“Or them?” This time I indicated a pair of Candela walking arm-in-arm down the hall, lost in one another’s eyes, with the glowing spheres of their Merry Dancers in attendance. “Do they need to be controlled? Does anyone here look like they need to be kept ‘under control’?”

“I . . . I don’t know.”

“Right. Let me tell you something: the only reason I worry about upsetting Sylvester is because he’s my friend, and I don’t like upsetting my friends.” Not that you could tell from my recent behavior—but Quentin didn’t know that. “I don’t do it because he’s better than I am, because he’s not. His rank gives him the right to command me, and I recognize that; we’re not living in a democracy. I’ll give him my attention and my courtesy, but that’s because I respect him. I’ve never feared or honored him just because he was the Duke, and I refuse to start doing it now.”

“But . . .”

“Hear me out,” I said, shaking my head. “Shadowed Hills is the most egalitarian duchy I’ve ever visited, and a lot of what makes it like that is the way Sylvester rules. He demands respect for who he is, not what he is. I refuse to see that change if I can help it. Am I making sense?”

Quentin nodded, eyes wide. “I . . . yes.”

“Good. Let’s go see Sylvester.”

“Yes, milady.”

“That’s another thing—my name’s not milady. It’s Toby. I’m not a cartoon dog.”

“Yes, Toby,” he said, and smiled at me. Maybe I was doing better than I thought. “Will you follow me now?”

“It wouldn’t do for me to ditch my escort, would it?” I stepped up beside him, and he grinned, offering his arm with all the gallantry and style one expects from a trained courtier. The difference in our heights made walking somewhat awkward, but no one laughed at us. Never laugh at a changeling in formal dress with a fledgling Daoine Sidhe on her arm. One of them is bound to take offense, and you could wind up with a serious problem on your hands. Besides, there was no way for us to look sillier than some of the other couples in the hall, even if their oddities could be ascribed to things like belonging to radically different species. We’d grow out of it; Quentin was bound to get taller, and I almost never went out in public wearing a dress. They’d still look silly in ten years.

We stopped at the audience chamber doors, Quentin releasing my arm. I gave him a quizzical look, and he shrugged, saying, “I don’t have permission to enter with you, milady.”

“Gotcha,” I said. I might have tried to invite him anyway, but I still needed to tell Sylvester about the Queen’s reaction. Smiling, I offered, “I should be around a little more after this. I’ll bring a ball or something. We can have a party, just you and me, where nobody cares whether we’re dignified or not. Cool?”

“I’d like that,” said Quentin. “Cool.”

“Good,” I said, and went back into the audience chamber.

The room seemed even emptier than it had before, now that it was just Sylvester and Luna waiting for me on the dais. They’d abandoned their chairs; Sylvester was sitting on the steps, and Luna was curled next to him, her head resting on his shoulder. Sylvester looked up when he heard me close the doors, and waved, beckoning me forward.

Luna sat up once I was in conversational distance, offering a wan smile. Her ears were still half flat, telegraphing her distress. I couldn’t blame her.

“Toby,” said Sylvester wearily. “Are you all right? Really? I . . . it’s been so long since you’ve come to see us, and when you finally do, you come with news of a murder . . . and Evening. She’s been here since forever. She was over a thousand years old, did you know that? The only one older living in this state is the Luidaeg.”

“I know,” I said, moving to sit down on the bottom step, looking up at the pair of them. I laced my fingers around one knee, resisting the urge to fidget. “I have to find the answers to why all this is happening. I don’t . . . I owe it to her to find out why she died.”

“It’s not just that, is it?”

Unwilling to answer him, I turned my face away.

After several seconds of silence, Sylvester sighed. “This isn’t the first place you came, is it?” I shook my head, looking back as he smacked the top step of the dais. “Dammit, Toby. You went Home, didn’t you? Answer me!”

“Yeah,” I said. “I did.”

“Oak and ash, why? You knew I’d help you if you asked. I’ve been waiting for you to ask.”

“We all have,” Luna said. “We’ve been so worried.”

“I didn’t think you would,” I said, lacing my fingers tighter together. “I’m sorry. I just . . . I didn’t think.”

“Oh, Toby.” Sylvester closed his eyes. “What did you promise him?”

“Bill to be settled later.”

“And it’s too late to talk you into telling him you won’t take his help, I suppose.”

I laughed, a little wildly. “Devin could call me on breach of contract if I even tried—and I won’t try unless you order me to. I have to find the answers to this.”

“Was there no one else?” Luna placed her hand on Sylvester’s arm, squeezing gently. “Even if you didn’t think you could come here, the Queen . . .”

“Sent me away.” Sylvester opened his eyes, both of them staring as I continued, “I went to her first. She said no one’s allowed to even speak Evening’s name, much less try to find out what happened. She ordered me out of her Court. Frankly, she scared me. I’m afraid she may not be entirely stable.”

“That’s not news, but it’s also not encouraging,” said Sylvester, his tone as grim as my own. There was a new sharpness in his eyes. It can be easy to forget that Sylvester won the right to hold Shadowed Hills; it wasn’t just his heritage that got him his throne. He was a hero once, and he earned everything he has. He changes when there’s a threat to be overcome: it’s like he pulls on a second skin, one he almost forgets the rest of the time, and becomes a hero again. A tired, old hero, one who wields a pen instead of a sword and rides waves of paperwork rather than a white charger, but still a hero. “I’m not happy that you went to Devin when she threw you out. You should have come here.”