horror movies?”
“I may have missed a few things while running back and forth to the kitchen for snacks,” I replied dryly.
I put my hand on the cherub and felt carefully around for a button or a lever, anything that might trigger the door to open. When I ran my fingers under the cherub’s wing, I found a tiny switch and pushed it. The door swung into a hidden corridor.
“Whaddya think?” I asked Beezle, indicating the corridor.
“It’s probably not the smartest idea in the world,” he said, putting one claw to his mouth like he was considering the situation. “It might be a breach of protocol to go wandering around the castle uninvited.”
“It might also be a breach of protocol to install me in a room where we can be spied upon,” I said. “I’m sure Amarantha carefully considered which guest room to put us in.”
Beezle clapped his hands together. “An offense for an offense—just the stuff successful negotiations are made of. Let’s go. If you could talk your way out of the last mess, I’m sure you can talk your way out of this one.”
I didn’t need any further encouragement. My curiosity overrode propriety. I wanted to know where the tunnels went. We walked into the surprisingly well-lit corridor. Lamps burned every few feet, and the stone floors were sparkling clean. There wasn’t a cobweb in sight. This was not the haunted passage of those old movies that Beezle loved.
Before I swung the door closed I realized we should have some way of knowing which door was mine, and also how to reopen the door from the corridor.
“Beezle, run and grab my lipstick from my makeup bag,” I said.
“You mean the lipstick that you spent twenty-five dollars on and never use?” Beezle asked.
“Just get it and keep your comments to yourself,” I said.
I examined the exterior of the door while Beezle flew back in the room on his errand. There was a small lever at doorknob height, built flat into the door. There was just enough room under the lever to slide my fingers and pull it out. As I did, I heard a click. Easy-peasy.
Beezle flew back to me and wordlessly handed the lipstick out. I closed the door and then drew a line just above the lever with my lipstick. Hopefully it was small enough to go unseen by anyone walking this way. No matter what I told Beezle, I really didn’t think Amarantha would tolerate another offense from me so soon after the last one.
The corridor stretched out in both directions with no defining features or useful signs, like “Watchtower this way” or “Ballroom on the next level.” I’d tried to pay attention to where we were taken but the castle had such a profusion of floors and twisting stairs that maintaining any sense of north-south orientation had been impossible.
With no clues to go on, I decided to go right. I remembered vaguely something that I’d read in a historical novel once. The characters had been attempting to negotiate a maze, and one character had said that if you always turned right when possible, you would reach the heart of the maze.
I didn’t know if turning right continuously would take me to the heart of the castle, but at least it would make getting back easier. I would just turn left until I found my corridor again.
We’d only gone a few feet when I heard Nathaniel’s voice. I stopped for a moment and looked guiltily around before I realized the voice was coming from his room. I crept closer, pressing my ear to the wall. Beezle gave me the big what-the-heck-are-you-doing eyes. I waved him away.
“Yes, of course. This delay won’t change anything. No, Lord Azazel is not aware of any of this. He has no inkling.”
Interesting. So Nathaniel was sneaking around Azazel’s back. But what was he up to?
“Do you take me for an idiot? I can handle her,” Nathaniel said angrily. “I said, I can handle her.”
Her? Who was he talking about? Me? Amarantha? Or some other player in whatever scheme he was involved in?
“I will speak to you tomorrow,” he said firmly. I heard the push-button tone as he clicked off his cell phone.
I waited a few minutes longer but he didn’t make any more illicit phone calls and I heard nothing more interesting than the shifting of mattress springs. I yielded to Beezle’s insistent gesturing and continued down the corridor. We turned right when we reached the end and only then did we feel it was safe to talk in whispers.
“What in the four hells did you do that for?” Beezle asked. “How do you know Nathaniel doesn’t know about the secret doors? You could have been caught.”
“I’d be surprised if Nathaniel knows about the doors. He doesn’t strike me as observant generally.”
“He doesn’t strike me as the sort to sneak around on Azazel, either,” Beezle retorted. “I didn’t think he had the stones.”
“I know. He always seems like the world’s biggest kiss-ass.”
We walked along for a while, turning right when the opportunity presented itself and going down stairs when we found them.
We heard nothing more exciting that the gossip of servants, which seemed to be everywhere. It made sense, I guess, that a castle of this size would need a lot of people to run it.
Amarantha seemed universally revered, which was surprising. Most monarchs would have managed to sow at least some discontent in a one-thousand-plus-year reign. Lady Violet, on the other hand, was despised by pretty much everyone. She “acted above her station,” made unnecessary demands and in general behaved as though she were the queen of the castle, not Amarantha.
I managed to avoid detection by the servants by putting out my wings whenever I heard footsteps approaching. Beezle would hover up near the ceiling out of sight.
My wings were far too large and unwieldy to leave out, though, even folded on my back. A couple of times I’d had to hold my breath as I pressed up against the wall while a faerie passed by. I ran my finger inside the rather snug waistband of my skirt. Maybe Beezle was right. Maybe I did need to take up jogging or something.