blue his father had informed him that he was getting his way and going south for the weekend.
Joy. Total fucking joy. He'd packed up three days early, and when he'd gotten in the back of the car after dark and been driven over the border into Connecticut, he'd felt like he was king of the world.
Yeah, it had been nice of his parents.
Course, then he'd learned why they'd done it.
The adventure at Sax's hadn't worked out all that well. He'd ended up drinking up a storm with his cuz during Saturday 's daylight hours and had gotten so sick off a lethal combo of J?germeister and vodka Jell-O shots that Sax's parents had insisted he head home to recover.
Being driven back by one of their doggen had been such the ride of shame, and what was worse, he kept having to ask the chauffeur to stop so he could throw up some more. The only saving grace was that Sax's folks had agreed not to tell his parents - on the condition that he make a full confession when he was dropped at his front door. Clearly, they didn't want to deal with his mother and father, either.
As the doggen had pulled up in front of the house, Qhuinn had figured he was just going to say he felt ill, which was true, and that he'd asked to come back home, which was not true and never would be true.
Except things didn't go down like that.
Every light in the place had been on, and music had been streaming in the air, coming from a tent set up out back. Candles were lit in every window; people were moving around in every room.
" 'Tis a good thing we got you back in time," the doggen at the wheel had said in his happy doggen voice. "Would be a shame for you to miss this."
Qhuinn had gotten out of the car with his bag and not noticed as the servant drove off.
Of course, he'd thought. His father was stepping down as leahdyre of the glymera after a distinguished term of service heading the Princeps Council. This was the party to celebrate his work and to mark the passing of the position to Lash's father.
And this was what the staff had been bustling around about for the last couple weeks. He'd just figured his mother was going through another one of her anal, clean-everything periods, but no. All the spic-n-span had been in anticipation of this night.
Qhuinn had headed around to the back of the house, sticking to the shadows thrown by the hedges, his backpack dragging on the ground. It had been so lovely in the tent. Twinkling lights hung from chandeliers and flickered on tables with arrangements of beautiful flowers and candles. Each and every chair had been trimmed out in satin bows, and there were runners down the aisles between the seating arrangements. He'd imagined the color scheme of everything was turquoise and yellow, reflecting his family's two sides.
He stared at the faces of the partygoers, recognizing each and every one of them. The whole of his bloodline was there, along with the leading families of the glymera, and all of the guests were dressed formally, the females in gowns, the males in tuxedoes with tails. There were young darting between the grown-ups like fireflies and the advanced aged sitting on the sidelines smiling.
He had stood there in the darkness and felt like part of the clutter in the house that had gotten shut away before company had come, another useless, ugly object to be stashed in a cupboard so no one saw. And not for the first time had he wanted to take his fingers and press them into his eye sockets and ruin what had ruined him.
Abruptly, the band had gone quiet, and his father had stepped up to the microphone at the head of the parquet dance floor. As all the guests assembled, Qhuinn's mother and brother and sister came up to stand behind his father, the four of them glowing in a way that had nothing to do with all the twinkling lights.
"If I may have your attention," his father had said in the Old Language. "I'd like to take a moment to acknowledge the founding families who are here tonight." Round of applause. "The other members of the Council." Round of applause. "And the rest of you who form the core of the glymera, as well as fill out mine bloodline." Round of applause. "These