The Shadow Queen

personal shopping, attend the theater and concerts. This is the town where I live. If I’m not safe here, I’m not safe anywhere. If you can’t relent enough for me to informally meet the people in this one town, then my being here is nothing more than a fool’s dream. On both our parts,” she finished softly.
    Theran looked shaken—and even more wary.
    She intended to visit the town. She couldn’t spend the rest of the year confined to this estate.
    Now there was a bitterness in his face—a look that was, sadly, becoming too familiar.
    He called in an envelope and slid it across the table. “That came for you this morning.”
    She wasn’t sure she recognized the writing until she turned the envelope over and saw the SaDiablo seal pressed into the black wax. Feeling a flash of concern that the High Lord might be writing to tell her bad news about her family, she relaxed when she opened the envelope and realized what she held.
    “It’s an invitation,” she said, smiling in anticipation. As she absorbed the significance of the phrasing, a trickle of worry began to seep in. “You, Gray, and I are invited to dine at the Keep.”
    Theran clenched his hands. The muscles in his tightened jaw twitched. “Invitation.”
    “More or less.” She held out the invitation so he could read it.
    He hesitated, then took the invitation and read it. And relaxed. “It isn’t convenient to go.”
    He’s afraid, she thought. And if he’s afraid of spending an evening with those men, how will Gray react?
    Unfortunately, it wasn’t as simple as Theran seemed to think.
    “Look at the phrasing,Theran,” Cassidy said.
    He read it again, and she saw no understanding in his eyes.
    “There is only one correct response to an invitation like this when it is made by someone like the High Lord,” she said.
    He understood her then. “But . . . Gray.”
    She nodded. “That has been taken into account. Lady Angelline being the kind of Healer she is . . . Believe me, that has been taken into account.”
    “No choice, then,” Theran said.
    “None.”
    “Then going to the town and hearing some of our music would be a good idea,” Shira said, her voice sounding far more confident than the look in her eyes. “It will give you all something to talk about.”

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    CHAPTER 21
    KAELEER
    D aemon glided through the Hall’s corridors, a vessel for the cold, silent fury that held a single thought: how many of these bitches would he need to kill before the rest of them finally learned to leave him alone ?
    The silence held until he reached his suite. Then he slammed the door, letting temper and Craft enhance the sound until it thundered through the Hall, warning everyone of what they faced if anyone dared disturb him.
    Moments after that came the knock on the door between his bedroom and Jaenelle’s.
    He ignored it, so moments after that, Jaenelle opened the door just enough to stick her head in the room.
    “Are you all right?” she asked.
    “You do not want to step into this room,” he snarled, knowing his eyes were glazed and his temper was lethal.
    It didn’t matter if she wanted to enter his room or not. He didn’t want her there. Not now.
    “That doesn’t answer the question,” she said.
    She pushed the door all the way open but stayed on her side of the threshold, which infuriated him even more. Especially because she was wearing one of his white silk shirts over a pair of slim black trousers—and her feet were deliciously bare, revealing toenails painted an enticing rose color.
    The only reason she painted her toenails was that he enjoyed seeing them that way—and since she did it rarely, it never failed to catch his attention.
    She must have painted them as a “welcome home” surprise for him, which only stoked his fury. Warlord Princes were passionately violent and violently passionate. Trouble was, he was spinning between violence and passion too fast to know which emotion would dominate if anyone gave him the slightest push.
    He wanted to pounce on her. He just didn’t know which kind of pouncing he wanted to do. Which was her fault, actually, because she’d painted her damn toenails, but it was clearly Jaenelle the Healer rather than Jaenelle the Wife who was studying him.
    And because he knew why the Healer would be asking the question, he let his temper slip the leash for a moment.
    “I’m not sick, I’m not damaged, and as sure as the sun doesn’t shine in Hell, I’m not feeling fragile in any damn way,” he roared. “What I am feeling is angry . So leave.