“Then we are ready when your queen is,” she said formal y. She glanced over at Arthmael. They'd brought her here, rather than Jacob being brought back to her room. Maybe Rhoswen thought Lyssa would be tempted to sample the results of Arthmael and Cadr's hard work before she had first opportunity. Lyssa's lips curved in a feral smile. She would have been right.

Arthmael stood on one side of the temple opening, Cadr the other, matched sphinxes. “Though I have no standing among you, my compliments on your preparation skil s,” she said. “I am pleased, as I am sure your queen will be.”

Arthmael appeared somewhat surprised at the gracious comment, and sketched a tentative bow.

“Lady.”

“She's ready.” Cayden spoke behind them. When Lyssa turned, she saw he'd changed out of his mail and heavy weaponry to a tunic and hose. He gave Jacob a short, appraising look. Usual y in such a situation, Jacob would studiously avoid making eye contact with another male, but this time he locked gazes with the captain, his expression chal enging. A muscle flexed in Cayden's jaw, then he nodded to Lyssa with stiff courtesy. “Fol ow me.” The courtyard was relatively quiet at the now late hour, apparently most Fae preferring a traditional sleep schedule, though they did pass a handful of graveyard shift staff. Brownies cleaning the light sconces, house elves polishing banisters or mopping floors, things best done during times of low foot traffic. The inevitable guards at each entry point.

They saluted Cayden as he passed. She noted the reactions to Jacob's appearance varied from outright appraisal and curiosity—mostly from the household staff—to the same deliberate, studied dispassion reflected in the face of the guards.

The captain walked a pace or two abreast of Lyssa, which all owed him to keep Jacob, fol owing just behind her, in his peripheral vision. Lyssa glanced at him. “I asked you earlier why the castle was so heavily defended. After meeting her, I'm even more curious as to why the queen requires such a substantial guard. She seems more than capable of repel ing any threat on her own merit.”

“No one can remain vigilant at all times,” Cayden said neutral y. “And I am not so gul ible that I would tel you who the queen's enemies are.”

“Do you view us as her enemies?”

“I do not view you as friends.”

“A clever tongue,” she mused. “Does Queen Rhoswen have any friends?”

“Does any queen?”

Lyssa lifted a brow. She knew that frustrated tone.

It came forth when a man loved a difficult woman with all his heart and soul.

It might not be a romantic love, like Jacob bore her, but it didn't necessarily have to be. Love was complex and had many forms. During the age of chivalry, she'd known men who gave everything they were to their liege ladies, though they'd never touch her in lust, considering it an insult to the honor they bore her. The pure love, it had been cal ed.

“Friends are rare,” she agreed. “But I expect if your queen does have a true friend, I am speaking to him.”

He paused, giving her a measured glance. They'd reached the opening to a tower, where a pul ey lift was provided instead of stairs. “I leave you here,” he said, though his grudging manner made it obvious how he felt about that. “The queen's chambers are at the top.”

He turned to Jacob then. The way Cayden kept his gaze rigidly fixed on Jacob's face suggested Rhoswen's captain had no wish to acknowledge Jacob's general state of bound nakedness. Of course, he stepped forward to confront her servant, close enough Lyssa thought he might be reminded of it quite rudely if he wasn't careful.

“The threat you issued to Patrick? If you harm my queen, you will suffer the same.”

“As long as your queen does nothing against my lady, I will not act against her. I don't harm women.” Jacob's gaze was just as unflinching. “Ever.” Cayden nodded. “Make sure everything is tucked into the lift, vampire. It's a narrow space and something extraneous might get whacked off.” Jacob bared his fangs. “Your envy is showing, Captain.”

Cayden snorted at that. Lyssa was surprised when the guard captain offered his hand to help her step up into the lift. A subtle gesture, but one suggesting his attitude might be easing toward them. Or perhaps his queen was no longer in such a petty mood as to deny her the basic courtesies that should be expected.

That could be a good sign, or simply a distraction for something far worse Rhoswen had planned.

There was no visible source of power to the lift, but then she looked up. She touched Jacob's shoulder, guiding his gaze upward. A trio of thick vines, populated with what reminded her of her moonflowers at home, was gathered and held in the mouth of a hippogriff. The creature with the body of a horse and head of a raptor had deep purple and black plumage. She surged off the platform with the help of her powerful wings, taking them up smoothly.

When they saw the night sky, Jacob realized the lift silo was open to all ow the hippogriff to come and go at her leisure, or at the queen's desire. When she reached the top, she settled on the stone ledge with a dainty clop of hooves, deftly dropping the vines into a catch hook that brought the lift to a slight thump of a halt.

As it opened, Jacob met Lyssa's gaze. By your command, my queen.

