Brave the Tempest (Cassie Palme) - Karen Chance Page 0,33

not true!”

“It’s entirely true! You’re never here, and when you are, you’re closeted away somewhere—”

“I am not!” I thought about it. “All right, maybe I am, but when I’m not, I’m mobbed. I have to go to the bathroom to get some peace and quiet anymore, and when I do, I still don’t. I have the right to some privacy!”

“Yes, you do,” said the man who’d just ruined it. “But your court also needs to see you occasionally. Do you even know all their names yet?”

“I was with them just this morning,” I pointed out.

“Yes, guarding them. But not interacting with them. I’d be willing to bet that more of them are afraid of you than of Marco—”

“That’s absurd!”

“—who at least gets down on all fours and plays with them, looking like some kind of huge bear—”

“First a gorilla, and now a bear. You really have a death wish, don’t you?”

“—whereas you do what, exactly? When was the last time you spent quality time with them? Have you ever?”

He stood there, hands on skinny hips, looking at me accusingly.

I stared back, completely flat-footed. Where had this come from? And what the hell was his problem? My court was fine. No, my court was better than fine! And where did Augustine, who wasn’t even part of it, get the right to tell me off? I was about to return the favor, but he didn’t give me a chance.

“Your own court doesn’t even know you yet,” he said reproachfully. “They speak of you in hushed whispers or in awed little voices—or maybe fearful ones—”

“They’re not afraid of me!”

“How would you know? I spend more time with them than you do!”

“I have a war to fight!”

A long-fingered hand clapped over my mouth. “Careful,” he said nastily. “They’ll hear you.”

I pulled it off and glared at him. “Is that why you’re here? To lecture me about my court?”

“No, I told you why I’m here. But apparently everyone else is too in awe of the great demigoddess to point out that her court still doesn’t have a Pythia. You’d think you were afraid of them, or maybe it’s just disdain. Like all those snooty women who buy my clothes and spend hours debating with me—as if they know anything—about button types, while the nannies raise the kids—hey!” He grabbed my arm. “Where are you going?”

“Out! I don’t need to listen to this!”

“Ah, so it’s fear, then.”

I rounded on him, unexpectedly furious. “You know exactly nothing about me! You don’t get to come in here—”

“And who else is going to?” he demanded. “Meek little Rhea, who worships the ground you walk on? The damned vampires, who don’t care what you do as long as it doesn’t cause the roof to cave in? Hildegarde, who might actually tell you the truth about some things, but who grew up in a time when children were best seen and not heard?”

“There’s Tami,” I said defensively, while wondering why I was arguing with a madman.

“Who is run off her feet and who isn’t you.”

He stopped the tirade as suddenly as it had begun and dropped onto the little pale blue velvet chair in front of my dressing table, although he was too tall for it and it left his knees poking up awkwardly. He ran a hand through his wet blond hair, making it stick up in little Pritkin spikes. And I felt a sudden pang of longing.

The war was playing havoc with my personal life, not that I had much of one anymore. I had to make an appointment to see my ex-“husband”; my supposed lover—who wasn’t one, since we’d never had a spare moment to define our relationship—was off trying to get himself killed; and now I was being told that I was managing to screw up my court.

Great.

I flopped onto another chair opposite Augustine and fiddled with my robe ties. “Maybe I’m better off at war,” I finally admitted. “I’m learning how to deal with that. I’m . . . not so great with the personal stuff.”

Augustine chuffed out a laugh and let his head fall back, exposing the long line of his throat. “Neither am I.”

We sat in silence for a moment.

“All I know,” he finally said, “all I can tell you, is what it’s like growing up in an environment where nobody cares. Or where it seems that way.”

I thought of Tony’s court, and my heart seized a little. I thought of Eugenie, my one-time governess, and it got worse. I’d clung to her because