Page 38 of Consort's Glory
Margot winced. Theodore had no way of knowing how mercilessly he picked at wounds, old and fresh. Throat tight, she answered, “It’s complicated.”
“I promise I can keep up if you explain it to me.”
“I already told you that my grandma is protective.” Margot folded her hands in her lap. They shook. “I meant it, Sovereign. She… I wasn’t allowed off of the Goodeland until I got into the apprenticeship at Luminous General. The only thing that convinced her to let me do it was its reputation, but even then I wasn’t allowed to…”
Make friends. Sign her name to groundbreaking research. Take credit for the work that might have made her one of the most respected healers in the world.
All this power to save lives, she thought, squandered.
Either way, Glory’s blessings meant nothing. If she exposed herself, there would be no more healing. If she lived by her grandmother’s rules, there would be no more healing. If she died, there would definitely be no more healing. No matter which way she looked at it, Margot was stuck; her power to do good smothered to death by circumstance and an inability to change it.
“That paper made headlines all over the world.” Theodore dropped his arm onto the table with enough force to rattle the dishes. “Luminous General was lauded for it. Got grants for it. I watched a feed of the Head Healer accepting an award for that surgery — and then I found out most of the work was done by an apprentice only identified by the initial M.”
Margot didn’t know what to make of the budding outrage in his voice, nor the fact that it seemed to be directed at everyone except her.
Brows slashing downward in a thunderous scowl, Theodore continued, “You reconstructed brain tissue that was functionally dead, Margot. For Glory’s sake, why wouldn’t Sophie want you to get the credit you fucking earned?”
“No, it’s not fair,” she replied. “But I understand why she wanted me to stay anonymous. The world isn’t safe for people like me.”
Theodore’s expression sharpened. Like a great cat sniffing blood, he leaned forward slowly, his claws digging tiny furrows into the tablecloth. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean, I—” Margot waved a hand, as if she could wipe the statement from his mind with a gesture. No, there was no way she could hope to explain it to him without lying. She had no desire to test his ability to pick up deception and dig a deeper hole. “I just mean that it’s not, okay? And to answer your question, I chose the Healing House because I came here looking for my bondmate, like I told you. Working at Laguna Honda or Solbourne General wouldn’t have allowed me the freedom to do that.”
Not that she didn’t want to. San Francisco’s premier medical institution, unfortunately named after Theodore’s family, was in league with Luminous. Their Healing Ward was phenomenal. Their contributions to the field of healing were renowned.
Margot would have loved to walk those halls, to work with those healers, to do the research that might save so many lives — but that kind of high profile position was out of the question.
That might have made her grit her teeth before, her wasted talents and intellect grating like ground glass under her skin, but now Grim’s soft hands rested on her neck. Margot didn’t have the energy or the time for that old, all-consuming bitterness. Death had a way of putting that sort of thing into perspective.
But of course, Theodore’s keen eyes didn’t miss a thing. “Do you want to work in the General?”
There was no way to answer that without revealing too much or lying outright, so Margot decided not to answer at all. Throwing caution to the wind, she snagged her wine glass and took another long pull of the sweet, richly flavored fey concoction. It was potent stuff — so potent that once upon a time it was rumored to turn non-fey into Changelings with only a few sips.
That wasn’t true, of course, since Changelings were fey children who simply looked and acted like humans until they hit puberty, but Margot could see why it had a reputation.
Not that drinking it would actually stop Theodore now that he was on a roll, though. Margot hadn’t known him long, but it didn’t take her genius intellect to pick up on the fact that he was a doggedly determined sort of elf.
Margot watched him warily from over the rim of her glass when he offered, “I could talk to the Head Healer and—”
“You will not,” she snapped. The wine went a long way toward loosening both her tongue and her temper. “It’s one thing to buy me some clothes, Sovereign, it’s quite another to get me a job. Please, I have some pride left!”
Theodore’s smile returned, but this time it had an edge to it that made her insides knot. “I’ll get you whatever I like,” he shot back, “and I’ll keep doing it even when you swipe at me. You know why?”
Margot sat up straight in her chair so fast she swayed. She fisted her hands in her lap, her jaw set in a hard line. Were all sovereigns this insufferable, or was it just him? “Why?”
“Because I like it when you claw at me.” Theodore’s eyes, so dark, framed by those lush, sooty lashes, promised all sorts of things she couldn’t take him up on. “The more you fight it, the sweeter it will make the moment you give in, darling. Just wait.”
She sucked in a livid gasp. “You are the single most arrogant elf on Burden’s ba—”
A shrill beeping cut her off.
Theodore’s hand snapped to his breast pocket, the place she knew he kept his phone, in the same instant that he lurched out of his chair so fast it tumbled onto the floor with a bang!
She didn’t get a chance to ask him what was wrong. One moment she was fuming, and the next a burning wall of magic opened up behind her. Margot clutched at the armrests of her chair as it rocked forward, pushing her stomach into the edge of the table hard enough to knock the breath out of her.
M-gate, her mind helpfully supplied as Theodore lunged across the table to haul her chair out of the way. He tugged her out of it just as quickly. Who would open an m-gate in a restaurant?
The initial burst of light and energy from an m-gate was legendary — they were, after all, one of the most complex and energy-consuming magical feats — but Margot had only ever read about them before. Theodore turned his body to shield her from the worst of the light, his arms locked tight around her and his shoulders curved to shelter her, but Margot still managed a peek at the dazzling break in reality that consumed the far wall.
Two figures materialized in the shattered brilliance of the m-gate just as it began to fade. Two familiar figures. Margot unconsciously shrank into Theodore’s chest. “Oh no.”
Theodore palmed the back of her head as he straightened, his fangs bared in a display that would have sent a saner person running. Turning only enough to look at the newcomers, he bit out, “Madam Goode, you have impeccable timing.”
