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TITLE: To Serve A Queen - Part Fourteen
SUMMARY: Elizabeth wished she could have accepted him, too. She wished a lot of things.
PAIRING: Liz/Ronan
RATING: R
NOTES: Happy Thanksgiving to those who celebrate it. Happy UnThanksgiving to those who don't! A longish chapter for your delectation.
To Serve A Queen - Part Fourteen
By the time Stephen brought the Gennii males before her, Elizabeth was deep in the throes of cold rage. It trembled through her like desire or hatred, an icy veil that had no mercy for anything that caught her attention.
This was far, far worse than an accusation of rape.
The Gennii had broken Aiden's inner web - the inner self of the Blood, which defined his capacity for Craft - rendering him unable to do anything more than basic Craft. He'd never wear Jewels again, never know the strength of the Darkness flowing through his consciousness.
They'd broken Aiden.
Facing the horror of what had been done to him was too much for her right now. She channelled all of it into rage.
She'd asked Rodney to weave a sleep-spell about Aiden, to keep him resting a little longer. Rodney did so without any of his usual protests, and the light in his eyes when he looked up was dangerous. Perhaps not in the way that John might be considered dangerous, but dangerous nevertheless.
Once again, she'd sent Ronan to keep an eye on John and Stephen, and silently apologised for her actions. It wasn't fair to ask him to serve like this - but she didn't want the Gennii males dead.
Not yet, anyway.
There was little question that the Gennii were responsible for Teyla's beating and Aiden's breaking. Tyrus' anger had been excessive, even for a protective father.
His arrogance now was insulting and only fuelled her rage deeper. He walked into her audience room, followed by the escort from Gennii Territory, and glared at her in her chair. "What is the meaning of this?"
No honourific, no shame - nothing to indicate that he felt even the slightest bit of remorse for what had happened here tonight.
"You forget who you're talking to," John said with vicious softness.
Elizabeth waved a hand and he fell silent.
The males of her court were both angry and afraid. They'd seen Elizabeth in temper before, but this was new. Right now, her fury was so far beyond mere anger that a core part of her watched from within and trembled at the storm that was building in her soul.
The males of Gennii Territory ranged from fearful to unabashed. She noted which of the warriors met her gaze, brazen in their defiance, and which refused to meet her eye. She also noted which of the males had moved with extra care, avoiding the wounds Teyla had inflicted on them.
Elizabeth smiled grimly to herself. For whatever reason, they hadn't expected a physical fight from the Black Widow, and she'd given them one.
"Two members of my court are injured, one beyond repair," she said. Her words were measured and cold, and she saw several of the Gennii males shiver. "I hope your revenge was worth the friendship between Atlantis and Gennii Territories, Lord Tyrus."
Tyrus' lip curled. "I took action for the honour of my daughter."
"Your 'honour' has left a male of my court broken," Elizabeth said with icy precision. "And grievously injured another member of my court."
"The Black Widow bitch?" One of the men sneered, then jerked back when he found himself with a bladed stick digging gently into his throat. Then he gasped as he realised he couldn't move any further back - and that the blade was gently slicing open the skin of his throat.
"Be careful what you say," John said with a cold calm. "My Queen doesn't want you dead, but I do."
"And you're going to countenance this?" Tyrus glared at Elizabeth.
John was at the killing edge. Only Elizabeth could stop him now - and even that would have to be done with extreme care. She was only half shocked to find that, at this moment, she truly didn't care if John slit the man's throat from ear to ear.
It was the voice in her mind warning caution that held her back from telling John to do it.
We can't afford a war.
As it was, Aiden would never wear Jewels again.
"You countenanced the breaking of a Purple-Dusk Warlord of my court," she said, and knew that the males shuddered at the ice in her voice. "You countenanced the attack on a witch of my First Circle. Tell me why I shouldn't countenance this?"
Tyrus' lip curled, even in his fear of her anger. "You've spent nearly fifteen years waiting for my daughter to reach her adult status, Lady. Fifteen years investing against the day you would deal with a Queen instead of the male council." There was mockery in his eyes. "You're not going to throw that away - even for a male of your court."
He was right in some ways and so wrong in others.
She narrowed her eyes. "I never said I was going to throw it away. A Queen has a right to demand a price for the breaking of anyone who serves in her court."
Even Tyrus felt the whiplash of her words - and the threat of what she might demand.
"That price should then be negotiated with my daughter!" Whatever else could be said of Tyrus, he wasn't a coward. He'd admitted to what he'd done in a room full of volatile men, and never flinched to say it.
She wanted to see the man dead. She wouldn't. Not this way, not yet.
*John,* she said.
*They broke Ford,* John said, tightly, not turning his head away from the man whose throat seeped a soft trickle of blood. If he added any pressure at all, the trickle would become a tide of scarlet. *And they would have raped Teyla to try to break her. You know that, don't you?*
Elizabeth shuddered to think of it. Teyla's history with sex was painful enough as it was. *Yes,* she said grimly. *I know. But the price must be agreed between Sora and I.*
The hand on the bladed stick trembled. *And if she won't accept the responsibility?*
*Then the price will be paid in other ways,* she told him as she rose from her chair and went over to him. Her fingers touched his forearm, not pulling back on his arm, just resting on his skin.
It was enough. He vanished the bladed stick and turned, breaking away from her. She didn't follow him, he needed his space.
"I won't forget this, Prince," Tyrus snarled.
Elizabeth was still close enough to see the implacable hatred in John's eyes as he swung around. "Neither will I."
Her own rage had hardly abated, but she waited until John had stalked away before she spoke again.
