Battle to Raise the Bayou Queen

To raise an army

The main ballroom stretched out as large as the whole main floor of Hilltop. To one side a long banquet table with mountains of flowers, and heaps of food I didn't have the leisure to eat, lay like perfect art pieces. The white table clothes dripped all the way down to the floors just brushing the intricate carpeting.

Standing near the tables, copses of people chatted in low voices holding long stemmed glasses with self-cooling cores in their hands like garnishes. The crowd moved in the middle of the room in peacock colors and bright bits of metal glittered with the evening lights.

I however stood by the door, as the good hostess, thinking of what was coming and how I could beg, borrow, or steal my way into getting the other families to join my battle plans. Still tired from calling to the Bayou King, I wanted more than anything to get this business over quickly and hide in bed for a few hours.

I extended one hand to the elder of the Amphihuma family who smelled faintly of fish and the docks. He glared at my hand, unwilling to take it. His bristling beard looked out of place with the gloss of his leather vest, and the tailored fit of his breeches. "I ain't shakin' no hand. Who knows whatcha got up your sleeve."

I curtsied to him instead, averting my eyes.

"That man done been an ass," Jack whispered at my shoulder, once he left.

I couldn't help but smile, but I used it to greet Lady Melusine. Her eyes were hooded as she looked about the room. "Let us not celebrate so late into the night that we are tired in the morning." Her mind brushed mine, and I felt her simmering rage, the desire to tear things limb from limb. In that moment, grateful that I wasn't the target of her rage.

"I'll take it under advisement." Joss stepped out from the crowd taking her hand and kissing it.

"You," she said turning up her nose. "Were not in favor of the deal we struck."

Joss nodded. "I am grateful for your assistance, nonetheless."

She took her hand back with a haughty look. "As I said, if it were just you, I wouldn't be interested."

He bowed to me and left, a prickling hurt resonated from him my way as if Melusine had just kicked Joss in the shins. Turning to Melusine, "Lady," I said, "You realize he likes you, right?" I absently asked Melusine, taking the next hand of a passing guest and bobbing into a curtsey as I was supposed to.

Her head snapped up and she looked over her shoulder. "He said that?"

I shook my head, wishing for pockets to shove my hands into and a better mental filter to keep me from saying stupid things. "No." I tapped my finger to my temple. "He just thought it."

Her eyes narrowed. "Curious." Melusine walked away, her eyes trailing along Joss' path.

"She's the one that likes puzzles right?" Celeste asked, straightening my skirt, her own full purple dress the color of the ladies in waiting.

I grinned. "I just sunk Joss. Ooops." Though I felt no guilt setting her on his tail, not after how he'd treated Jack. "He needs a good tumble before we meet the Ormr."

Celeste stuffed down her own smile, stepping back to the side.

I held up my hand for the next guest, whose cold grip I knew too well. I met Vorm's eyes, those black pools where the ghosts of all his tortured victims screamed. "Little Sassy found her way home." The smile that accompanied those words sent trembling down my back, and I wanted to curl up on the floor covering my head.

"Go away, Vorm, crawl back to your father. I am Lady Winhamina now and I am not cowed by you." I breathed into the steel bones of my corset, each one like a strangling snake about my chest. The courage I held became slippery.