Fate's Edge

marrying him.” Maybe if she grabbed the dark-haired woman and shook her, she’d get her point across. “He’s insane.”
    “Wait until Memaw hears of this. She will have an aneurysm from the shock.”
    “I’m not marrying Kaldar!”
    “Shhh! This dampener only works on quiet voices. How long have you known him?”
    “Nine days.”
    “Have you slept with him?”
    “No!” What kind of a question was that?
    The woman slapped her hand to her face. “Oh Gods. He is going to marry you.”
    “Are all of your family insane?” Audrey told her. “Or just the two of you?”
    The woman sighed. “My name is Cerise.”
    Cerise, Kaldar’s cousin, Cerise? The cut-a-steel-beam-like-butter Cerise? The Cerise with the husband who was a changeling like Jack? What was his name . . .
    “Call me Candra, Lady of In,” Cerise said. “And here comes my husband.”
    The dark-haired man with the predatory stare walked through the doors. His eyes flared with the same lethal fire she had seen in Jack’s irises just before he had lost his mind in the church.
    Audrey took a step back.
    The man closed the distance between them. His face was terrible with fury. He looked like he was about to lose it.
    “I know, darling,” Cerise said. “I know. I’m sure he has a reason for bringing the children into this.”
    “No, he doesn’t,” the man growled.
    William! That was his name.
    “He usually—”
    “No. I don’t care. I’ll kill him, and we can write his excuse on his tombstone.”
    “You can’t,” Cerise said. “He’s getting married.”
    The man turned to Audrey. “To you? You don’t look stupid . . .”
    “I’m not marrying him,” she said.
    “See?” William turned to Cerise. “She doesn’t care.”
    “I care,” Cerise said. “This isn’t the time or the place for this. For now we’re going to be civil. This is . . . What’s your name?”
    “Audrey.”
    “Nice to meet you, Audrey. For now, Audrey will be Lisetta, and she is my friend. She was sick when we disembarked. We don’t know Kaldar, and we don’t know the boys.”
    William growled.
    “Your eyes are on fire.” Cerise swiped the flower dampener off the rail. It snapped shut.
    William pulled a small box out of his pocket and put contact lenses into his eyes. “This changes nothing. Come nightfall, I’ll have his guts.”
    “If we live that long.” Cerise smiled and put one hand on his elbow. “Please, William. For me?”
    William’s face softened. He took Cerise’s hand and kissed her fingers. He looked at Cerise as if the entire world didn’t exist. That look set off a gnawing ache inside Audrey, an ache that she realized was envy.
    Cerise smiled at him and put her other hand on Audrey’s forearm. “And we’re on.”
    They headed back to the doors.
    “Are you familiar with the Weird at all?” Cerise asked.
    “Not enough.”
    “That’s all right,” Cerise said. “Just stay close to us. If we get in trouble, we’ll kill everything.”
    Somehow, Audrey didn’t find that reassuring.

    THE children were natural and relaxed. They chatted with the younger men, George being polite, Jack dropping a laconic “yes” or “no” here and there with that arrogantly bored expression.
    He had been incredibly lucky, Kaldar realized. After kicking him in the gut, Fortune had finally presented him with a gift. And in the nick of time, too. Getting into this gathering without the boys would’ve been very difficult, if not impossible.
    The ornate double doors swung open, and Morell de Braose entered, shadowed by the butler. Gnome’s photograph didn’t lie. The man was trim, with a cultivated tan and a body honed by constant targeted exercise, and he wore a Weird doublet, a deceptively streamlined but elaborate affair of pale blue, as if he were born to it. A precise blond beard framed his jaw. He walked in with a wide smile, a tiger who was everyone’s best friend. Until he got hungry, that is.
    “My lords, my ladies. Welcome! Welcome to my humble abode. I and my staff are at your service. They tell me there are refreshments in the other room. Personally, I think we should take advantage of this beneficial fact before they disappear.”
    A few polite laughs fluttered through the gathering, and people began to move through the doors. Morell nodded and smiled as they passed. Kaldar drifted closer, and Morell’s gaze fixed on him. “Master Brossard. A moment?”
    “Of course.”
    Kaldar lingered.
    George glanced in his