"You will be escorted back to your rooms," she told the Gennii males, looking along the row. "You won't be allowed to leave them until Lady Sora has returned from making the Offering." She held Tyrus' gaze the longest. "And you'd better pray to the Darkness that Lady Teyla is better by morning."
She watched them go, followed by most of the Second and Third Circle guards. Marc Lorne's lift of the eyebrow asked if she wanted him to keep an eye on John, she shook her head. Stephen would be up to the task of keeping John contained tonight - not that it should be too difficult. John would be found in Teyla's sickroom, waiting for the best or worst news. The Master of her Guard knew how to handle John in a temper - he'd had years of experience at it after all.
"What does Kate say about Teyla's state of body?" She directed the question at Carson. He had an interest in medicines, brews, and the healing Craft - not a Healer, of course: males couldn't be Healers - but very capable at what he did know.
"The healing web was doing its job when I left," Carson said with quiet authority. "Kate would have sent for us if anything happened since." He looked at John. "Kate would like your presence in the sickroom, if you've the time."
John glanced at her first, and she nodded. "Go," she said, then turned to Stephen. "Prince Caldwell, go with him. Run a security check around Lady Teyla's sickroom, please, and report back."
It would give Stephen a valid reason to keep an eye on John. And, right now, she needed someone to watch over her First Escort. Anger and grief did terrible things to a man.
The door closed behind them, leaving her with Rodney, Carson and Ronan.
She hadn't even realised Ronan had remained behind, her fury focused on the Gennii males. Then again, he'd been very subtly ubiquitous tonight, first in Teyla's rooms, then helping Rodney. He'd sensibly kept away from Stephen as the Master of the Guard rounded up the Gennii for the audience, but had somehow managed to be in the audience room when the Gennii were brought in.
Carson was speaking, drawing her attention away from the man who'd turned to stare out the window of the audience room.
"I didn't want to say this before Sheppard, but Teyla nearly drained the Grey trying to keep them at bay," Carson said. "Kate says it's possible she was drugged. It would explain why she didn't call for help."
"And why she didn't just shatter them with the Grey," said Rodney.
"She still managed to hold them off," Elizabeth murmured.
"Only just," Rodney muttered. "She's okay now?"
"Once the drug's worn off, and the healing webs are finished, she'll be fine," said Carson. "Tired and drained, but she'll live." The Steward looked weary and wry. "Things might be a bit snappish for a while, though."
Rodney snorted. "A bit? Carson, we've got an injured Black Widow who has never given in gracefully when the First Circle males wanted to fuss. Then we have a Warlord Prince who's caught between the fear that he's going to lose her and anger that she endangered herself. The only way you're going to miss the fights is to move off the estate."
In spite of herself, Elizabeth smiled. "I don't think that Teyla will argue too much against John's right to fuss," she said. Although she quite understood where her friend was coming from: John could be an overbearing prick when he got too protective.
Her amusement was cut short when Carson sobered. "And Ford?"
She looked at Rodney, who shrugged. "He'll sleep until midmorning. I can't do more than that."
"It wouldn't be worth it, anyway," Carson said. "At some stage, his subconscious mind will realise what's been done to him and he'll try to wake up. By then, keeping him asleep would be cruelty. He'll have to face what was done to him sooner or later."
Rodney looked grim - an odd expression on his face. "At least he's alive." Coming from the pessimistic Green-Jewelled Prince, the words had a certain irony to them.
"For whatever kind of a life is left to him," Elizabeth murmured.
"Broken males can still serve," said Carson. "He might no longer wear the Jewels, but he's still a Blood male and a Warlord - and an asset to this court. If you want to keep him--"
"If I want to keep him?" She caught herself before she lashed out in anger. Carson wasn't criticising her; he was offering her options, she knew that, but after what had been done to Aiden, her instincts were still angry. "I would never send him away, Carson! His loyalty is not in question. But he may not want to live with the reminder of what he was - and what he no longer is."
"Well, there's no telling what he might still be," Carson said. "I'm just pointing out that his Jewels were only one aspect of him."
Elizabeth nodded. "And I recognise that." She took a deep breath. "Go to bed," she told him. "You, too, Rodney. No spells, no brews, no books - go directly to bed."
"Do not pass the Landing Web, do not collect a hundred gold marks?" Rodney asked with dry whimsy.
She rolled her eyes and watched them leave.
They closed the door behind them, and she thanked the Darkness for males who sometimes knew her better than she knew herself. She and Ronan Dex had things to say to each other here, now that he'd seen what the Gennii were capable of: what he'd thought he might be able to serve alongside.
"I'm sorry." The words slipped from her lips, useless in the end. Regret was no help at all.
"You had nothing to do with them." His voice was deep and quiet, and she shivered at the delicate thread of anger in it. Not at her - she could sense that so clearly - but at the Gennii, at Sora - at himself. "Don't be."
There was nothing she could say to that. She could only watch the angled profile of him as he stared out the window towards the torch-lit darkness of the central courtyard. She didn't know why she'd allowed him to remain behind. It wasn't to prove a point to him - that the Gennii males were untrustworthy - it was just that she'd never thought to exclude him.
And the other people in her court seemed to accept his presence as a matter of course. Kate had asked him for blood to start the healing web for Teyla. Stephen had set him to watch over her when it looked like John wasn't able to think past Teyla's bloody body. And not one of the warriors had batted an eyelash when he walked into the room a step behind Carson and Rodney.
They'd accepted him.
Elizabeth wished she could have accepted him, too. She wished a lot of things.
