Crown of Moonlight (Court of Midnight and Deception #2) - K.M. Shea Page 0,42

of the carpet, wearing a cocky smirk with a thin wreath of golden leaves pressed into his russet hair.

Apparently, to observe the “passing of the seasons,” King Birch was supposed to present a “harvest bouquet” to King Fell, officially passing the season off to him.

Yeah, I’m pretty sure some heavy drinking was involved when they came up with this idea.

I rested my chin on my fist. “Sheesh. I should have been suspicious when Lord Linus insisted on staying home—he had the right idea.”

“The ceremony has existed for centuries,” Skye said. “And it’s tradition for other monarchs—especially those in the Fae Ring—to be present to witness. You had to come.”

“You’re just being quarrelsome,” Indigo said. “Because you hate socials.”

She and Skye stood behind me, in the shadows of my temporary throne. King Fell had assembled four of them—one for me, King Solis, Queen Rime of the Winter Court, and Queen Verdant of the Spring Court.

We were the “lucky” monarchs who made up the regional Fae Ring—basically the monarchs who made all the decisions for fae in the Midwest, including which monarch would serve as the fae representative on the Regional Committee of Magic.

Being a part of the Fae Ring isn’t random chance—heck, no, that’d be a waste of power plays and politics! No, we were the Fae Ring because we were the most powerful Courts in the Midwest, and had been for decades, if not centuries.

I scowled as I shifted in my stupid temporary throne—I’m pretty sure Fell designed them to be as uncomfortable as possible, and whoever was in charge of decorating had hot glued a ton of dried corn stalks to the wooden thrones, making them the perfect home for bugs.

“Yes, I hate socials, but if someone could give me a legit reason for this, I wouldn’t be so bitter,” I said. “But as far as I can tell, this is just another way for monarchs to show off their power to each other. I mean, there isn’t even a human audience that they’re performing for!”

I glanced to the side, where more onlookers stood—though calling them that was possibly a little misleading since I didn’t think they wanted to be there any more than I did.

King Fell had recruited a bunch of his nobles to watch, but he’d also made all of the unseelie and seelie monarchs in the Midwest come to the ceremony.

The seelie and unseelie Courts are different from the bigger Courts—like my Night Court or freakin’ Fell’s Autumn Court.

Their territories are a lot smaller—usually just one city—and there’s a lot of infighting and wars because you can sometimes get multiple seelie and unseelie Courts competing for the same city.

The real seal to their power, though, is that they don’t have land in the fae realms like the rest of us titled monarchs, and in general, they just have to live with whatever rules the more powerful Courts decide on.

Since they’re easy to push around because they can’t really say no—even to the less powerful monarchs like me—none of the seelie/unseelie rulers could refuse Fell after he told them to come. It was just a way for him to remind them they were subservient to him—the jerk.

I’ll give him what he deserves—it might not be until I’m an old granny, but I will persevere!

Weirdly, a few of the unseelie and seelie monarchs saw me looking at them. Their complexions turned ashen, and they bowed deeply to me.

Huh. I wonder what that’s about?

“After the ceremony, there is a celebration feast. You can leave after that,” Skye said. “I’m confident you can last that long.”

I glanced one last time at the still-bowing unseelie and seelie monarchs, then straightened in my chair. “Easy for you to say that—you’re wearing slacks and a suitcoat,” I grumbled. “I’m doing historically-inaccurate-punk-Greek.”

For the ceremony, Indigo had piled my hair on top of my head in messy ringlets and used pins and a headband to keep it there. She’d then stuffed me into a gown Fell had sent—which was a deep, purply-black, and fit kind of like a toga, except it was more fitted through the waist and gathered at my neck like a halter top, completely baring my shoulders.

Apparently, this was the dress code for Fell’s ego trip, because Queen Verdant and Queen Rime were dressed similarly—although Rime wore a white gown and Verdant wore green.

Solis—the lucky duck—got to wear a comfortable golden robe that didn’t look too different from his regular stuff.

The fae used clothing as a sort of manipulation—they put them on