“New town, fresh start.”

“Until he met a girl from another aristo family,” Daemon guessed.

Perzha nodded. “No indication that he did anything that would get himself in trouble, but the rumors about him reached the girl’s father. Once again, Dillon was paid to go away.” She sighed. “Aristos can be such gossipmongers.”

Daemon choked on a laugh, since Perzha was so good at netting the social tidbits others tossed away. Then he sobered as he considered a boy’s descent from first love to an unsavory way of life where he was reduced to using a combination of spells to hold a girl’s interest.

“At some point he turned rejection into a business?” he asked quietly. “Decided he would be the betrayer instead of the betrayed?”

“I don’t think it’s that simple. If he’s the betrayer, it could be because he no longer believes he has any other choice. If you ask me, he still wants what he wanted with that first girl. He wants to be with someone who loves him—and he wants a way to repair his honor and reputation.” She shook her head and tsked. “The foolish boy had no idea what he was up against when he fixed his attention on young Jillian. I doubt it even occurred to him that Eyriens do things a bit differently when it comes to suitors, especially when the Eyrien is a Warlord Prince.”

Daemon snorted. “Lucivar would be more inclined to kill the problem than pay off someone who touched a girl in his family.”

He refilled his coffee cup.

“I’ll call for a fresh pot,” Perzha said. “That must be cold by now.”

It was cold and bitter, but that suited him right now. “It’s fine.”

They both looked at her garden, aware that there wasn’t much time left before Perzha needed to retire for the day.

“He used a combination of seduction and compulsion spells on Jillian,” Daemon said quietly. “It was too skillfully done to have been the first time. That’s probably how he’s been convincing girls that they were desperately in love with him. After that, if they were forbidden to see him, the girls themselves would cause such turmoil that the rifts created within the family might never be healed.”

Surreal had been right; while under the influence of Dillon’s mix of spells, Jillian would never have forgiven Lucivar if he had driven Dillon away.

Perzha nodded. “Having his own heart broken doesn’t excuse his behavior since then.”

“No, but it makes it more understandable.” Daemon smiled reluctantly. “We’ve offered Dillon the chance to become acquainted with Jillian—and us.”

Perzha chuckled. “Properly chaperoned?”

“Of course.” More than properly. One Sceltie would be enough. Three guaranteed a boy couldn’t do more than hold a girl’s hand. “If he takes advantage of the invitation, we’ll give him the chance to set his past aside and show us who he is now.”

“Why?” Perzha asked.

“Doesn’t everyone deserve a chance to learn from past mistakes and move on to the next part of his or her life?”

“Should someone be allowed to continue doing the same harm because she got away with it?”

Everything inside him went still as he descended to the Black—the cold, glorious Black. “Do you have a name?” he asked too softly.

Perzha called in a piece of folded paper and pushed it toward him. He picked it up and vanished it before rising to the level of his Red Jewel.

“And now, Prince, I must go in and review the court’s work for the day,” Perzha said.

Daemon rose and pulled out her chair. “Thank for you for the information—and the entertaining breakfast.”

She gave him a big smile, showing her buckteeth. Then the smile softened and warmed. “This is a small village and my court is not large. But it would be a different experience for a heart that is bruised and needs time to heal. A safe place for a girl who might want to look at things beyond her own community.”

“Far enough away but not too far?”

“Exactly.”

He raised her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles. She walked to the doors where Carleton hovered, waiting to coax her inside before she weakened from her allergy to sunlight. Prince Arrick, her Master of the Guard, escorted Daemon all the way to the landing web.

“If Lady Perzha needs anything that her court can’t provide, you let me know,” Daemon said.

Arrick tipped his head, a small bow of respect. “Thank you, Prince. We will.”

Daemon stepped onto the landing web, caught the Black Wind, and returned to the Keep. Then he called Lucivar on a psychic spear thread and requested a meeting.

THIRTY-TWO

Daemon studied the listings in the two registers, which Geoffrey had fetched from the private part of the Keep’s library. The listings didn’t tell him much, since he wasn’t familiar with the aristo families in Askavi. The registers certainly didn’t provide a list of the lovers the girl had had before and after Dillon, but they did give him a good idea of the social distance between Dillon’s family and the girl who had been his first, disastrous love.

There were other ways to find out about the girl’s sexual conquests—and Dillon’s.

“Is there something else I can help you find?” Geoffrey asked, approaching the large blackwood table.

“Not at this time, thank you,” Daemon replied. When the historian/librarian didn’t leave, Daemon raised an eyebrow in inquiry.

“You’re asking about two Rihlander families who live in Askavi, which isn’t your Territory.”

A subtle reminder that rulers were not supposed to interfere in the Territory of others.

“This isn’t about Territory, Geoffrey,” Daemon said quietly. “This is about family.”

Geoffrey gave him a long look and then smiled. “I understand.”

Daemon closed the second register and set it on the table. “Let me know when Lucivar arrives. I’ll be in the Consort’s suite taking care of some paperwork.”

“Would you like anything to eat?”

A laugh caught in his throat. “No, thank you. I’ve already had an interesting breakfast.”

* * *

* * *

He’d been working steadily for an hour—and wondering if Holt could have stuffed one more piece of paper into the bulging satchel his secretary had handed him before he’d left the Hall that morning—when he felt a hand rest on his shoulder.

Not substance that he could touch, but he felt her warmth.