by Piper Rayne
But I knew how to do the spell work. I knew where to start—and so when Rosaline straightened and said, somewhat flirtatiously, “All right, teacher. Teach me,” I pushed the stub of a candle across the table, a foot away from her face.
“All right,” I said to her. “Light the candle.”
Rosaline studied me, as if suspecting a trick, then started to stand to get the matches.
“No.” I held onto her forearm. “Not with matches. Just with magic.”
Rosaline looked utterly lost. “But… how? I don’t even know where to begin.”
“We all find our own way into the spells,” I said, reciting the same things that Mortas told me back when he was teaching the basic tenets of magic work. “You’ll have to make your own pathway.”
Was it wrong of me to use Mortas’s lessons to teach Rosaline? Would that give Mortas some sort of key into her mind? I was conflicted—but Mortas was the one who had shown me how to do this, and it was the only way I knew how to teach.
Rosaline stared at the candle, her eyes growing red. I counted the leaves that fell from the trees outside, patient while my darling Rosaline found her way into the spell—
And finally, she did it
A tiny flame, dancing on the wick of the candle.
I was thrilled and clapped to congratulate Rosaline on her very first summoning—but the sour sneer on her face made me chuckle.
“You look so disappointed,” I commented, clearing our dishes to scrub in the sink.
“The world’s smallest fire,” Rosaline said of her spell. “That’ll show Mortas.”
“You have to be patient,” I told her. “You’ve only just learned that you are even capable of such things, like you said—every relationship with magic must start somewhere. And for the record, it took me weeks before I was able to bring forth a flame.”
Rosaline’s mouth tugged up in a reluctant smile. “Truly?”
“Truly.” I pressed a kiss into her hair. “Now, come on, let’s get you all cleaned up. I love you dearly, but you smell like pond scum.”
“Isn’t that how you wild men like your women?” Rosaline teased back, and my chest panged.
Would I ever be only a man for her again? Or would I sink deeper and deeper into this curse until there was no part of me that recognized her, no part of me that delighted in her small magics?
No part of me that remembered how much I loved her?
Rosaline kept practicing with the candle, producing flames that were bigger, producing them faster, making them burn hotter.
By the time I’d cleaned up dinner, Rosaline was able to burn a candle down to wax in less than a minute.
By the time all the leaves had fallen off the trees, leaving the branches barren and lifeless, Rosaline had exhausted herself and fell asleep on the floor in my arms.
By the time my mind untangled itself enough for me to sleep, too, the snow had started drifting down in spirals.
Outside the hut, Rosaline’s wards held fast—but beyond them, I could hear the wolves of the woods coming nearer than they had ever dared to before, as if coming to challenge their alpha.
As if they knew that I would soon only be an animal like they were.
Chapter Twenty-one
ROSALINE
Snow.
Snow everywhere.
Not just outside in the yard and the forest beyond—but inside, all over the hut. A dusting on the kitchen table. Frost in the hearth. A blanket of snow on top of the blankets that were wrapped around me. My hair was damp with snow, my eyelashes…
There was snow stuck to every bit of Gawen’s fur, and when I shook him awake, he started, blinking, looking up at the swirling white, undoubtedly unsure of where he was.
“I guess autumn is over,” I said playfully. “Isn’t winter the time of cuddling by the hearth?” I leaned back into the warmth of his body, then glanced up at his face—his eyes were glinting black, and a long, low snarl issued from his chest.
Oh god.
Not my Gawen, love of my life, keeper of the forest.
The beast—whatever the curse had made of him.
My heart was pounding as I moved away from him, settling into a crouch. If I had to, I could spring back, away from his reach, and buy myself enough time to cast a spell—
If I dared to shoot magic at my love. I didn’t want to hurt him, even though he got to his feet, growling in the snow.
He would hurt me, though, I reasoned with myself—not Gawen, but the curse within him.
But just as he lunged towards me, fangs bared, ready to tear me into pieces, he paused, and he coughed, doubling over, and I watched his eyes shift back from the hard black of the cursed beast’s orbs to that soft, almost golden glint.
Gawen.
Before he could even say a word, his face crumbled with shame, and I rushed forward into his arms. He stroked my hair, muttering, “God, Rosaline, I could have—”
“But you didn’t.” I tilted my head, making him meet my eyes—the worry that was radiating from him nearly broke my heart, but I wanted him to know that I did not blame him for this.
I was not afraid of him.
The snow, on the other hand…
Gawen finally peered around us, shaking his head. “Well, that’s something. A snowstorm in spring.”
“The seasons are all mixed up.” A row of icicles clung to the roof of the hut, jutting down like glassy fangs; beyond the hut, there was a voice on the wind.
Faint, but it was there—
The trees were speaking to me.
“What do they say?” Gawen asked. His curse had made it difficult for him to hear the voices, and while the trees were still speaking in that vague, garbled language, I could make out one phrase, one name, intoned against the ice and the snow.
One name.
“Mortas,” I breathed. “He’s here. He’s in the forest.”
Tension made Gawen’s entire frame tighten. He wrapped an arm around me protectively, pulling me close, and I placed my hand on his chest. “I have to go meet him,” I said.
Gawen’s reaction was instantaneous—he inhaled sharply through his nose, unhappy with this prospect.
“I have to,” I repeated. “This could be our only chance to see him face-to-face, and to…” I didn’t dare finish my sentence. I didn’t dare say “to fight him,” or “to defeat him at last.” It still didn’t feel real, that the person who was meant to battle with Mortas for the protection of the forest and of the man I loved was… me.
A farmer’s daughter.
A nobody, until I’d met Gawen.
But Gawen looked at me with sadness in his eyes and shook his head. “I… I can’t go. I should stay here, in case the curse tries to take me again.”
