Chapter 2

Lucas slapped a hand over his mouth. "Am not." Not exactly the sharp, cutting rejoinder he'd been hoping for, but... well.

Lucas + Ale apparently = Squishy Brain² with a remainder of Fuzzy Tongue.

Parry smirked. "You might as well be. I don't even want to know where you went just now."

Lucas's eyebrows went up. "I've been right here." He frowned. Hadn't he? He didn't remember going anywhere.

"Riiiiight." Parry sat back in his chair and eyed Lucas with a look that was unsettlingly appraising. "So tell me, Tripp, since you're seeming a bit more... relaxed than usual...."

He shrugged when Lucas narrowed his eyes, but the smirk was still there, and if there was one thing Lucas knew all too well, it was that one should never trust a smirking Redford Parry. Also, one should never trust one's older sister to dye one's ridiculous red hair a much more sedate and respectable shade of brown, but he'd been ten, after all, and Nan had *sworn* she knew what she was doing, and then sworn it wasn't *quite* as green as Lucas kept wailing it was, and anyway, it was autumn and all the lads were wearing hats these days, so she didn't see why he was being such a prat about--

"*Tripp*!"

"*What*?"

Lucas jolted this time, back snapping straight, as he squinted across the table and tried to focus once again on... Parry. Right.

"I asked you if you'd found a buyer for the estate yet."

Lucas scowled as he watched Parry fill his ale up again, then he took a long slurp before answering, "Who said anything about selling the estate?"

Well, besides Lucas, who'd been begging his mother for bloody *years* to let him try to unload it. Because they simply couldn't afford to run it. And the expense of "keeping up appearances" was running it into the ground. "The-Queen-your-cousin would never approve, dear," his mother had said. "We can't embarrass her by being her 'poor relations,' can we? You'll have to figure something out. You're the master, after all."

It was going to turn Lucas's ridiculously red hair white, and very soon, he just knew it. All being cousin to the Queen seemed to be good for was making it necessary to spend money one didn't have in order to maintain property one didn't want. Well, that wasn't entirely fair--accepting the position of Queen's Librarian his cousin had offered him in a rather astute moment of mercy had helped. Until his mother started faking fainting spells every time she was reminded that her only son had taken a--gasp!--job.

"If your father was still alive, this would kill him."

Lucas somehow doubted that. Lucas was of the very private opinion that his father might not, in fact, be dead, but merely hiding.

"It simply isn't done, love! Just raise the rents," Mother said blithely, like it was that easy. Like the tenants weren't scrabbling just as hard as Lucas was. Of course, he'd wager the tenants didn't have to worry about why there had to be real silk ribbons stitched into each of the four--four!--layers of his sisters' petticoats, even though no one could see them. At least, no one had *better* be seeing them.

"I've heard the odd mutter now and then." Parry waved it away. "Understandable, I suppose, that you can't get a buyer, what with the Circle on the eastern downs, and all."

Lucas curled his lip. The Stone Circle--or The Bloody Millstone, as Alex fondly referred to it--was the reason Lucas wouldn't be able to get a buyer, even if his mother let him try. And Parry bloody well knew it. One stupid ancestor invites one stupid Daimin through the portal and causes a tiny little (massive, crop-destroying) flood, and the place is branded forever after. It wasn't fair.

"The Circle belongs to the Queen." Lucas muttered it into his ale then drained it and thumped the empty mug to the table. This wasn't nearly as fun as it had been a few minutes ago. Bloody Parry.

"Who dotes on her youngest cousin." Parry nodded like they were conspirators as he refilled Lucas's mug.

Lucas had to grin a little. "She does, doesn't she?"

Whoops, he hadn't meant to say that out loud. Even if it wasn't exactly a secret, it was a bit rude to go about trumpeting it. Still, it was nice to be doted on by someone. Well, Alex doted on Lucas for some reason. The grin stretched wider as Lucas cast a hazy glance back over to the billiards tables and shoved his spectacles up again as he tried to focus, but it didn't help this time. Didn't matter. He'd know Alex's shape anywhere. Damn, he looked so good in that blue cravat. It brought out the color of his eyes as they caught Lucas's, like a pair of cobalt lakes above a soft, spreading smile that made Lucas's stomach do a lazy little flip, and heat pool down in his--

"Tripp!"

Damn it. "What?"

Oh. Parry again. Still. Whatever.

"I was *saying*," Parry told him patiently, "that, if you asked it of her, the-Queen-your-cousin would probably see her way to granting you the rights to the Circle."

Lucas scowled. "Why would I want to do that?" Just what he needed--one more maintenance expense he couldn't afford.

"So you could sell the entire estate." Parry said it with the obvious long-sufferance of one addressing the very dim. Or the very drunk. "The Circle would still be a detriment to a good price, but you've a full roster of tenants that's the envy of every landlord in the province, and your vineyards and wineries turn some good coin." He shrugged. "It could even out."

Yes. Brilliant. Lucas could make just enough with the sale to pay off all the debts, and then they'd all be homeless as well as poor. Honestly, did Parry think Lucas hadn't looked at all the angles? And anyway, now that Lucas thought about it, how was it that Parry seemed to know exactly how taut the Tripp purse strings were these days, when Lucas had been bloody killing himself to keep it quiet?

Perhaps he was being uncharitable toward an old not-quite-friend, since Parry had introduced Slade to Clara, after all, but none of this was sitting quite right.

Lucas narrowed his eyes. Drat it all, there went the pleasant buzz he'd been nursing. "Parry," he began slowly, "just exactly what are you--?"

"Yes, just exactly what are you doing, Parry?"

"Alex!" Lucas tried to twist around so he could see, because that had come from right behi--whoops, moved too fast. Alex gripped Lucas's elbow and helped him right himself in the chair again. Lucas thanked him with a grin. By the lift of Alex's eyebrows, Lucas thought perhaps he hadn't managed it very well. Or maybe he'd managed it a little too well.

Alex patted Lucas's shoulder then turned on Parry. "You've been hovering about Mister Tripp all evening." His tone a bit on the accusing side. "And that's the seventh time I've seen you refill his flagon."

He paused as Lucas snorted. "Refill his flagon"--it had a vaguely filthy ring to it.