"No." Doyle cupped my face in his hands. "I would not risk our green knight. He is one of the fathers and will be a king."

"How is that going to work?" Rhys asked.

"Yes," Sholto said, "how can we all be king?"

"I think the answer is that Merry will be queen," Doyle said.

"That is no answer," Sholto said.

"It's all the answer we have now," Doyle said, and I stared into those black eyes and saw colored lights. Colors of things that were not in this room.

"You are trying to bespell me," I said.

"You need to rest, for the sake of the babies you carry. Let me help you rest."

"You want to bespell me and me to allow it," I said softly.

"Yes."

"No."

He leaned in toward me with the colors in his eyes seeming to grow brighter like rainbow stars. "Do you trust me, Meredith?"

"Yes."

"Then let me help you rest. I swear to you that you will wake refreshed, and that all the problems will still be waiting to be decided."

"You won't decide anything important without me? Promise?"

"I promise," he said, and he kissed me. He kissed me, and suddenly all I could see was color and darkness. It was like standing in a summer's night surrounded by fireflies, except these fireflies were red, green, yellow, and... I slept. 

Chapter Two

I woke to sunlight, and Galen's smiling face. His curls were very green in the light, haloed with it, so that even the pale white of his skin showed the green tint that usually only showed when he wore a green shirt. He was the only one of my men who had short hair. The only sop to custom was a braid of hair that now trailed over his shoulder and down past the bed. I'd mourned his hair at first, but now, it was just Galen. He had been just Galen to me since I was fourteen and had first asked my father to marry me to him. It had taken me years to understand why my father had said no. Galen, my sweet Galen, had no head for politics or subterfuge. In the high court of faerie you needed to be good at both.