"That's closer than you know," I said.
"Then may I?" he asked.
He tried to keep the eagerness off his face, but failed. I guess I couldn't blame him. It was
going to be like this all night once word got out. No, it was going to be worse, much worse.
I nodded.
He began to bring my hand to his lips as he spoke. "You know I would never willingly hurt you, Merry." He kissed my hand, and his lips brushed the ring. It quickened-that was the only word I had for it. It flared through me, through us both. The sensation seemed to squeeze my heart, chase it into my throat like a trapped thing.
Rhys stayed bent over my hand, but I heard him breathe out an "Oh, yes." He raised up, and his eye looked unfocused.
It was the strongest reaction yet, and that sort of worried me. Did the strength of the reaction say something about how strong the man's virility was, sort of a supernatural sperm count? Nothing personal to Rhys, but if I had to sleep with anyone tonight, it was probably going to be Galen. The ring could pulse away to its carved little heart. I would decide who shared my bed. Until Auntie dearest sent her spy to me, of course. I pushed that thought away-I couldn't deal with it right now. There were sidhe in her Guard that I'd sooner kill than kiss, let alone anything more.
Rhys wrapped his fingers through mine, pressing the palm of his hand against the ring. The second pulse was stronger, bringing an involuntary gasp from my throat. It felt like things deep inside my body were being caressed. Things that no hand should ever touch-but power... power wasn't constrained by the bounds of flesh.
"Oh, I like it," Rhys said.
I pulled my hand out of his. "Don't do that again."
"It felt good and you know it."
I looked into his eager face, and said, "She doesn't just want me to find another fiance. She wants me to have sex with several or all of the Guard that this ring recognizes. It's a race to see who gives her an heir of the blood royal first. Cel, or me."
He stared at me, studying my face, as if trying to read my expression. "I know you wouldn't make a joke of this, but it seems too good to be true."
It made me feel better that Rhys didn't trust it either. "Exactly. Right now she's told me the celibacy is off for little ol' me, but I have no witnesses. I think she's sincere, but until she announces it in full court, I'll just pretend that sex is still taboo."
He nodded. "What's a few hours more of waiting after a thousand years?"
I raised eyebrows at him. "I can't do everybody tonight, Rhys, so it's going to be more than a few hours wait."
"As long as I'm first in line, what does it matter?" He tried to make it a joke, but I didn't laugh.
"I'm afraid that this is exactly how everyone else is going to feel. There's only one of me, and what, twenty-seven of you?"
"Do you have to sleep with all of us?"
"She didn't say so, but she is going to insist on me sleeping with her spy, whoever he turns out to be."
"You hate some of the Guard, Merry, and they hate you back. She cannot expect you to take them to your bed. Lord and Lady, if one that you hated got you pregnant..." He didn't finish the thought.
"I'd be trapped into marriage with a man I despised, and he would be king."
Rhys blinked at me, the white eye-patch catching the light as he moved his head. "I hadn't thought about that. Truthfully all I was seeing was the sex, but you're right-one of us is going to be king."
I glanced up at the grey sheet of webs. They were empty, but... "Should we be talking about this here with this above us?"
He looked up at the spiderwebs. "Good point." He offered me his arm. "May I escort you to the banquet, my lady?"
I slid my hand over his arm. "With pleasure."
He patted my hand. "I hope so, Merry, I certainly do hope so."
I laughed, and the sound echoed strangely in the hallway, making the cobwebs drift and float. It was almost as if the ceiling stretched far, far overhead into some vast darkness that only the spiderwebs hid from our view. My laughter faded, long before we stepped out from under the webs.
"Thank you, Rhys, for understanding why I'm afraid, instead of just concentrating on the fact that you may be about to end several hundred years of celibacy."
He pressed my left hand to his lips. "I live only to serve under you, or above you, or any way you want me."
I punched him in the shoulder. "Stop it."
He grinned.
"Rhys isn't the name of any known death god. I researched you in college, and you weren't there."
He was suddenly very busy staring down the ever-narrowing hallway. "Rhys is my name now, Merry. It doesn't matter who I was before."
"Of course it matters," I said.
"Why?" he asked, and suddenly he was all serious, asking a very grown-up question.
Watching him glow white and shining in the grey light, I didn't feel grownup. I felt tired. But there was a weight to his gaze, a demand in his face, that I had to answer.
"I just want to know who I'm dealing with, Rhys."
"You've known me all your life, Merry."
"Then tell me," I said.
"I don't want to talk about the long-ago days, Merry."
"What if I invited you into my bed? Would you tell me all your secrets then?"
He studied my face. "You're teasing me."
I touched the scarred edge of his face, tracing with my fingers from the roughened skin to pass a fingertip over the full softness of his lips. "No teasing, Rhys. You're beautiful. You've been a friend to me for years. You protected me when I was younger. It would be poor repayment if I left you celibate when I could put an end to it-besides the fact that running my mouth down that washboard stomach of yours has been a recurring sexual fantasy."