He was a Warlord Prince looking for service. She was a Queen responding to an attractive man. It would be so simple to mesh the two things into one: he would gain service and she would gain a lover.
It would have been much simpler if she hadn't bought him from the Belkans.
In Belka, Ronan Dex had been a slave - a pleasure slave whose existence was merely to act as a pretty plaything for the witches in the Territory. Now that he was free, he needed something more - a service in which he could take pride and find pleasure.
To take him to bed would only reinforce what he'd become in Belka. Elizabeth wouldn't do that to him.
She sighed. So many could-haves, would-haves, should-haves, but none of them helpful. And everything was complicated by the Gennii's presence and the repercussions of Sora's Virgin Night.
Maybe she just wanted to believe in the girl's better nature. After all, as Tyrus had pointed out, she'd invested over fifteen years into Sora of the Gennii, waiting for the day when a strong young Queen might take back her Territory from the male council. It had always been a waiting game, the balance of her hope against the council's control of Sora, and she still didn't know how the scales would weigh out in the end.
Elizabeth supposed they'd find out at dawn.
Standing, she stretched her arms and body, wishing that she'd been able to wear more comfortable clothing than this dress. But the audience with the Gennii had been formal, so she'd worn formal apparel.
As she lowered her arms, she caught Ronan watching her, carefully inscrutable. "What?"
He looked away. "Nothing, Lady."
She paused. Her nerves were too tightly strung to endure sleep right now. And she had here a man who, if no longer a pleasure slave, at least knew the duties of a Consort...
"How are you at playing chess?"
He turned, disbelief plain in his expression. "Now?"
"Were you going to sleep?"
One corner of the mouth quirked. "No."
"Then would you care to play a game?" Elizabeth wanted something to take her mind off what had happened tonight, something to occupy her mind so she didn't spend all night running through outcome permutations. A game of chess would do that.
A game of chess with Ronan Dex would definitely do that.
He took a few seconds to answer. "I'm not very good at it."
"Neither am I," she said.
Beneath the short beard, his mouth curved slightly. "Then I would be pleased to play a game against you."
She had a sitting room made ready and went to change out of her gown. The trousers and knit sweater into which she changed were plain and comfortable - hardly the attire of a woman trying to seduce a Warlord Prince. Elizabeth wanted no room left for doubt: this was something to while away the hours, nothing to do with sex or attraction.
It was why she left the doors wide open when she reached the sitting room. The slight smiles of the servants were what decided her on that point. Nobody would dare say that she had seduced or encouraged him. His choices were his own, and his own they would remain.
The chessboard they used was old - onyx and red pyrite. Her great-grandfather had carved it as a wedding gift to her great-grandmother, and it had been handed down from mother to daughter until it reached Elizabeth. Ronan took a pawn of each colour and made her choose fists, and although she was tempted to smooth her fingers over the back of the hand she selected, she only tapped it lightly with one fingertip. Even that much contact was dangerous.
Elizabeth won black, he took the red, and they set up a game and began play.
It was close. She played a strong game, but he played a stronger one, using his Jewelled male pieces more aggressively than she.
One by one, Elizabeth's Jewelled pieces were taken by his as she sought to protect the pawns that represented Blood males and witches. Ronan didn't hesitate to sacrifice his pawns where necessary, and each time he left the pawn to her, her hand hesitated over the piece that would finish the kill.
Once, as she moved a Warlord to take one of his pawns, she glanced up at him and found him watching her with something like a smile on his lips, but the slightest of frowns around his eyes. "What?"
"Nothing," he said, but his gaze never wavered from her face.
Unnerved by his regard, she set the pawn down gently on the side of the table and the game continued.
They played against each other, balancing tactics with simple strength. When her Queen was checkmated between his Warlord Prince, Priestess and pawn, she gave him a rueful smile and tipped over her Queen in submission. "You're better than you led me to expect," she accused him, lightly.
"I'm a warrior, Lady," he replied as he reached out and gently pulled the Queen back up with a brush of one fingertip that was almost tender. "It's a game of strategy."
She arched an eyebrow at him. "Not a slave?" How long ago that conversation seemed! Four days, and yet so many things had happened between then and now.
Silence stretched out for a long moment. "Not a slave."
Elizabeth managed a smile as she began taking up the pieces to put them away. She kept her voice even and pleased. "I'm glad you acknowledge that."
He didn't help her pack up. Instead, one hand reached out and rested gently and firmly on her wrist. "Why?"
She didn't pretend not to know what he meant. But she did look at him for a long time. "Because you were dying in Belka," she said at last. "I didn't need a tangled web to show me that, Ronan. You were a Warlord Prince looking for honourable service and Belka was killing you. I wasn't going to let that happen."
And there'd been the elemental flicker she felt from him; like tiny lightning down her skin. Nothing more than a reaction to a male who interested her. Nothing more.
Ronan's gaze didn't abate as he watched her. "Five hundred gold marks is a lot to pay for a slave."
Elizabeth took her hand back, but lifted her chin slightly. Her voice was calm and deliberate as she said, "Ask any Queen what the loyalty of a Blood male of her court is worth to her and she will tell you that five hundred gold marks is nothing."
She didn't let herself look away. He'd wanted to know and she'd answered him. And if the quiet between them was breathless with potential, it was also tense with honesty.
At last he nodded and began putting the pieces away. She handed him the last piece that had fallen off onto the carpet, and he placed it in the box, then slid the lid over it and held it out to her. "I'm not of your court."
"No," Elizabeth said as she took the box from his hands. "But I didn't bring you out of slavery specifically to serve me."
She was turning away as his fingers brushed her hair back from her face. "Why not?"
