The Shadow Queen

not the Green. His strength wasn’t needed, and if he added it now, it would feel like a lie.
    “You can drop your shield now, Lady,” Ranon said.
    The Rose shields behind Cassidy vanished. Shira rushed over to the girl, who was still wailing.
    “Let me have a look.” Shira pulled the girl’s hands away from her face. “I’m a Healer. I’m going to help—”
    “Shira?” Cassidy said.
    “Hell’s fire,” Shira said. Then she looked at the girl’s mother. “Give me a hand. Come on, darling. Come back here with us.” She hustled the girl to the back of the family’s space, where they had a canopy for shade and a small table and chairs.
    “Shira? ” Cassidy said.
    “Let me work!”
    It’s bad, Theran thought, remembering other Healers who had that particular tone in their voices.
    “That Healer should be looking after my arm, not some slut’s face,” the older Warlord said.
    “If he’s the one who threw the stone, I’ll be happy to take care of his arm,” Shira said. “And I promise there won’t be much left of it when I get done.”
    All the men, even Ranon, looked startled by the words. Cassidy just nodded.
    “Well,” the older Warlord said,“I guess it’s done. We’ll be on our way.”
    “It isn’t done,” Cassidy said. “Everything has a price, and your little bit of sport is going to cost you.”
    “Now, look here . . . ,” the Warlord began, taking a step toward Cassidy.
    Blades were raised in warning. Cassidy and Vae bared their teeth and snarled.
    “What is the Queen’s will?” Theran asked.
    Cassidy walked over to the loom and stared for too long before she turned back to the men.
    “The weaving is ruined,” she said. “From the smell of it, there’s horse manure along with some other muck. Since the streets are dry, the only way to make this kind of shit soup is by making it somewhere else and bringing it here.”
    A quick glance at the youngsters’ faces confirmed it.
    “So that ruined piece of weaving will cost you one hundred gold marks,” Cassidy said, her eyes filled with a wild fury as she stared at the older Warlord.
    “What?” the Warlord yelled. “For that piece of—”
    Vae snarled, and the sound rumbled through the whole street.
    “One hundred gold marks as compensation for the lost work and as a penalty for not teaching your boys some manners. As for them . . .” Cassidy’s eyes focused on the two younger Warlords. “Ten days’ labor, without using Craft, or ten lashes.”
    “I’ll handle the whip if it comes to that,” Ranon said. “And I’ll strip flesh from bone.”
    “Shalador bastard,” the Warlord growled.
    “Since you understand the Shalador temper so well,” Cassidy said, “ your little bastards will work under Prince Ranon’s supervision.”
    “Don’t you insult my boys.”
    “Ten days or ten lashes,” Cassidy snapped. “Choose.”
    “It’s not right, making my boys work like landens,” the Warlord protested.
    “It will help them appreciate what someone without Craft has to do in order to accomplish a task. Choose. ”
    “You’ve got no right!” the Warlord shouted.
    Something in the air. Something delicate being weighed down by words. Bending, bending. Almost breaking. If it broke . . .
    Theran stepped closer to Cassidy. “She is the Queen of Dena Nehele. Her will is the law. You’ve been given a choice, Warlords, and the Queen’s First Circle stands witness.” And may the Darkness help me, I stand witness.
    The feeling in the air was gone, as if a question had been answered.
    “Ten days’ labor,” the Warlord said. “And I’ll bring the gold marks when—”
    “No,” Cassidy said. “The three of you are forbidden to set foot in the landen section of this town. You come here again, you’ll be exiled from Dena Nehele.”
    The guards gasped. Even the Warlord Princes who supported her looked stunned.
    “You will report to the Steward of the court and give the payment to him,” Cassidy said.
    “Can’t come up with that much all at once,” the Warlord said.
    “Then you’ll work out a payment arrangement with the Steward—and if you don’t show up with the payment, the First Circle will be showing up on your doorstep to find out why. And they can take the payment however they see fit.”
    *Mother Night, Cassidy,* Theran said. *You’ve just told him the Warlord Princes can rip him apart without penalty.*
    She looked at him with eyes still filled with fury.
    He didn’t know this woman. Didn’t know this Queen.
    But he knew with cold certainty that he was seeing the Old Ways of the Blood, and that under the same