The Shadow Queen

because if they are here, they will not survive—and they must survive a few years longer. They must.
Lia is dead. Tomorrow I will grieve. Tonight I will set in motion all the spells we created to keep the treasure safe—and the hope that is hidden with it.
Thera

    Cassidy closed the journal and started to put it back. Then she hesitated. If she left it all where it had been safely hidden for so long, would the key work a second time? Or was this part of the spell done, and this was the only opportunity to retrieve these items?
    Not willing to take that chance, she pulled all the journals out of the compartment and set them aside before she removed the last item—the trinket box.
    During all this, Vae stayed with her, not really interested or curious, but still watchful.
    Cassidy opened the trinket box and smiled as she lifted a few pieces from the jumble of jewelry.
    No expensive pieces here, no precious stones. She imagined that, during Lia’s lifetime, the pieces weren’t jumbled to deceive someone into thinking they weren’t important. Because these trinkets were important. When she went through the journals, she’d find each piece recorded. Gifts from Lia’s children. Sentimental presents from her husband. Not expensive, but priceless nonetheless.
    She spent an hour wiping the journals and trinket box clean of dust before hiding them in the bottom of a trunk of her own belongings.
    Then she put the piece of floor back in place.
    *The smells are gone,* Vae said.
    The key was embedded in the wood, and when she tried to remove it, it broke cleanly, becoming nothing more than an odd gold glint in the wood.
    She put the rest of the key in her own trinket box, then finished putting the room in order.
    Time had made its shift from late night to early morning before she finally climbed into bed withVae stretched out beside her.
    Just before she fell asleep, she realized why the servants had acted so oddly when she’d chosen these rooms over the fancy Queen’s suite.
    This must have been the suite that had belonged to Lia.

----

    CHAPTER 25
    KAELEER
    V ulchera slipped into the bedroom and looked around. The maid had turned down the bedcovers and plumped the pillows. Everything was ready for the Warlord when he bade the other guests good night and came up here to his chaste bed.
    Damn Sadi for his lack of discretion. Why in the name of Hell did he have to explode like that? She hadn’t been aiming for him at that house party. Not initially. But when he wouldn’t even flirt with her, when he looked at her with those cold yellow eyes like she was some kind of scabby street whore, when every remark he did make to her had been blandly worded but so heavily laced with contempt everyone knew he wouldn’t consider soiling himself by being with her . . .
    Well, she had her pride, didn’t she? She’d wanted only to give him a twinge of discomfort, a little payback because the other men who had been present at Rhea’s country house had taken a good measure of Sadi’s feelings and avoided her.
    She’d wanted only to make him uneasy. She certainly hadn’t intended to do anything that would upset Jaenelle Angelline. Anyone who had heard about what Sadi had done to Lady Lektra last spring knew better than to aim anything , even a barbed comment, at Sadi’s wife.
    But he had exploded when he found her in his room, had heaped his rage on Rhea’s head to the point where the Province Queen had “suggested” she leave their little house party—and had made it clear there would never be another invitation.
    They had been friends, and she’d truly liked Rhea. Besides, having a Province Queen as a friend had put her in contact with the kind of men who could be most useful, and it had provided her with some clout she wouldn’t have had otherwise when she’d asked for favors from those men, even if Rhea hadn’t been aware of providing that clout. Now it was all spoiled because she had miscalculated the depth of Sadi’s rage.
    None of that mattered now. Rhea still wanted to believe that she had intended to meet a lover who was an available male and had gotten the rooms mixed up. But they both knew Rhea’s court was going to break under the weight of Sadi’s temper, and that the friendship was just the first thing to break because of her mistake.
    It wasn’t prudent to play this game again so soon, especially at this particular friend’s house. His wife didn’t like her. He didn’t like her, but he was an aristo Warlord who had wanted a bit of