He Dethroned His Queen, Now He Wants Her Home novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: The Ferry at First Light

Alaric meets Linnet alone on the harbour pier and learns she would have stayed if he had asked, then Edith reveals that the Queen Mother told Willowmere to hold the Alpha seat for her.

Edith drove the whole way to Saltgate harbour with both hands on the wheel and said nothing until the city lights were behind us.

"The vet said somebody poured that oil on her cuffs," I said. "Verity told him it was perfume, and he believed her."

"Then somebody wanted your cat dead," Edith said, "or wanted you blamed for it."

Neither of us said who.

"We find out later," she said. "Tonight you sleep."

"I packed your toothbrush," she said. "I packed the cat's medicine, and the good teapot."

"Thank you."

"I did not pack the king."

I laughed, and it came out wrong, and Biscuit stirred in my lap.

The vet had strapped his ribs and given him a syringe of something for the pain.

He lay with his chin on my wrist and breathed in small, careful sips.

"How is he?" Edith asked.

"He's ugly when he sleeps," I said. "He's always been ugly when he sleeps."

She smiled at the road and kept going.

The ferry to Willowmere sailed at first light.

Until then we had a bench at the end of the pier, a flask of tea, and a view of black water.

The harbour smelled of salt and diesel and nothing else, and I sat in that smell with my eyes shut and was grateful for every breath of it.

I heard the car before I saw it.

It was a plain grey saloon with no flags, and it stopped at the head of the pier with its engine still running.

Alaric got out alone.

He had thrown a coat over the shirt he had worn to the vet, and he had not shaved.

"I'll check the boat," Edith said, and she was gone before I could stop her.

He walked down the planks and stopped a few steps from me.

In all our years I had never seen him arrive anywhere without a guard.

"Is he alive?" he said.

"He is."

"Good." His shoulders dropped. "Linnet, I should have gone after you. I didn't know where you'd go."

"You asked me. I told you."

"You told me an island."

He held out a cloth bundle, and I took it.

It was Biscuit's blanket from the foot of our bed, still warm from the car.

His fingers closed over mine for a moment and I did not pull away.

His wolf was close under his skin. I could feel it, the way I had felt it every day for eleven years.

"I won't let it be like this," he said. "Stay one night. Let me put you in the east wing."

"With Verity in the Luna suite?"

He had no answer for that.

I looked at the water.

"You never asked me whether I wanted to stay," I said.

His head came up.

"I stood in the hall," I said, "with the whole court listening, and I signed. Nobody asked me anything first. Not the Council, not you."

"You said you accepted."

"I did, because it was already done."

"Would you have stayed if I had asked?"

"Yes."

It was out before I could stop it.

He stood there, and I watched the answer land.

His eyes were very bright, and he took one step closer, and then another.

The pier boards shifted under him.

I could smell the soap he used and the rain on his collar, and under that the warm smell of him that no soap had ever touched.

My body knew it better than my mind did.

"Linnet," he said.

He lifted his hand toward my face.

"Your Majesty," I said, "you're standing on my ferry ticket."

He looked down.

He was standing on it.

It had slid from my lap when I took the blanket, and his boot held it flat against the planks.

For a moment neither of us moved.

Then he stepped back and picked it up, and gave it to me without a word.

His mouth had gone tight.

I folded the ticket into my coat and held it there.

I had not meant it to hurt him, and I had not meant it as a joke either.

If he touched my face I would not be able to leave.

"I'll send word," he said.

"Don't."

"When Biscuit is well."

"Send it to the vet," I said.

The ferry horn sounded across the water, one long note, and it was still dark.

Alaric stood on the pier a long time while Edith and I walked up the gangway.

Then the engines turned over, and he got smaller, a man in an unbuttoned coat with his hands hanging at his sides.

He did not leave until we were past the harbour light.

Edith found me at the rail.

She put a mug of tea in my hand and stood close, shoulder to shoulder.

"I didn't tell you something," she said. "I should have told you a month ago."

"What?"

"The elders at Willowmere have been waiting since spring. Your uncle's chair has been empty since he died."

"Why would they wait?"

Edith turned the mug in her hands.

"Because Queen Mother Beatrix told them to," she said. "She wrote that they should hold the seat until you were free."

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