He'd moved around the table, closing the gap between them. The scent of him made her head spin, entirely male. Blood rushed to her cheeks. She could feel it staining her throat, her forehead, pinkening the tips of her ears. "I..." Her voice took a few seconds to work again, but she answered the question without breaking her gaze. "That's not a question I'm prepared to answer, Prince."
"Then maybe you should."
His words terrified her.
He'd been a slave for seven years, forced to please whatever witch held his contract. And Elizabeth had bought him free, but that didn't mean he felt he had to repay the debt - even if part of her desperately wanted to know what this man was capable of in bed. She recalled the ghostly hands that traced across her skin, the unrelenting hunger he'd inspired in her, and shivered.
Yes, she wanted him, but she didn't want him to owe her anything. She particularly didn't want him to feel he owed her that.
"You don't have to do anything because you feel indebted to me," she began.
"No," he agreed, "I don't." And his fingers traced up her cheek and slid down the line of her throat to rest at the hammering pulse in the hollow between her collarbones. His eyes held her, warm and dark. It would be so easy to fall into those eyes and not come out until the sun was high in the sky.
Her hands were still gripping the box, and the sofa chair pressed lightly against the backs of her legs. There was nowhere for her to go, even if she'd wanted to elude his touch.
It would be so easy to lean into that caress. So easy and so wrong.
Darkness help her, but she wanted to give in.
"Ronan--" Elizabeth paused.
At the psychic core of her being, something was thrumming. It began vibrating with a quiver that trembled through her body; not painful, just unexpected.
It was coming from below the Red, a powerful surge that she could feel building beneath her, gathering force like the storms that swept across the southern shores of Atlantis Territory every twenty-seven years.
A glance at Ronan showed that he, too, was feeling it. "The Grey," he said.
"Teyla."
She was halfway to the door before she realised she still held the chessbox and vanished it between one step and the next.
Outside, the corridor was lit with a single candleabra with four candles still burning. The servants had looked in on them during the game, bringing them goblets of water and sweetmeats for snacks, but she'd waved the last of them away, practically ordering him to bed. No reason for them to stay up when she wasn't going to want anything.
As she set a ball of witchlight before them as a guide through the empty, dark corridors of the house, Elizabeth hoped she'd been circumspect enough to keep his reputation intact. It was one thing to think of taking a male to bed - and another to wreck his reputation through thoughtlessness.
"Do you know where she was taken?"
She glared at the thread of amusement that rang through his voice. *John?* Elizabeth contacted John on a Sapphire psychic thread and could feel the tremors of the surge building below. *Which room did Kate put Teyla in?*
*Second floor, looking out in the orchard. What's happening?* He felt the vibrations too.
Changing their course towards the sickroom, Elizabeth answered him. *Psychic storm,* she said tersely. *From the Grey.*
Surprise, followed by anger. *She's still not awake. How?* She hesitated a moment too long with her answer and felt John's suspicions rouse. *What is it? Elizabeth...*
She glanced at Ronan who'd kept pace with her so far. Her answer was to both men. *Wait. It's coming...*
A moment later the surge caught her up, power seeping through the strands of her inner web, flooding it with a rush. She felt the flow of power passing through her web with Teyla's familiar psychic signature, but if it shivered through her core, nothing broke beneath the force of the power.
Still, it was enough to cause the world to spin dizzingly around her as it flowed beyond the Red, up to the Sapphire. There was floor beneath her feet and wall against her shoulder, and she was in the dark, but she was whole. Shaken, but whole.
And left with the impression of a hint of Purple-Dusk.
Then she realised that if her shoulder was against the wall, there was an arm around her waist and a well-muscled shoulder into which her cheek was pressing.
The scent of him sang in her veins, and she felt shaken all over again.
Witchlight bloomed, a tiny spark that grew to a glowing ball, illuminating the hallway and the man who held her. He, too, looked more than a little dazed.
"Black Widow," he murmured.
"Yes," she said and stepped away from him. Pushing hair out of her face, Elizabeth looked at him. "Are you all right?"
He looked up, watchful. "Fine. Are you?"
Her colour rose, and she moved on. A quick probe of the psychic plane showed that the storm had risen above the Sapphire, flooding the Green. Rodney and Carson would be receiving a shock right now. *John?*
His hiss echoed in her mind. Not fearful or afraid, just surprised. *Remind me never to get her really mad at me,* he said, more than a little shakily.
Elizabeth couldn't help the laugh that escaped her as she and Ronan started off again. *You serve in the same court, John. Irritating her is a matter of course.* She kept the conversation light, knowing that John was aware of Ronan's presence.
The witchlight took a wrong turn. With a half-smile, Elizabeth produced her own and his spluttered into darkness as hers led the way.
*Irritating her is not the same as getting her mad,* John retorted, still speaking on the psychic thread. *Besides,* he added with a hint of his usual insouciance, *She likes me. At least, she does most of the time.*
*Spare me,* Elizabeth told him as they reached the second floor, but she couldn't help the smile that touched her lips. *You aren't injured?*
*No,* came the answer. *But there's something else happening...*
Ronan touched her arm. "Stop," he said, lifting his head like one of her hounds scenting the hunt.
The anger was from lighter jewels - Summer-sky, Rose, Tiger Eye, White - but Elizabeth could still feel the rage along them, no less poignant for that the Jewels held less power.
She flung out an Opal thread. *Stephen?*
*I'm headed to the guest quarters now.*
John was hungry for the hunt; she quelled him with a thought. *John, stay with Teyla - that's an order, Prince!*
And she ran, Ronan a step behind her, already knowing what she'd find.
