"I earned the right to be here, Darkness, trust me on that," Abe said. His smile was gone, and there was something very sober in his charcoal-grey eyes.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Walters asked.

Neither the guards nor I had to ask. If he'd earned it, then he'd done something that he'd hated but had pleased the queen. It usually involved sex, or sadism, or both. The guards kept their secrets about what humiliations the queen demanded of them. There's an old saying that you'd crawl over broken glass for someone, or something. Apparently that wasn't just a saying with the queen. What would a person do to end hundreds of years of celibacy? What wouldn't he do?

It must have shown on at least some of our faces, because Walters looked even grumpier and said, "What aren't you telling me?"

Barinthus and Doyle gave him their empty faces, honed to unreadability by centuries of court politics. I turned in against Frost's body so that my face was hidden from the major. I just didn't give good blank face anymore.

Frost slid one arm across my shoulders, but opened his coat so that I was snuggled inside it. Most people would have thought that he was trying to get me closer to his body, but I knew better: He was opening his coat so he could go for his gun, or knives if he needed to. Hugging was fine, but for the guards, duty had to come first.

Since it was my life they were protecting, I never got my feelings hurt about it.

"To my knowledge, Major," Barinthus said, "we are not concealing anything from you that will impact your ability to perform your job."

Walters almost smiled. "You're not going to deny that you're withholding information from me, from the police?"

"Why should I deny it? You would have to be a fool to believe that we have shared all we know with you, and I don't think you a fool, Major Walters."

He looked at Barinthus, and it wasn't an entirely unfriendly look. "Well, that's good to know. You don't want Abe here, do you?"

"Obviously not," Barinthus said.

"Then why is he here?"

Madeline tried to intervene. "Major, we really must get them all ready for the press conference."

He ignored her. "Why is he here?"

Barinthus blinked at him, and his second eyelid flicked down and up. The clear membrane allowed him to see underwater. When it showed on dry land, it meant he was nervous.

"You heard me say that Abloec was not my choice, but the queen's."

"Why would she send a drunk?"

"I resent that," Abloec said, leaning in toward the major.

Walters wrinkled his nose. "Your breath smells lethal."

"Just good scotch," Abloec said.

Barinthus grabbed him by both shoulders. "We need some privacy, Major Walters, to discuss things."

Walters gave Barinthus a sharp nod and called his men out. He tried to leave two, but Barinthus asked him not to. "You are welcome to put officers at both doors, as long as they are outside and do not try to eavesdrop."

"Unless you yell, they won't hear you."

Barinthus smiled. "We will try not to yell."

Walters herded his men out, and Doyle called, "Please, hold the door for Ms. Phelps."

The publicist looked at him, her eyes wide, mouth in a little O of surprise. It was an act, because she recovered too quickly. "Now, Doyle." She put her well-manicured hand on his arm in its black leather jacket. "I have to get you all presentable for the press conference."

He looked at her much the way Walters had, except meaner. She let go of his arm and took a step back. For a moment the real Madeline stared out; ruthless, determined. She played her trump card with a face that was harsh with her anger. "The queen's orders are for me to make sure you are all lovely for the press conference. When she asks why I didn't do that, do you want me to tell her that you contradicted her orders?" She, more than most of the humans who dealt with the court, knew what the queen was capable of, and she used that knowledge well.

I turned in Frost's arms so that my face was framed by the fur of his coat. "None of us is contradicting my aunt's orders," I said.

The look she gave me was just this side of insolence. Madeline had enjoyed the queen's favor for seven years now. Seven years of basking in the absolute power the queen had over beings who could have snapped Madeline in half with their bare hands. She felt safe behind the shield of Andais's power. Up to a point, she was right. Beyond that point—well, I was about to remind her of what that point was.

"We have a major press conference, Meredith." She didn't even bother to use my title now that no other humans were around to listen. Her glance flicked from Galen's much loved, old brown leather jacket to Doyle's short black one, and finally to Kitto's Day-Glo parka. Her lip curled just a bit. "Some of the coats, some of the hair, and you are seriously not wearing enough makeup for this kind of photo opportunity. I have makeup and wardrobe outside." She turned toward the door as if she'd fetch them.

I said, "No."

She turned back, and the arrogance on her face would make any sidhe proud. "I can call the queen on my cell, but I promise you, Meredith, that I am following her orders." She actually slipped a small phone out of the inner pocket of her blazer. A phone so tiny it hadn't disturbed the line of her jacket.

"You are not following her orders, not to the letter," I said. I knew I looked small, near child-like, peeking from amid the ticklish fur of Frost's coat. And for the first time it didn't matter, not to people like Madeline. I could hide my power until we needed it. I didn't have to be forceful to win this one.

She hesitated with the phone open in her hand. "Of course I am."

"Did my aunt tell you to dress us, and primp us, as soon as we came in out of the cold? Were those her express orders?"

She narrowed her carefully lined and shaded eyes. "Not in so many words, no." She sounded uncertain, then gained her businessy tone as she continued, "But we have the press conference, and then you'll have to change again before the big party. We have a timetable here, and the queen doesn't like to be kept waiting." She hit a button on her phone, put it to her ear.

I stepped out from the warmth of Frost's body and whispered in her other ear, "I am heir to the throne, Madeline, and you've always been nasty to me. I'd start trying to make nice if I were you and I liked my job."

I was leaning so close that I heard my aunt's secretary answer the phone, but not what he said. Madeline said, "Sorry, hit the wrong button. Yes, they're here. We've got some challenges, but nothing we can't handle. Okay, okay, great." She hung up and stepped back from me the way I'd seen people step back from Andais and Cel over the years, as if she was afraid.

"I'll wait out in the hall." She licked her lips, glanced at me, but couldn't completely meet my eyes. She wasn't as good at court politics as some. There were those who had tried to kill me before, who would smile and nod to my face, acting as if we'd always been best friends. Madeline wasn't up to that level of duplicity. It made me think better of her.

She hesitated at the door. "But please, hurry. We really do have a rather tight schedule, and the queen did say, exactly, that she had outfits for everyone for the party tonight. She'll want everyone changed before the festivities begin." She didn't look at me as she left, as if she didn't want me to see what was in her eyes.

When the door clicked firmly behind her, Galen asked, "What did you say to her?"

I shrugged and cuddled back against Frost. "I reminded her that as heir to the throne, I might have some say in who gets hired or fired."

Galen shook his head. "She went pale. That wasn't just from the threat of being unemployed."

I looked at him. "Exiled from faerie, Galen, not just unemployed."