A bracing reminder that only one royal held his all egiance. Sliding her hand down to the smal of his back, she caressed his servant's mark along the way. Giving him a teasing scrape of her nails over his bare ass, she stepped out of the lift ahead of him.

Jacob wasn't certain if this was the queen's private chamber or simply the place she chose to enjoy those she summoned to her. He suspected it was the latter, because though Lyssa had taken him in a lush bedroom his first night with her, he'd later learned she'd had a matching underground chamber. That was where she went to be herself, unguarded and relaxed. None but a precious few invaded that sanctum. Rhoswen struck him as the same.

This chamber was a display area for a queen's power and beauty, not a haven for her personal quiet time. A large bed was hung with more moonflower vines and strips of silk. The fireplace was roaring, firefly Fae cavorting in the flames. In the corner, teal yarn was strung on a large spinning wheel. Whoever operated it was creating a tapestry that looked like an ocean wave, the completed portion crumpled below the wheel on the floor.

Positioned before an open window was a standing frame like a doorway, only sculpted of smooth black stone. It looked similar to the Torii outside Shinto temples, gateways to havens for the divine, but he had a feeling that was not Rhoswen's purpose for it. Through the window, Jacob could see the torchlike Castle of Fire.

Now he fol owed his lady's attention to something else. Positioned next to the fire was a no less intricately carved but far smal er throne than what was in Rhoswen's main hal . A comfortable guest chair sat opposite from it, but between them was a smal table with a child's tea set on it. A dol with porcelain face, long dark hair and long-lashed green eyes sat in the guest chair. Rhoswen sat in the throne, of course.

Lyssa moved toward her, bidding him stay where he was with another touch on his shoulder.

Contemplating the two women together caused his ice encased cock to respond, which almost wrenched a groan from his throat. The gold and green garment was a robe. The dress his lady wore beneath it at Rhoswen's behest was a stretched sheath of dark cobwebs, every feature of her body visible and yet temptingly shadowed by the lace work. It made her raven darkness, her dangerous edge, even more irresistible.

Rhoswen was her ice counterpart, the vivid blue eyes molten and white hair touched with a gleam in the firelight. She wore a filmy bit of white silk that hugged her hips and draped low on her breasts, showing her nipples through the cloth, the long lines of her thighs. A cluster of fragrant flowers like tiny gardenias were caught in her long hair.

Unlike Rhoswen's plunging neckline, Lyssa's was high on the throat, so it made the tight, revealing fit of the lace over her breasts even more noticeable, the nipples impossible for a man to ignore. Her feet were bare, as were Rhoswen's.

Rhoswen's outfit made her appear softer, more feminine, and so the whole picture was disarming, which made Jacob even more on his guard. What appeared to be bees were hovering around the flowers in Rhoswen's hair, more of the tiny insect Fae. While others might fear her wrath, apparently the smal est of her subjects felt comfortable being in her chambers.

Still, that tea set and dol bothered him.

Rhoswen nodded to Lyssa genial y enough, gesturing her to the chair with the dol . Those tempting legs crossed as she turned her attention to Jacob. Starting at his feet, she worked her way up, inch by inch. As she covered the terrain, her lips parted, moistening. He was far too aroused to ignore the fact the pink frosted gloss on them made them all the more mesmerizing. He could imagine a wide variety of crude, wicked things she could do for him with those lips. She made it worse by becoming more stimulated during her appraisal.

Her nipples drew tighter before his gaze, thighs sliding in a restless shift, a tel ing arousal. Her musk was flavored with those flowers, but his vampire senses knew female readiness, no matter the species or scent.

Lyssa took a seat, picking up the dol and setting her on the table next to the tea set. Rhoswen nodded to the stone archway. “Put yourself there, vampire.

And take your time. I'd like to see you walk.” Walking fast with ice shoved up one's ass wasn't real y possible, so he could accommodate that. But that erection was going to kil him, the heat and cold making every step pleasure and torment both. As she drank it in, he sensed his lady doing the same.

No matter the situation, Lyssa's natural sensuality would kick in to enjoy him to the ful est. He could resist it all he wished, but he knew it was one of the things that kept him hard so often.

Rhoswen purred, no other word for it. “I'm going to love taking my pleasure of that, vampire or not. How do you ever let him get any rest?”

“Who says I do?” Lyssa returned, and won the queen's tight smile.

When he reached the archway, he saw imprints in the floor to place his feet. He figured he must be getting more used to the magic of the Fae world, for he barely flinched when talons emerged from the floor and circled his ankles above the ice manacles, though he bit back an oath as those talons pierced his skin, drawing blood. His wrist manacles released, but it was a temporary reprieve. Rhoswen gestured above his head. “There.”