--
to Part Fifteen
SUMMARY: Elizabeth wished she could have accepted him, too. She wished a lot of things.
PAIRING: Liz/Ronan
RATING: R
NOTES: Happy Thanksgiving to those who celebrate it. Happy UnThanksgiving to those who don't! A longish chapter for your delectation.
To Serve A Queen - Part Fourteen
By the time Stephen brought the Gennii males before her, Elizabeth was deep in the throes of cold rage. It trembled through her like desire or hatred, an icy veil that had no mercy for anything that caught her attention.
This was far, far worse than an accusation of rape.
The Gennii had broken Aiden's inner web - the inner self of the Blood, which defined his capacity for Craft - rendering him unable to do anything more than basic Craft. He'd never wear Jewels again, never know the strength of the Darkness flowing through his consciousness.
They'd broken Aiden.
Facing the horror of what had been done to him was too much for her right now. She channelled all of it into rage.
She'd asked Rodney to weave a sleep-spell about Aiden, to keep him resting a little longer. Rodney did so without any of his usual protests, and the light in his eyes when he looked up was dangerous. Perhaps not in the way that John might be considered dangerous, but dangerous nevertheless.
Once again, she'd sent Ronan to keep an eye on John and Stephen, and silently apologised for her actions. It wasn't fair to ask him to serve like this - but she didn't want the Gennii males dead.
Not yet, anyway.
There was little question that the Gennii were responsible for Teyla's beating and Aiden's breaking. Tyrus' anger had been excessive, even for a protective father.
His arrogance now was insulting and only fuelled her rage deeper. He walked into her audience room, followed by the escort from Gennii Territory, and glared at her in her chair. "What is the meaning of this?"
No honourific, no shame - nothing to indicate that he felt even the slightest bit of remorse for what had happened here tonight.
"You forget who you're talking to," John said with vicious softness.
Elizabeth waved a hand and he fell silent.
The males of her court were both angry and afraid. They'd seen Elizabeth in temper before, but this was new. Right now, her fury was so far beyond mere anger that a core part of her watched from within and trembled at the storm that was building in her soul.
The males of Gennii Territory ranged from fearful to unabashed. She noted which of the warriors met her gaze, brazen in their defiance, and which refused to meet her eye. She also noted which of the males had moved with extra care, avoiding the wounds Teyla had inflicted on them.
Elizabeth smiled grimly to herself. For whatever reason, they hadn't expected a physical fight from the Black Widow, and she'd given them one.
"Two members of my court are injured, one beyond repair," she said. Her words were measured and cold, and she saw several of the Gennii males shiver. "I hope your revenge was worth the friendship between Atlantis and Gennii Territories, Lord Tyrus."
Tyrus' lip curled. "I took action for the honour of my daughter."
"Your 'honour' has left a male of my court broken," Elizabeth said with icy precision. "And grievously injured another member of my court."
"The Black Widow bitch?" One of the men sneered, then jerked back when he found himself with a bladed stick digging gently into his throat. Then he gasped as he realised he couldn't move any further back - and that the blade was gently slicing open the skin of his throat.
"Be careful what you say," John said with a cold calm. "My Queen doesn't want you dead, but I do."
"And you're going to countenance this?" Tyrus glared at Elizabeth.
John was at the killing edge. Only Elizabeth could stop him now - and even that would have to be done with extreme care. She was only half shocked to find that, at this moment, she truly didn't care if John slit the man's throat from ear to ear.
It was the voice in her mind warning caution that held her back from telling John to do it.
We can't afford a war.
As it was, Aiden would never wear Jewels again.
"You countenanced the breaking of a Purple-Dusk Warlord of my court," she said, and knew that the males shuddered at the ice in her voice. "You countenanced the attack on a witch of my First Circle. Tell me why I shouldn't countenance this?"
Tyrus' lip curled, even in his fear of her anger. "You've spent nearly fifteen years waiting for my daughter to reach her adult status, Lady. Fifteen years investing against the day you would deal with a Queen instead of the male council." There was mockery in his eyes. "You're not going to throw that away - even for a male of your court."
He was right in some ways and so wrong in others.
She narrowed her eyes. "I never said I was going to throw it away. A Queen has a right to demand a price for the breaking of anyone who serves in her court."
Even Tyrus felt the whiplash of her words - and the threat of what she might demand.
"That price should then be negotiated with my daughter!" Whatever else could be said of Tyrus, he wasn't a coward. He'd admitted to what he'd done in a room full of volatile men, and never flinched to say it.
She wanted to see the man dead. She wouldn't. Not this way, not yet.
*John,* she said.
*They broke Ford,* John said, tightly, not turning his head away from the man whose throat seeped a soft trickle of blood. If he added any pressure at all, the trickle would become a tide of scarlet. *And they would have raped Teyla to try to break her. You know that, don't you?*
Elizabeth shuddered to think of it. Teyla's history with sex was painful enough as it was. *Yes,* she said grimly. *I know. But the price must be agreed between Sora and I.*
The hand on the bladed stick trembled. *And if she won't accept the responsibility?*
*Then the price will be paid in other ways,* she told him as she rose from her chair and went over to him. Her fingers touched his forearm, not pulling back on his arm, just resting on his skin.
It was enough. He vanished the bladed stick and turned, breaking away from her. She didn't follow him, he needed his space.
"I won't forget this, Prince," Tyrus snarled.
Elizabeth was still close enough to see the implacable hatred in John's eyes as he swung around. "Neither will I."
Her own rage had hardly abated, but she waited until John had stalked away before she spoke again.
