13. Jade and Balm: at the Court of Opal Night

Jade said, "So, that...  Didn't go like I thought it would."

Balm had to agree. They had assumed Malachite was just a queen trying to get an advantage over another court. They had been so wrong, so stupidly blind.  Balm blamed herself, she had given Jade bad advice. She said, glumly, "I thought she would be looking for an excuse to send him back to us; she knows he wants to go. I thought all we had to do was give her a way to do that and save her pride.  I'm sorry."

"No, it was me," Jade said.  "I said in the wrong way.  It might have worked if I hadn't--  I challenged her."  She took a deep breath.  "And that was a mistake."

It was good that Jade realized it, Balm told herself. At least Jade knew now what approach not to take with Malachite. And Balm knew to shut up and stop giving terrible advice on how to deal with a queen who had been torturing Fell progenitors to death while she and Jade were still fledglings play-stalking each other in the nurseries.

Then Jade said, "I did not take advantage of Moon."

Jade needed to be honest, if they were going to get Moon back. Balm had seen his expression, or lack of expression, when he had left the meeting chamber. It wasn't just Malachite that Jade was going to have to appease. Balm let out her breath, and forged ahead. "No, you didn't take advantage of him, not like Malachite thinks. But we did need a consort, and we did know he must have come from a good bloodline." Finding out he had come from the primary bloodline of a court as old and prestigious as Opal Night had explained a lot. "She's right about that. We assumed his court was destroyed, but we didn't know. We didn't try to find out."

Jade didn't want to hear it yet.  "What, I shouldn't have taken him until we got to the Reaches and asked if anyone recognized his bloodline?"

"That's probably exactly what she thinks."

 Jade grimaced. "He wanted to be with me.  With us."

"Of course he did. His other choice was to go live with groundlings again, or alone in a tree or a hole somewhere." Everything Moon had told them about how he lived before Stone had stumbled on him sounded awful, even the parts Moon clearly thought of as the good times. Balm couldn't imagine that he would turn down the security of a court, even a court one stumble away from its last legs like Indigo Cloud.

Jade hissed at her.  Because they were alone, with no one to see, Balm gave her a shove to the shoulder. "It's true.  Moon knows a lot about groundlings, and hunting and fighting, and survival, so it's easy to assume that when he sounds certain about something, he must know what he's talking about. But he still knows hardly anything about Raksura and he doesn't understand much about courts."

Jade folded her arms, tapping her claws on her arms.  But Balm could tell she was listening now. "You're saying that when he says he wants to stay with Indigo Cloud, it's only because he has no idea what a real court is like."

"Yes."   Moon had a choice now.  Balm  couldn't imagine what it would be like to be offered a life as a consort at Opal Night, a court so strong it could take in and protect its half-Fell children, so powerful it could give Moon anything he wanted. And he would be the only consort of Malachite and Dusk's blended bloodline until Celadon clutched.

Queens didn't usually want to take a consort who had already been taken by another queen, but it wasn't unheard of. Indigo had taken Cloud, after all. And for a chance to get a claw into Opal Night's primary bloodline, there were probably a lot of queens who would be happy to take Moon, secondhand or not. He was still young, still beautiful, and Opal Night's protection would erase any qualms about his past.

Moon's royal Aeriat fledglings would be in Malachite's direct line, and would have their pick of mates. It was a huge advantage for any court, and it would be hard to believe that Indigo Cloud hadn't schemed for it, that they hadn't known Moon had come from Opal Night.

It would be hard to believe if you didn't know Indigo Cloud. Balm doubted anyone in the court, including Pearl, was capable of scheming their way into an extra helping of baked roots right now, let alone hatching a plot to acquire Opal Night as an unwilling ally.

From Jade's glum expression, she was thinking along the same lines.  She hissed out a resigned breath.  "I'll get him back.  I'll convince her to let him go.  Even if I have to help save this stupid groundling city."