“Visits to a couple of Provinces,” Daemon said. “Seems my presence is required to sort out some things. Jaenelle left this morning for Dea al Mon to visit Surreal, who is feeling crowded by the amount of trees in the Territory.”

“The Dea al Mon are called the Children of the Wood,” Lucivar said. “Isn’t hard to figure their Territory would have trees.”

“Isn’t hard to figure that the Dea al Mon’s idea of a city is vastly different from Surreal’s,” Saetan said.

“She doesn’t have to stay there,” Lucivar said. “She can come back to the town house in Amdarh if she’s happier living there.”

“She’s not quite ready to leave. Apparently she and Grandmammy Teele are getting along extremely well.”

It took a minute before Lucivar remembered to breathe. Grandmammy Teele, as she was called, was the matriarch of a Dea al Mon clan and had adopted Jaenelle into her family before Saetan had formally adopted Witch. She wore the role of cranky old woman because she enjoyed it, but she was a force to be reckoned with—not to mention a very skilled Black Widow. “That’s a terrifying thought.”

Saetan’s gold eyes twinkled as he said dryly, “Isn’t it?”

TERREILLE

“Cassie.”

Cassidy sat back on her heels, looked over her shoulder, and wondered whom she was dealing with—Gray the boy, or Gray as the man he was becoming. Since she wasn’t sure, she said warily, “Yes?”

“Do you think you’ve had enough for today?”

Asking, not telling. But not a long step away from telling, and a much shorter step away from that bossy, fussy state of mind that was impossible to deal with when a Warlord Prince got stubborn.

“I’ve got one more annual to plant. Then I’ll get cleaned up and meet with the Steward for Queen’s work,” Cassidy said. Which meant she would be sitting quietly for the next several hours, an activity that didn’t make Warlord Princes as temperamental as physical activity did.

“All right,” Gray replied.

Satisfied with each other’s answers, they went back to their respective work.

Cassidy took her time planting the last annual just to stay outside a little while longer and take in how much had been done over the past three days.

Lucivar had been a lesson in how one man could shake up a court. By the time she and Shira had joined the men, Lucivar had set down rules and boundaries that everyone had agreed to. All right, to be accurate, no one had dared to argue. Even Gray, who was clearly trying to deal with a side of his nature he’d never dealt with before.

But Lucivar had done more than set boundaries. He’d knocked down boundaries the other men hadn’t been aware of building.

“You have a problem with sweating?” Lucivar asked Ranon.

“No,” Ranon replied.