Rapture's Edge

beauty.

Picasso would have killed to paint your portrait, she thought. Michelangelo would have sold his soul.

It brought a faint smile to her lips. Seeing it, the Queen looked momentarily bemused. Then, impossibly, her own lips curved, a slight, upward tilt that her formidable husband didn’t miss.

He looked back and forth between the two of them. Sharply, he directed, “Viscount. Carry on.”

The warm feeling of homecoming was snuffed out, replaced by a very non-warm feeling of dread.

The viscount shot the Alpha’s brother a smug, victorious look, but it turned sour when the Queen spoke.

“Why is she half naked?”

Everyone froze. Her husband drew in a breath, his lips flattened.

“And handcuffed?” She turned to the viscount. “Weymouth?”

Her voice—the unembellished American accent startling in the midst of all this English regalia—was exquisitely neutral.

The viscount shifted his weight from one foot to another. “She was brought in with handcuffs, Your Majesty, and it would be prudent to keep her in them—”

“Surely all you men could manage to control one collared woman?”

There was faint mockery in her voice, and Eliana sensed a lifetime of anger behind it.

Weymouth’s face turned a mottled shade of red. “She is a traitor—”

“That remains to be seen.”

“Of the worst kind—”

“I didn’t realize there were degrees.”

Weymouth’s voice rose. “Who is the daughter of a traitor—”

At that, the Queen’s voice lost all its light neutrality and hardened to a knife-blade coldness that had everyone in the room sitting a little straighter in their seats.

“As am I. Or had you forgotten?”

The Queen’s gaze, flinty now, rested on the viscount. He fidgeted under it, lips twitching in outrage, but she kept her frozen gaze on him, a dare or a warning, and apparently he thought better of arguing. He looked at Keshav and gave a quick jerk of his head.

The handcuffs were unlocked, removed. Eliana’s arms slid forward, and she had to bite back the moan of pain when feeling came flooding back into her numb arms.

“Thank you, Viscount,” said the Queen, neutral once more. “You’re always so accommodating.”

If her words or her tone held no offense, the slight curl of her lips belied her opinion of the pompous viscount.

Weymouth’s nostrils flared, his face went from red to purple, and he looked to be physically biting his tongue. The other men at the table didn’t even dare to look at him, or the Queen. Everyone kept their eyes down or on her, the lone traitor in a chair set across from them.

And this was absolutely fascinating to Eliana. Even when the Queen’s voice had hardened, she hadn’t raised it, and if she’d had any doubts before how a woman could be allowed to lead they were summarily extinguished.

This elegant, angelic-looking woman had them all—even her fierce, powerful husband—under complete control.

Instantly, Eliana knew that whatever decision was made about her fate, whatever punishment would be applied, it would be the Queen’s doing, and no one else’s. She might let them have their clown court, but the ultimate say would be hers.

In light of that, Eliana addressed her statement directly to her.

“I know there’s no way for me to prove my innocence, and if I were you I probably wouldn’t believe anything I’m about to say. All I can do is tell you the truth—if you want to hear it—and let you decide for yourself.”

This little speech was met with arched brows from the Queen, a scoff from the viscount, and a few chuckles from the other men at the table.

The Alpha, however, did not look amused. He escorted his wife up the dais. “Truth is a highly subjective thing.” His voice was as elegant and masculine as the rest of him, a resonant tenor that, combined with his British accent, she imagined was devastating to all but the most frigid of females.

Or the ones he was about to condemn to death.

“You’re wrong,” she said forcefully. This elicited a round of little gasps from the men. “Truth is an absolute, and one of the only things that really matter.”

Horribly, horribly, because she was going to die and pain was burning through her and the full weight of the realization that she might never see Demetrius again finally sank in, her eyes filled with tears. “And love.” Her voice broke over the word. “That’s the other thing. Lose either one and life becomes meaningless.”

The Queen, seated now, froze in her elaborate throne. She stared at Eliana long and hard, then quietly said, “I couldn’t agree more.”

With thinned lips and a long, sideways glance in her direction, the Alpha sat beside her and then turned his gaze back to Eliana. “You expect us to believe you had no knowledge of what happened? That you and your brother were not partners in this?”

“I don’t expect you to believe anything I say. But the truth is, I knew nothing of it.”

The viscount added flatly, “None of us will ever believe that.”

Eliana swallowed around the lump in her throat, big as a fist, and repeated a quote she’d once read, attributed to Gandhi. “Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is still the truth.”

“Your father,” the viscount went on, his voice acid, “was a mass murderer. Would you have us believe you knew nothing of that, as well?”

Eliana closed her eyes for a moment. Shame. Shame so hot and rancid and total it was like being submerged in a lake of vomit. Like a full-body tattoo, she would never be free of it.

“Yes. I—know. Now. I’m sorry.” She opened her eyes and looked at the Queen. “I don’t share his…ideas. I wanted to live with humans, not—”

“Live with humans?” The Queen jerked forward in her throne, her hands wrapped tightly around its carved arms. Her expression was incredulous. “You believe we can live together with humans, openly?”

It was evident from her reaction, from the restless shifting and blanched faces of the others, that this was a topic of monumental importance. She knew nothing of their ways, if they interacted with humans in the same way as they had in the Roman colony, some allowed to come and go, some—like her—confined, but judging by what little she’d seen so far, she’d bet they weren’t exactly revolutionaries, espousing equality and the abolition of segregation.

Would this be the truth that would get her killed?

She stared at the Queen and decided she’d rather die from this truth than from all the lies they’d accused her of. At least—here at the very end of things—she could be brave.

“Yes,” she said simply. “In fact, some of my best friends are human.”

More gasps from the gathered men, these louder than before. She’d never heard so many gasping ninnies in her entire life, and she wondered if they might suck all the oxygen out of the air and she’d suffocate to death.

But the Alpha wasn’t gasping. He wasn’t even moving. He was just inspecting her with a pair of glittering, malice-filled eyes. His voice came low, and very dark. “You’ve already been living together with them.”

It wasn’t a question, it was a statement, vibrating with menace.

I will not be intimidated. She lifted her chin. “We’re no better than them. And they’re no better than us. There’s no reason we shouldn’t live together.”

A look passed between the Alpha and his Queen.

“No more hiding, is that what you propose? No matter the consequences?” The expression on the Queen’s face was indecipherable.

Gathering her courage like armor, Eliana said quietly, “Hiding is for mice. And we are not mice.” She looked at the viscount. “At least, I’m not.”