"You will be escorted back to your rooms," she told the Gennii males, looking along the row. "You won't be allowed to leave them until Lady Sora has returned from making the Offering." She held Tyrus' gaze the longest. "And you'd better pray to the Darkness that Lady Teyla is better by morning."
She watched them go, followed by most of the Second and Third Circle guards. Marc Lorne's lift of the eyebrow asked if she wanted him to keep an eye on John, she shook her head. Stephen would be up to the task of keeping John contained tonight - not that it should be too difficult. John would be found in Teyla's sickroom, waiting for the best or worst news. The Master of her Guard knew how to handle John in a temper - he'd had years of experience at it after all.
"What does Kate say about Teyla's state of body?" She directed the question at Carson. He had an interest in medicines, brews, and the healing Craft - not a Healer, of course: males couldn't be Healers - but very capable at what he did know.
"The healing web was doing its job when I left," Carson said with quiet authority. "Kate would have sent for us if anything happened since." He looked at John. "Kate would like your presence in the sickroom, if you've the time."
John glanced at her first, and she nodded. "Go," she said, then turned to Stephen. "Prince Caldwell, go with him. Run a security check around Lady Teyla's sickroom, please, and report back."
It would give Stephen a valid reason to keep an eye on John. And, right now, she needed someone to watch over her First Escort. Anger and grief did terrible things to a man.
The door closed behind them, leaving her with Rodney, Carson and Ronan.
She hadn't even realised Ronan had remained behind, her fury focused on the Gennii males. Then again, he'd been very subtly ubiquitous tonight, first in Teyla's rooms, then helping Rodney. He'd sensibly kept away from Stephen as the Master of the Guard rounded up the Gennii for the audience, but had somehow managed to be in the audience room when the Gennii were brought in.
Carson was speaking, drawing her attention away from the man who'd turned to stare out the window of the audience room.
"I didn't want to say this before Sheppard, but Teyla nearly drained the Grey trying to keep them at bay," Carson said. "Kate says it's possible she was drugged. It would explain why she didn't call for help."
"And why she didn't just shatter them with the Grey," said Rodney.
"She still managed to hold them off," Elizabeth murmured.
"Only just," Rodney muttered. "She's okay now?"
"Once the drug's worn off, and the healing webs are finished, she'll be fine," said Carson. "Tired and drained, but she'll live." The Steward looked weary and wry. "Things might be a bit snappish for a while, though."
Rodney snorted. "A bit? Carson, we've got an injured Black Widow who has never given in gracefully when the First Circle males wanted to fuss. Then we have a Warlord Prince who's caught between the fear that he's going to lose her and anger that she endangered herself. The only way you're going to miss the fights is to move off the estate."
In spite of herself, Elizabeth smiled. "I don't think that Teyla will argue too much against John's right to fuss," she said. Although she quite understood where her friend was coming from: John could be an overbearing prick when he got too protective.
Her amusement was cut short when Carson sobered. "And Ford?"
She looked at Rodney, who shrugged. "He'll sleep until midmorning. I can't do more than that."
"It wouldn't be worth it, anyway," Carson said. "At some stage, his subconscious mind will realise what's been done to him and he'll try to wake up. By then, keeping him asleep would be cruelty. He'll have to face what was done to him sooner or later."
Rodney looked grim - an odd expression on his face. "At least he's alive." Coming from the pessimistic Green-Jewelled Prince, the words had a certain irony to them.
"For whatever kind of a life is left to him," Elizabeth murmured.
"Broken males can still serve," said Carson. "He might no longer wear the Jewels, but he's still a Blood male and a Warlord - and an asset to this court. If you want to keep him--"
"If I want to keep him?" She caught herself before she lashed out in anger. Carson wasn't criticising her; he was offering her options, she knew that, but after what had been done to Aiden, her instincts were still angry. "I would never send him away, Carson! His loyalty is not in question. But he may not want to live with the reminder of what he was - and what he no longer is."
"Well, there's no telling what he might still be," Carson said. "I'm just pointing out that his Jewels were only one aspect of him."
Elizabeth nodded. "And I recognise that." She took a deep breath. "Go to bed," she told him. "You, too, Rodney. No spells, no brews, no books - go directly to bed."
"Do not pass the Landing Web, do not collect a hundred gold marks?" Rodney asked with dry whimsy.
She rolled her eyes and watched them leave.
They closed the door behind them, and she thanked the Darkness for males who sometimes knew her better than she knew herself. She and Ronan Dex had things to say to each other here, now that he'd seen what the Gennii were capable of: what he'd thought he might be able to serve alongside.
"I'm sorry." The words slipped from her lips, useless in the end. Regret was no help at all.
"You had nothing to do with them." His voice was deep and quiet, and she shivered at the delicate thread of anger in it. Not at her - she could sense that so clearly - but at the Gennii, at Sora - at himself. "Don't be."
There was nothing she could say to that. She could only watch the angled profile of him as he stared out the window towards the torch-lit darkness of the central courtyard. She didn't know why she'd allowed him to remain behind. It wasn't to prove a point to him - that the Gennii males were untrustworthy - it was just that she'd never thought to exclude him.
And the other people in her court seemed to accept his presence as a matter of course. Kate had asked him for blood to start the healing web for Teyla. Stephen had set him to watch over her when it looked like John wasn't able to think past Teyla's bloody body. And not one of the warriors had batted an eyelash when he walked into the room a step behind Carson and Rodney.
They'd accepted him.
Elizabeth wished she could have accepted him, too. She wished a lot of things.
He was a Warlord Prince looking for service. She was a Queen responding to an attractive man. It would be so simple to mesh the two things into one: he would gain service and she would gain a lover.
