Chapter 199: The Journey 2

LYSANDER

Bonnie stopped at the top of the steps.

"That is a great many cars," she remarked.

I glanced down the line of them, black and polished, engines idling in the cold. "Sadly, it is nowhere near enough. But it sends a message, and it lends us an illusion we badly need."

Her brows drew together. "What illusion?"

"That the Regent is protected." I tipped my head toward the men standing beside the lead car, each one watching the treeline instead of us. "That he trusts this small team, and that the team is strong enough to put down whatever enemy shows its face. Any more cars and the picture changes. A convoy twice this size tells every watcher that the Regent is afraid for his life."

She looked down the line again, counting without meaning to, and I watched her reach the end of the count and decide not to comment.

I walked her down the steps. At the open door she paused, one hand on the frame, and glanced up at me.

"You first," she offered.

"I prefer being a gentleman."

"I am not a Lady."

"You are today."

She held my eye a moment longer, then dipped her head and climbed in. She settled against the far seat and arranged the green skirt over her knees. I set the case in after her and reached for the door.

Behind me, someone coughed. It was a woman’s cough, too deliberate to be accidental, and it landed squarely between my shoulder blades. I let go of the door and turned.

Queen Edelina stood at the foot of the steps with her hands folded at her waist. She wore a dark blue gown that turned the pallor of her face into something she had chosen. Her hair had been pinned properly, every strand in its place, and she had put on her makeup with far more care than she had troubled to give it at dinner. Nothing about her looked tired, and nothing about her looked left to chance.

"Your Majesty," I greeted her.

"Your Majesty," she returned.

We looked at each other for a long beat. Behind her, the sentinels held their posts with their eyes fixed on the middle distance, and every one of them was listening. Each word we spoke would be carried indoors before the cars left the drive, turned over in the corridors, and served up again by supper. With the family in its present state, it would be the hottest tea in the house.

"You have come to wish me a safe journey, I assume," I said.

The corner of her mouth curved. "Of course."

I waited. She offered nothing more, so I filled the quiet myself. "Well, thank you."

"Enjoy your time in Lily of the Valley," she said at last, as though the thought had only just crossed her mind.

"I intend to."

"It was always a blessing of geography, that place. I never visited often, but I did like it there." Her gaze drifted past me to the open car door and came back. "The lake, the woods, the quiet. I am sure it was good to you as a boy."

"It was. It still is."

The silence returned, and she let it run on purpose. Every second of it gave the sentinels longer to take in the sight of the Queen standing at the foot of the steps to see the Regent off. I could have ended it there and climbed into the car. I stayed where I was.

"You will not even beg me to take pity on my cousin?" I asked.

The corner of her mouth moved again, slower this time. "Nothing I said would soften a heart as hard as yours."

"No, it would not."

"And my boy did step out of line." She lifted one shoulder, an elegant little shrug, as though the matter had been settled weeks ago and not last night. "So I understand."

"You understand?"

"I am capable of it."

I almost laughed. She watched me almost do it, and something in her face flickered, small and quick, before she put it away.

"Do try not to make a mess of this place before I return," I added.

She chuckled. It was a real one, low in her chest, and it startled me more than the cough had. I could not remember the last time I had heard Edelina laugh at anything I had said.

"I am sure Bradley has been coached on what to do to prevent that from happening," she replied. "And I am only a woman. What could I do without my son as a proxy?"

"A great deal."

"You flatter me."

"Can it be called flattery when it is the whole truth?" I said, "You know what you are capable of, Your Majesty."

She looked at me for a long moment, and then she stepped forward and put her arms around me.

That was the part I had not prepared for. Edelina did not hug. In all small moments in the years I had existed under the same roof as her, I could count the number of times on one hand and still have fingers left. She was warm, and she smelled of something expensive, and she held on a fraction longer than courtesy required.

"Goodbye, Lysander," she said into my shoulder.

I smiled, mostly at the top of her head where she could not see it, and said nothing at all.

Then she let go, stepped back, and folded her hands again as though the whole thing had never happened. I climbed into the car and pulled the door shut. The driver was already in his seat with the engine idling soft and low. He glanced at me in the mirror, and I nodded, and the car turned on the gravel and carried us out through the gate.

Behind us the estate shrank. First the windows, then the roofline, then the trees closed over the whole thing and took it away.

Bonnie had not moved. She sat with her hands in her lap, spine straight against the seat, watching the trees slide past.

"Was that ominous," she asked, "or am I imagining things?"