Sholto was one of the fathers of the children I carried, so the Goddess had shown all of us. So technically I was still his queen. Sholto had not pressed that idea in this month back home; he seemed to understand that I was struggling to find my footing in this new, more-permanent exile.

All I could think to say aloud was, “I didn’t think the Fear Dearg owed allegiance to any court.”

“Some of us fought with the sluagh in the last wars. It allowed us to bring death and pain without the rest of you good folk”—and he made sure the last phrase held bitterness and contempt in it—“hunting us down and passing sentence on us for doing what is in our nature. The sidhe of either court have no lawful call on the Fear Dearg, do they, kinsman?”

“I will not acknowledge kinship with you, Fear Dearg, but Meredith is right. You have acted with courtesy. I can do no less.” It was interesting that Doyle had dropped the “Princess” he normally used in front of all lesser fey, but he had not used queen either, so he was interested in the Fear Dearg acknowledging me as queen, and that was very interesting to me.

“Good,” the Fear Dearg said. “Then I will take you to Dobbin, ah, Robert, he now calls himself. Such richness to be able to name yerself twice. It’s a waste when there are others nameless and left wanting.”

“We will listen to your tale, Fear Dearg, but first we must talk to any demi-fey who are at the Fael,” I said.

“Why?” he asked, and there was far too much curiosity in that one word. I remembered then that some Fear Dearg demand a story from their human hosts, and if the story isn’t good enough, they torture and kill them, but if the story is good enough they leave them with a blessing. What would make a being thousands of years old care that much for stray stories, and what was his obsession with names?