Distress hitched into her voice. “It was never a concern. The room, it faces north. I thought…I only thought there would be less direct sun, and you’d be more comfortable. I would never insult a guest—a friend. I wouldn’t insult someone who welcomed me into their home when they have come to mine.”

She got quickly to her feet. “I can have your things moved, right away. I—”

He held up a hand. “There’s no need. And I apologize for assuming.” It was rare for him to feel the discomfort of guilt, but he felt it now. “It’s a considerate choice. I shouldn’t have expected less.”

“Why are we…I don’t understand why we seem to be so often at odds.”

“Don’t you?” he murmured. “Well, that’s likely for the best. So, to what do I owe the honor of your presence?”

“You make fun of me,” she said quietly. “You’re so hard when you speak to me.”

She thought he sighed, just a little. “I’m in a mood. I don’t rest well in unfamiliar places.”

“I’m sorry. And I’m here to impose again. I’ve asked Blair to hunt the vampires now in Geall, to bring at least one of them back here. Alive.”

“Contradiction in terms.”

“I don’t know how else to express it,” she snapped. “My people will fight because it’s asked of them. But I can’t ask them to believe—can’t make them believe—what seems impossible. So they need to be shown.”

It would be a good queen, he thought, who didn’t expect to be followed blindly. And see how she stood there now, he noted. So still, so serious, when he knew a war raged inside of her.

“You want me to go with her.”

“I do—she does. I do. God, I am forever stumbling with you. She asked that you and Larkin go with her. She doesn’t want me. She feels, and so do I, that I’m of more use gathering the forces, helping lay the traps she devised.”

“Ruling.”

“I don’t rule yet.”

“Your choice.”

“Aye. For now. I’d be grateful if you would go with her and Larkin, if you can find a way to bring back a prisoner.”

“I’d rather be doing than not. But there’s the matter of knowing where to look.”

“I have a map. I’ve already spoken with my uncle, and know where the attacks—the known attacks—took place. Larkin knows the land of Geall. You can have no better guide. And you know you can have no better companion, in leisure or in battle.”

“I’ve no problem with the boy, or with a hunt.”

“Then as soon as you’re ready, if you’d come to the outer courtyard. I can have someone show you the way.”

“I remember the way.”

“Well. I’ll go see to your mounts and provisions.” She went to the door, but he was there before her—without seeming to have moved at all. She looked up into his face. “Thank you,” she said and slipped quickly out.

Those eyes, he thought as he shut the door behind her. Those long gray eyes could kill a man.

It was lucky he was already dead.

But he could do nothing about the scent she’d left behind her, the scent of woodland glades and cool spring water. Not a bloody thing he could do about that.

“W e’ll be watching.” Glenna laid a hand on Blair’s leg when Blair mounted her horse. “If you get into trouble we’ll know. We’ll do what we can to help.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve got thirteen years of this under my belt.”

Not in Geall, Glenna thought, but she stepped back. “Good hunting.”

They rode through the gates, and turned south.

It was a good night for it, Blair thought. Clear and cool. It would be easier to track them by night when they were active than by day when they would have gone to nest somewhere. In any case, she wouldn’t have Cian, which she considered an advantage, if they hunted by day.

She rode between the two men at an easy trot. “I didn’t want to ask Moira,” she began. “But her mother was the first attack reported.”

“Aye, the queen was the first death we know of.”

“And there were no other attacks that night? No one taken?”

“No.” Larkin shook his head. “Again that we know of.”

“Target-specific then,” Blair mused. “They came for Moira’s mother—we assume. We don’t know how they got in.”

“I’ve thought of it,” Larkin admitted. “Before the queen’s death, there would have been no reason to stop someone from coming in. A wagon of supplies, perhaps, or any reasonable bit of business. They would have been passed through.”

“Plays.” Blair nodded after a moment. “Come in shortly after sundown. Stay in a bolt hole until everyone settles in for the night. Lure the queen outside, kill her.” She glanced at Larkin. “We don’t have more specifics?”

“Moira won’t speak of it, really. I’m not sure she remembers the details of it.”

“Maybe it doesn’t matter—for our purposes. So they kill the queen, then they stay. Maybe they can’t get back through except at specific times. But they don’t rampage,” she pointed out. “A handful of deaths in all these weeks. That’s pretty low profile for the breed.”

“There will have been more,” Cian commented. “Travelers, whores, those not as quickly missed as others. But they’ve been careful, and avoided what we’re doing now. The hunt. I don’t think they’re only hiding from us.”

“Who then?” Larkin glanced over and saw Blair was studying Cian thoughtfully.

“He means Lilith. You think they’re trying to stay off her radar? Why?”

“Because it could be you’re only half right in your theory. Target-specific, yes,” Cian agreed. “But I doubt the target was the queen. It’s Moira who was chosen as a link in the first circle.”

“Moira.” There was alarm in Larkin’s voice as he swiveled in the saddle to look back at the castle growing smaller with distance. “If they tried to kill her once—”

“They’ve tried to kill all of us, more than once,” Cian pointed out. “Without success. She’s as safe as she can be, where she is.”