That was Mircea, of course, talking to the guards and, despite what we’d just seen, sounding as imperious as the prince he’d once been. And looking like it, too, because the cold loved him. It made my face flush like I had a fever, sent enough static electricity through my hair to make it frizz and crackle, and caused snowflakes to gunk up my eyelashes like old mascara. But Mircea…

Looked like the goddamned god of winter.

The cold heightened his color, but just enough to faintly tinge the high cheekbones and redden the shapely lips. The glorious mane of thick, dark hair was loose and flowing on the breeze, the usually dark eyes were starting to glow amber bright, with striations of color spiraling up from the depths as his temper rose, and the rich, dark blue, mink lined robes he wore, old fashioned even in the seventeenth century, fit the scene perfectly.

They were from the time when his family had ruled this region with an iron fist and a lot of pointy wooden stakes, or at least his brother had. But Vlad the Impaler was just a legend now, and not one that the fey appeared to have heard of, because they weren’t even looking at the current family scion. They also weren’t paying any attention to the blond huddled under a blue greatcoat and reeking of alcohol in the driver’s seat.

They were staring at me.

I looked back in surprise, because I was just supposed to be Mircea’s date for the evening and should have been beneath their notice. The Svarestri type of fey didn’t think much of their own women, and believed the human variety to be beneath contempt. My outfit ought to have helped with that, consisting of a frilly, shell pink dress with enough lace to choke a horse, and the currently fashionable “Spaniel ears” hairstyle, which looked exactly like droopy dog ears on either side of my head with a bun in back. If anyone had ever looked like the human version of a fluffy bunny, it was me.

Yet the fey didn’t seem to think so. Twin pairs of pewter colored eyes, almost the same pale gray as the sky, stared into mine. Thanks to the height of the carriage, and the fussy, watered silk high heels I was wearing, we were almost eye to eye. And theirs were wide and getting wider.

“Um,” I said, a brief, reflexive sound, barely a huff on the freezing air. But it had an outsized effect.

Two powerful fey warriors, probably centuries old and covered with weapons, abruptly turned tail and ran, with one screaming something in a language I didn’t know. They disappeared through the portcullis, both of them yelling now, and two more pairs of eyes turned on me. One was now amber bright and one was as green as a new leaf, but they held identical, accusing expressions.