I tried to read her face and couldn’t. “Why tell me this?”

“I don’t know; perhaps I’ve wanted to tell someone my idea for a very long time.”

“You lived in the high court of faerie for centuries, Maeve, and then in Hollywood for decades; you don’t say things without understanding how it will affect people, or how you hope it will affect people, so what’s your point? Why tell me? Why now?”

“I don’t know, and that is the honest answer; it just seemed time.”

I shook my head. “I wish I believed that.”

“I would never mean to make you doubt Doyle.”

I laughed then. “I don’t doubt Doyle; nothing you could say would make me do that.”

She controlled her face, but for just a moment I saw she was unhappy. Why would she want to divide me from Doyle? Out loud I said, “Do you have an old grudge against Doyle?”

“Why would you say that?”

“He’s been the left hand of the queen for centuries, and their court was often at war with yours, so just answer the question. Do you have a grudge against him?”

“If I had to choose a king to follow I would prefer the energy of sunlight and life, not darkness and death.”

“Doyle was who faerie crowned as my king.”

“Your Unseelie king,” she said.

I nodded. “And faerie crowned me Sholto’s Queen of the Sluagh.”

She couldn’t hide her distaste. “They are the stuff of nightmares.”

“True, but the Goddess saw fit to make me their queen all the same.”

“I would wonder who faerie would choose for you if it were the Seelie throne you were sitting upon, or a new throne of faerie. Who would be that king for you, Meredith?”

“Since we gave up the crowns that faerie offered us, and I can’t go back to visit Sholto’s kingdom for fear of Taranis, I don’t think it matters. I think I’ve turned down too many thrones for the Goddess to offer me another.”

The first pink rose petal fell from empty air and floated down between us. We watched it fall slowly to the floor.

“You are surrounded by miracles, Meredith.”

“The Goddess blesses me with Her presence.”

“I think She’s happy to have someone worth blessing again.”

Rose petals began to fall like a flurry of candy-colored snow. I stood in the center of it holding my hands up, raising my face toward the fall of petals. I thanked the Goddess for Her attention and Her blessing, and the rose petals fell faster until it was a blizzard of cotton candy petals.

Maeve Reed, the Golden Goddess of Hollywood, once the goddess Conchenn, fell to her knees and began to weep.

CHAPTER

TWENTY-SIX

BY THE TIME Maeve recovered herself, the rose petals had almost stopped falling. Only a few of them trailed me to the nursery, like pink snow flurries. Two of the new Diplomatic Security Services, or DSS, guards had trailed us from outside Maeve’s bedroom to here; now they stood at the door in bodyguard pose, one hand holding a wrist, or just arms free, but strangely at attention. They were on duty while all the rest of the guards were at blade and hand-to-hand training. The human guards had tried to participate, but the difference in strength and speed had made it … awkward. Though some of the humans had persisted.

It also meant that the only people left to tend the babies were human. Liam came running to us as we entered the triplets’ nursery. “Mommy! Come see, babies!” he yelled, and grabbed Maeve’s finger so he could drag her farther into the room.

Her whole face lit up, not with magic, but with happiness that he’d run to her, not me. She’d been spending as much time with him as she could in the last few days, and just like that, he was running to her more. A tightness I hadn’t realized was there eased as I watched him pull her forward.

One nanny was diapering Gwenwyfar on the changing table. Alastair was in his crib with most of the dogs crowded around it, and him. Liam’s nanny, Rita, was in one of the two rocking chairs, holding Bryluen, and that was where the little boy led Maeve. Rita’s dark head was bent low, giving only a glimpse of her smile, as she gazed down at the baby. Rita was short for Margarita, and she was a pretty, dark, older woman, very shy. She rarely spoke and when she did, she didn’t like to hold eye contact. I wasn’t sure if she was just naturally that shy, or if it was being in the presence of Hollywood stars and princes and princesses of faerie. Danika, the second nanny, was as tall as Maeve with thick blond hair that fell to the tops of her shoulders. She did a serious yoga workout every day, and used the weights when the guards weren’t in the room. She hadn’t bulked up, just made her curves more firm. She moved with a physicality that reminded me of the guards. Apparently she’d gone through college on an athletic scholarship, and the habit of it hadn’t left her. Rita was only a few inches taller than me, in her early forties, and had given up the fight for the gym a few years ago, so she was just comfortably round. She’d been a nanny when she was Danika’s age, but a divorce had forced her out to work again. It had also made her interested in live-in positions like this one.

How did I know all this? Galen had told me; he’d apparently won her confidence with all his time in the nursery. She’d never seen a man who loved his children so much, and she’d informed me I was a lucky woman.

Danika glanced up and said, with a smile, “Ms. Reed, Princess Meredith.”

“Hello, Danika. Hello, Rita,” I said.

Maeve said, “Rita, are you all right?”

I walked farther into the room so I could see Rita more clearly around Maeve’s tall form. Rita kept smiling and rocking Bryluen but never looked up at Maeve. In fact, she didn’t react at all, as if she hadn’t noticed us come into the room.

“Rita, Rita!” Maeve raised her voice a little.

“Bree likes ’ita to rock her,” Liam said.

Maeve waved her hand between Rita’s face and Bryluen’s gaze. The nanny didn’t react. Maeve kept her hand above the baby’s face, completely blocking them both from looking at each other.

“Rita, can you hear us?” I asked.

Danika walked toward us holding Gwenwyfar. “What’s wrong with her?”

“Rita!” Maeve said sharply, her hand still held between them.

Rita startled, almost as if she’d been asleep, her arms starting to unfold as if to drop Bryluen, but she recovered instantly and held the baby closer. The baby started to fuss.

“What’s wrong? Did I doze off? I’m so sorry, Ms. Reed, I’ve never done that before.”

Maeve straightened up. “It’s okay, Rita, I know … it’s not your fault.”

“But I fell asleep with the baby in my arms.” She looked at me. “I am so sorry, Princess, so sorry, I would never …”

“It’s okay, Rita, honestly,” I said.

She was completely beside herself, thinking she’d nearly dropped Bryluen because she fell asleep. I waited for Maeve to explain, but she didn’t, and I didn’t either. I wasn’t sure how to explain it, and I definitely didn’t want the media to know that one of the triplets was already so magically powerful that she could bespell people with her gaze. No, that bit of information was not something I wanted in the tabloids.