“No, indeed, I do believe things will continue to be interesting in this world,” she raised her eyes to Lavinia. “The good kind of interesting this time.”
Lavinia shook her head, a smile playing at her mouth, and Valentine knew if she didn’t feel it was beneath her, she would have rolled her eyes.
Valentine felt her lips curl at her friend’s reaction, but her thoughts strayed.
There had been much that had happened over the last years in this universe. It took a great deal of attention. So it wasn’t a surprise that the few people she knew in this world, most of them quite clever, had not taken the time to scratch under the surface of Franka Drakkar.
The truth of the matter was Valentine would have been interested in her even if she was as vile as they all thought she was.
In this world, much more than Valentine’s own (even though it was still prevalent in her own, irritatingly), a woman had very little power.
In this world, she had to rely solely on her cunning and wits, her looks, her sexuality, anything at her disposal, in order to get what she needed, grasp hold of what she wanted, wield as much power as she could amass.
These were not weak weapons in any arsenal, a woman’s or a man’s.
It was just, for some reason Valentine didn’t understand, the organ swinging between a man’s legs put him at an advantage.
In this world, where wars were still fought with swords, bows and arrows, it was understandable physical strength was valued.
Understandable but still unacceptable, as the successful reign of Queen Aurora would attest.
And from what Valentine knew, Franka Drakkar enjoyed a good life with no paid occupation, traveling the Northlands, flitting from ball to ball in fine dresses, wreaking havoc as sport as she injected her venom, her aim so true there were many who actually feared her.
Yes, Valentine found Franka Drakkar very interesting.
She had business to attend to, amongst other, more intimate needs to be met, at home. Those intimate needs she hadn’t seen to in a long time.
She needed to return to New Orleans, see to that business, then spirit back for the wedding.
She was in the mood to do a little scratching, dig beneath the surface.
And it was what lay under the skin of Franka Drakkar that she wished to discover.
* * * * *
Noc
“You’re brooding.”
“I’m not brooding.”
“You’re totally brooding.”
“Who even says brooding?”
“They do here.”
Noc scowled at Cora.
Princess Cora, to be precise. Her twin was an evil one, and now a dead one, a casualty of yesterday’s dramas, and not a big loss.
Her body had been spirited to her parents in Hawkvale.
Fucking spirited.
Apparently they grieved.
But they were the only ones.
Jesus, this place was fucking crazy.
It was also crazy interesting.
But it was still fucking crazy.
The woman sitting next to him had to seriously love her man to give up their world to live in what seemed to Noc like a Renaissance Festival run amuck. A really good one. But with all that snow outside, a really cold one.
Though Cora had told him Bellebryn, where she lived, was much farther south and had a different climate.
“We have weather like Florida. Cool winters, warm summers, sunshiny days,” she’d said then shot him a huge smile. “Without the humidity, which makes it totally perfect.”
Noc shook himself out of his thoughts and carried on the conversation.
“She’s not that girl,” he stated as to the reason of why he was “brooding.”
Cora’s beautiful face got even more beautiful when she openly showed her concern.
“I don’t know her, but from what Frey and Apollo say, she is, as in she really is,” she replied. “And Maddie told me the story of what she’d said to her, right to her face, and, Noc, it was not nice.”
“It’s an act, Cora. All a big show,” he told her.
“Maybe so, but if it is, from what I’ve heard, it’s a good one.” She leaned his way where she was sitting beside him at the dinner table. “And Noc, okay, she helped save the world. That was a big deal. But Frey explained to you what they gave her in the queen’s study. In our world value, it’s worth millions.” She leaned closer. “Maybe even billions. No joke.”
“She put her ass on the line, babe,” he returned. “And maybe she needs it.”
“Perhaps the furs, some coin.” She shook her head, moving away and tipping her eyes back to her plate. “But all that?” She kept shaking her head, speared a buttered, herbed new potato and looked back at him. “She’s a member of a House. In Lunwyn, they take care of each other in aristocratic families. She’ll have an allowance. And that allowance will be handsome. You can’t know this, but her clothes are of superb quality. She clearly has more than one maid, the way she’s tended to. She wasn’t hurting before. Her taking all that, well, I don’t need to know her to know it’s greedy, Noc.”
“I’m a cop, Cora, I read people for a living. And I’m tellin’ you, that woman who walked into that room today is not the woman that woman is.”
“I know,” she muttered, lifting the potato to her mouth. “You told us all that before she showed.”
She ate the potato, and Noc looked to his own plate to spear one too because this world might be crazy, but they had great food, and he didn’t know how those potatoes were made, but they fucking rocked.
“Maybe she was, I don’t know…playing you,” Cora suggested softly.