It would have been much simpler if she hadn't bought him from the Belkans.
In Belka, Ronan Dex had been a slave - a pleasure slave whose existence was merely to act as a pretty plaything for the witches in the Territory. Now that he was free, he needed something more - a service in which he could take pride and find pleasure.
To take him to bed would only reinforce what he'd become in Belka. Elizabeth wouldn't do that to him.
She sighed. So many could-haves, would-haves, should-haves, but none of them helpful. And everything was complicated by the Gennii's presence and the repercussions of Sora's Virgin Night.
Maybe she just wanted to believe in the girl's better nature. After all, as Tyrus had pointed out, she'd invested over fifteen years into Sora of the Gennii, waiting for the day when a strong young Queen might take back her Territory from the male council. It had always been a waiting game, the balance of her hope against the council's control of Sora, and she still didn't know how the scales would weigh out in the end.
Elizabeth supposed they'd find out at dawn.
Standing, she stretched her arms and body, wishing that she'd been able to wear more comfortable clothing than this dress. But the audience with the Gennii had been formal, so she'd worn formal apparel.
As she lowered her arms, she caught Ronan watching her, carefully inscrutable. "What?"
He looked away. "Nothing, Lady."
She paused. Her nerves were too tightly strung to endure sleep right now. And she had here a man who, if no longer a pleasure slave, at least knew the duties of a Consort...
"How are you at playing chess?"
He turned, disbelief plain in his expression. "Now?"
"Were you going to sleep?"
One corner of the mouth quirked. "No."
"Then would you care to play a game?" Elizabeth wanted something to take her mind off what had happened tonight, something to occupy her mind so she didn't spend all night running through outcome permutations. A game of chess would do that.
A game of chess with Ronan Dex would definitely do that.
He took a few seconds to answer. "I'm not very good at it."
"Neither am I," she said.
Beneath the short beard, his mouth curved slightly. "Then I would be pleased to play a game against you."
She had a sitting room made ready and went to change out of her gown. The trousers and knit sweater into which she changed were plain and comfortable - hardly the attire of a woman trying to seduce a Warlord Prince. Elizabeth wanted no room left for doubt: this was something to while away the hours, nothing to do with sex or attraction.
It was why she left the doors wide open when she reached the sitting room. The slight smiles of the servants were what decided her on that point. Nobody would dare say that she had seduced or encouraged him. His choices were his own, and his own they would remain.
The chessboard they used was old - onyx and red pyrite. Her great-grandfather had carved it as a wedding gift to her great-grandmother, and it had been handed down from mother to daughter until it reached Elizabeth. Ronan took a pawn of each colour and made her choose fists, and although she was tempted to smooth her fingers over the back of the hand she selected, she only tapped it lightly with one fingertip. Even that much contact was dangerous.
Elizabeth won black, he took the red, and they set up a game and began play.
It was close. She played a strong game, but he played a stronger one, using his Jewelled male pieces more aggressively than she.
One by one, Elizabeth's Jewelled pieces were taken by his as she sought to protect the pawns that represented Blood males and witches. Ronan didn't hesitate to sacrifice his pawns where necessary, and each time he left the pawn to her, her hand hesitated over the piece that would finish the kill.
Once, as she moved a Warlord to take one of his pawns, she glanced up at him and found him watching her with something like a smile on his lips, but the slightest of frowns around his eyes. "What?"
"Nothing," he said, but his gaze never wavered from her face.
Unnerved by his regard, she set the pawn down gently on the side of the table and the game continued.
They played against each other, balancing tactics with simple strength. When her Queen was checkmated between his Warlord Prince, Priestess and pawn, she gave him a rueful smile and tipped over her Queen in submission. "You're better than you led me to expect," she accused him, lightly.
"I'm a warrior, Lady," he replied as he reached out and gently pulled the Queen back up with a brush of one fingertip that was almost tender. "It's a game of strategy."
She arched an eyebrow at him. "Not a slave?" How long ago that conversation seemed! Four days, and yet so many things had happened between then and now.
Silence stretched out for a long moment. "Not a slave."
Elizabeth managed a smile as she began taking up the pieces to put them away. She kept her voice even and pleased. "I'm glad you acknowledge that."
He didn't help her pack up. Instead, one hand reached out and rested gently and firmly on her wrist. "Why?"
She didn't pretend not to know what he meant. But she did look at him for a long time. "Because you were dying in Belka," she said at last. "I didn't need a tangled web to show me that, Ronan. You were a Warlord Prince looking for honourable service and Belka was killing you. I wasn't going to let that happen."
And there'd been the elemental flicker she felt from him; like tiny lightning down her skin. Nothing more than a reaction to a male who interested her. Nothing more.
Ronan's gaze didn't abate as he watched her. "Five hundred gold marks is a lot to pay for a slave."
Elizabeth took her hand back, but lifted her chin slightly. Her voice was calm and deliberate as she said, "Ask any Queen what the loyalty of a Blood male of her court is worth to her and she will tell you that five hundred gold marks is nothing."
She didn't let herself look away. He'd wanted to know and she'd answered him. And if the quiet between them was breathless with potential, it was also tense with honesty.
At last he nodded and began putting the pieces away. She handed him the last piece that had fallen off onto the carpet, and he placed it in the box, then slid the lid over it and held it out to her. "I'm not of your court."
"No," Elizabeth said as she took the box from his hands. "But I didn't bring you out of slavery specifically to serve me."
She was turning away as his fingers brushed her hair back from her face. "Why not?"
