They had been gone so long that she had partially forgotten what the hall had looked like when they stepped through, her finger smarting but healing over quickly with a tingle of magic inside her that made her feel deliciously normal.
The hush that came over the room as the doorway opened and they stepped through was loud and they were met with a sucked intake of breath.
Glancing around the room, her eyes found Alaric and then Epharis, whose eyes had locked onto her in an instant.
Her eyes moved from him, and she found Versalis, his intensity drawing her attention to him.
His jaw was set, and she caught a glimpse of his disappointment when she turned her attention from him.
"Where are the twins?" she asked into the silence and Alaric cleared his throat.
"Welcome back, princess."
"Where are the twins, Alaric?" she repeated, and his jaw clenched.
"Dungeons," he said moodily, very aware that she had been rude in front of half of the Court.
Turning her back on him, she swept from the room with the three men following along with faces like marble, cold and determined.
When the door to the cell turned out to be locked, she simply ripped it off the hinges and stepped inside to find the two vampires shackled to the walls and looking pitiful, unnaturally skinny and hollow.
They keened as she approached and she lowered herself to her knees between them, her arms lifting to them.
She didn't so much as flinch as they bit and ravaged her forearms, digging for her blood that began to spill the moment they bit her.
She let them feed until they were satiated, and Kai looked up at her as she stood, his face pale as he saw her indifference.
"Release them," she ordered, Epharis having followed them though she had not seen him following.
When she turned, she found him breathing down her neck. "You and I are going to talk, just as soon as you release them."
He seemed taken aback by her demand and his curiosity got the better of him, nodding.
She ignored the cry of her name from Kai, sweeping from the cell and back upstairs to find Alaric stomping towards her looking agitated.
"You, who do you think you are speaking to me like that?" he snarled.
"I'm the Queen of Winter, Alaric, and I will speak to you how I wish," she said coldly, causing the man to stop and stare at her. "Move, or I will move you."
He was blocking the hall and without a word, he stepped aside to allow her to pass. She swept past him, her companions following along behind her with new additions being the twins and then Versalis.
She ignored them all as she moved through the halls and up to her rooms beside Alaric's, finally turning to observe the group of stragglers.
Uzo, Jagum and Daemon moved to flank her immediately as the various men moved into her room.
"You Epharis, and you two," she indicated the lich and twins. "Will perform the same methods you performed before in order to return me to my natural state. We have four days and I'm not in the mood to play games with any of you. I came to you three only as a courtesy, if you refuse, I will find others."
Her coldness was met with silence, and she turned away from them, drawing Daemon down and he bowed to her immediately.
"Incapacitate them if required," she murmured in his ear and he nodded once, his golden eyes going to the group as she swept from the room and into the bathroom.
The door didn't close as she had intended it to, and she looked up in the mirror as she began tugging at the silver strands of her hair in the braid but then she realised that it was black once more and she wondered when that had happened. The lich looked ready to breathe flames as he stalked towards her.
"I don't recall inviting you in," she said calmly. "If you touch me, I will remove your arm."
He paused an inch from her, his breath warm against her back as she began to run the comb through her hair.
"What are you thinking, coming back here and making demands?" he hissed.
She turned to him, pressing two fingers against his chest and pushing him back from her. He took one half step back and she knew that was the best she was going to get out of him.
"I no longer belong to you, Epharis. Keep in mind that I rule over two quarters of Faerie and can obliterate you with a thought."
He bared his teeth at her but she smiled. It was a cold smile, but it was a smile.
"I require your attempt to change me Epharis. That is all."
"You are my wife, and still you speak to me like that?" he growled, and her cold smile melted.
"Do not for an instant think I will not kill you and find another lich. You are important only so long as you do as I ask."
His hand flung out to strike her, stopping dead an inch from her skin as she called magic to her, and it flowed out of her in an aura.
He stared at his hand, and she smiled at him, a cruel smile.
His eyes widened just as she drove her fist into his chest and he was flung out through the bathroom wall, and then through the brick wall of her bedroom and into the hallway.
"Apologies Alaric, I'll have that fixed," she said as she stepped out through the wall, and they heard Epharis groaning in pain.
The vampires were staring at her in horror, their faces smeared with her blood and Kai moved to block her.
"Move," she said simply, her voice a low growl of warning. Something in her wouldn't allow her to strike him, not Kai. It didn't matter what he did to her, how many times he abandoned her or lied to her or broke her heart, he was still her love and her child.
Uzo took the vampire by the arm, but he refused to move, staring down into her eyes.
"Etani what happened to you?" he whispered, afraid for her.
"You lost the right to ask me on my state when you and your brother decided to run away from the fight," she said coldly, and his face paled.
Jaia growled and Versalis sucked in a breath at her implied accusation of cowardice on their part.
"How could you say that?" Kai whispered and she met his eyes, indifferent to his pain.
"Winter is driving her anger," Epharis growled as he dragged himself back through the hole in the stone, looking like she had broken his spine by the hunched way he moved.
Her attention turned to the lich, and he glared at her.
"She is drawing on Winter like a leech," he growled, her eyes narrowing at his choice of words.
"Either agree to my task or we will find others who can," she said, and Kai whimpered, grabbing her arms and giving her a little shake.
Her eyes lowered to his hands on her, then up to his face and he looked terrified at her expression as anger pulsed through her that he would dare touch her.
"Etani please stop, we love you," he pleaded.
She pulled on Faerie and his hands were suddenly thrown off her, howling as his fingers blistered under the sudden drop in temperature that left him holding ice.
"You're up, lich," Uzo said and Epharis swore at him, turning his eyes to her.
"I'll turn you over my cold, dead body," he snarled.
"Very well," she replied calmly and lifted her hand, her index and middle finger pointed at his chest. His eyes went wide, and Kai grabbed her arm, forcing it up.
The magic hit the ceiling and rubble exploded down on them in a cloud of dust and stone.
Someone grabbed her and their body covered her, the smell of Jagum telling her it had been him protecting her from the rubble.
When the rubble stopped falling, she straightened and looked up at the hole in the ceiling, her magic blowing a hole clean through two floors.
Movement caught her attention, and she looked down to Epharis as he lunged for her, his arms going around her middle and he tore her apart.