He'd moved around the table, closing the gap between them. The scent of him made her head spin, entirely male. Blood rushed to her cheeks. She could feel it staining her throat, her forehead, pinkening the tips of her ears. "I..." Her voice took a few seconds to work again, but she answered the question without breaking her gaze. "That's not a question I'm prepared to answer, Prince."
"Then maybe you should."
His words terrified her.
He'd been a slave for seven years, forced to please whatever witch held his contract. And Elizabeth had bought him free, but that didn't mean he felt he had to repay the debt - even if part of her desperately wanted to know what this man was capable of in bed. She recalled the ghostly hands that traced across her skin, the unrelenting hunger he'd inspired in her, and shivered.
Yes, she wanted him, but she didn't want him to owe her anything. She particularly didn't want him to feel he owed her that.
"You don't have to do anything because you feel indebted to me," she began.
"No," he agreed, "I don't." And his fingers traced up her cheek and slid down the line of her throat to rest at the hammering pulse in the hollow between her collarbones. His eyes held her, warm and dark. It would be so easy to fall into those eyes and not come out until the sun was high in the sky.
Her hands were still gripping the box, and the sofa chair pressed lightly against the backs of her legs. There was nowhere for her to go, even if she'd wanted to elude his touch.
It would be so easy to lean into that caress. So easy and so wrong.
Darkness help her, but she wanted to give in.
"Ronan--" Elizabeth paused.
At the psychic core of her being, something was thrumming. It began vibrating with a quiver that trembled through her body; not painful, just unexpected.
It was coming from below the Red, a powerful surge that she could feel building beneath her, gathering force like the storms that swept across the southern shores of Atlantis Territory every twenty-seven years.
A glance at Ronan showed that he, too, was feeling it. "The Grey," he said.
"Teyla."
She was halfway to the door before she realised she still held the chessbox and vanished it between one step and the next.
Outside, the corridor was lit with a single candleabra with four candles still burning. The servants had looked in on them during the game, bringing them goblets of water and sweetmeats for snacks, but she'd waved the last of them away, practically ordering him to bed. No reason for them to stay up when she wasn't going to want anything.
As she set a ball of witchlight before them as a guide through the empty, dark corridors of the house, Elizabeth hoped she'd been circumspect enough to keep his reputation intact. It was one thing to think of taking a male to bed - and another to wreck his reputation through thoughtlessness.
"Do you know where she was taken?"
She glared at the thread of amusement that rang through his voice. *John?* Elizabeth contacted John on a Sapphire psychic thread and could feel the tremors of the surge building below. *Which room did Kate put Teyla in?*
*Second floor, looking out in the orchard. What's happening?* He felt the vibrations too.
Changing their course towards the sickroom, Elizabeth answered him. *Psychic storm,* she said tersely. *From the Grey.*
Surprise, followed by anger. *She's still not awake. How?* She hesitated a moment too long with her answer and felt John's suspicions rouse. *What is it? Elizabeth...*
She glanced at Ronan who'd kept pace with her so far. Her answer was to both men. *Wait. It's coming...*
A moment later the surge caught her up, power seeping through the strands of her inner web, flooding it with a rush. She felt the flow of power passing through her web with Teyla's familiar psychic signature, but if it shivered through her core, nothing broke beneath the force of the power.
Still, it was enough to cause the world to spin dizzingly around her as it flowed beyond the Red, up to the Sapphire. There was floor beneath her feet and wall against her shoulder, and she was in the dark, but she was whole. Shaken, but whole.
And left with the impression of a hint of Purple-Dusk.
Then she realised that if her shoulder was against the wall, there was an arm around her waist and a well-muscled shoulder into which her cheek was pressing.
The scent of him sang in her veins, and she felt shaken all over again.
Witchlight bloomed, a tiny spark that grew to a glowing ball, illuminating the hallway and the man who held her. He, too, looked more than a little dazed.
"Black Widow," he murmured.
"Yes," she said and stepped away from him. Pushing hair out of her face, Elizabeth looked at him. "Are you all right?"
He looked up, watchful. "Fine. Are you?"
Her colour rose, and she moved on. A quick probe of the psychic plane showed that the storm had risen above the Sapphire, flooding the Green. Rodney and Carson would be receiving a shock right now. *John?*
His hiss echoed in her mind. Not fearful or afraid, just surprised. *Remind me never to get her really mad at me,* he said, more than a little shakily.
Elizabeth couldn't help the laugh that escaped her as she and Ronan started off again. *You serve in the same court, John. Irritating her is a matter of course.* She kept the conversation light, knowing that John was aware of Ronan's presence.
The witchlight took a wrong turn. With a half-smile, Elizabeth produced her own and his spluttered into darkness as hers led the way.
*Irritating her is not the same as getting her mad,* John retorted, still speaking on the psychic thread. *Besides,* he added with a hint of his usual insouciance, *She likes me. At least, she does most of the time.*
*Spare me,* Elizabeth told him as they reached the second floor, but she couldn't help the smile that touched her lips. *You aren't injured?*
*No,* came the answer. *But there's something else happening...*
Ronan touched her arm. "Stop," he said, lifting his head like one of her hounds scenting the hunt.
The anger was from lighter jewels - Summer-sky, Rose, Tiger Eye, White - but Elizabeth could still feel the rage along them, no less poignant for that the Jewels held less power.
She flung out an Opal thread. *Stephen?*
*I'm headed to the guest quarters now.*
John was hungry for the hunt; she quelled him with a thought. *John, stay with Teyla - that's an order, Prince!*
And she ran, Ronan a step behind her, already knowing what she'd find.
--
to Part Fifteen
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