I bit my lip, thinking this over as I dressed for the cold. Only moments ago, Gawen had lunged towards me with his claws out, the beast within him hungry for my flesh.
But I knew that I was stronger when he was near me.
And so I firmly held his shoulders and told him, while looking directly into his perfect eyes. “No. You’re coming with me. We are going to face him together.”
The vision under the pond had been very clear—one of the three of us would have to die in order for the other two to survive, and in order to restore the forest back to its glory and its health.
I wasn’t going to let it be me, and I wasn’t going to let it be Gawen.
I wanted Gawen by my side when I brought down Mortas and undid the hold that he had on the orphan he’d stolen for his own gain.
Gawen leaned down and met my mouth with a fierce kiss, one that sent heat rippling through me, cutting through the chill of the snow. “All right, but, Rosaline, if I—if I start to turn…”
“You won’t.” I had no evidence with which to assure him—but I knew that if I could manage to produce any spell work larger or more powerful than the one I had last night, with the candle and the flame, it would be because Gawen’s life depended on it.
�
�Come on,” I said, pulling on my boots. “Let’s go before we lose him.”
The forest was resplendent in winter.
Ice hung from every bleak dead tree, giving the landscape teeth and claws. The sky was white, the snow drifting down in fat flakes the size of fingernails, and I wished that this was just the magical first day of the season and that I could bound into the pristine mounds of snow without trepidation. I wished that back in the hut, a stew and some cocoa waited for us, and that a hearth would warm us up later, along with newly knitted socks and a quilt that we would share.
I wished that it was an ordinary day and that Gawen and I were out trekking in the forest for the sheer pleasure of it.
But there was nothing ordinary about the reasons we were heading out into the cold.
Somewhere in the woods, there was a man waiting for us, and he wanted to harm us.
Wanted us dead.
One, or both of us—and even if Mortas was planning to keep Gawen alive, it would not be a mercy.
It would be to use Gawen as he had for years, as a source of magic, a funnel with which to drain the forest’s enchantments and make himself young and powerful and alive forever—
But I had no doubts that Mortas would try to kill me the very same second that he saw me.
So I kept my eyes open as we crept through the skeletal trees, and every noise in the still-fallen landscape, I leaned into, trying to decipher if it was a spell coming my way.
But as we made our way from Gawen’s hut to the edge of the forest, near the birch tree, near the now-frozen green pond that had granted me visions and voices not once but twice now, we saw nothing.
We heard no one.
“It’s a big forest,” Gawen pointed out when we had reached the boundary of the woods. “He could be on the other side of the perimeter—he could be anywhere.”
Through the stark black tree line, I could see all the way to the village—
Fairfront.
Where I’d grown up.
Where I’d called home for all of my life until last week.
Winter had fallen on them, too—I could only imagine what disaster that had wrought on the crops, the gardens, and the livestock. Had they even managed to pick any of the spring vegetables and set them to pickle and in cans before the snow fell, turning the carrots and radishes and potatoes into frozen gray mush? Had they even had enough firewood chopped and dried for this early a winter?
I suddenly heard voices.
Men shouting, and dogs barking.
Peering through the branches, I saw a group of village men, axes slung over their shoulders, marching towards the forest.
Apparently they had not procured enough firewood yet—and they were coming into the Fair Forest to hack into the trees and find some.
I was shocked, almost too shocked to move—the villagers of Fairfront had never come into the forest before, not in my lifetime. With one exception—they had marched me beyond the protection spells around the perimeter to tie me to the birch tree, but that was it.
Fairfront farmers were forbidden from entering the forest—and yet here they came, without a hitch, almost cheerful.
“The boundary spells,” I whispered when Gawen reached my side. “They’re broken. Look.”
Gawen did not stand there to witness the exact faces of the people coming into the forest—faces of farmers I had known for all of my years.
He was much more sensible than I was in this moment—he grabbed my arm and tugged me behind a fat pine trunk, hiding me from their view.
“Which one did Mortas say was off-limits?” one of the villagers called to the other, and someone pointed to the silver birch tree.
“That one. The one that glows. Every other tree is fair game,” he answered.
“And every animal.” Someone lifted a bow with an arrow notched in its string, searching the ground for rabbits or other game. It didn’t take him long to find his first kill—his arrow went straight through the heart of a pheasant that was fluttering to its nest, and the bird flopped into the snow, motionless.
I turned to make a comment to Gawen—pheasant was such a rare delicacy in Fairfront that this man would likely be the envy of the town, and his children might even be presumed to have magical powers after dining on this bird.
But Gawen was standing away from the tree trunk, snarling, and one glance at his eyes told me all I needed to know.
The curse.
It had taken hold of him again. His eyes were black as cold, and he snarled loud enough to echo through the white winter woods.
Loud enough to catch the ears of the villagers, who suddenly ducked low, their breaths coming out in huge, frightened puffs, their posture ready to fight.
They’d heard the sound of a beast, and I knew they would shoot their arrows into him upon first sight—I couldn’t let them see him. I couldn’t let them come any further into the woods than they already had.
Closing my eyes, I summoned the forest. I whispered to them what I needed, and within seconds the trees responded.
I could hear their howls before they even reached the border—the wolves of the forest, drooling and snarling. They chased the villagers back from the trees, back towards Fairfront—a few arrows were loosed, but none hit their targets, and I sank back against the trunk, relieved when I saw that the coast was clear.
But Gawen had not shifted back yet—the gold in his eyes was still gone, and now, with the wolves circling him, circling me, all these predators ready to lunge, I was an easy target.
And no matter what I whispered to the forest, no matter how I pled for guidance, the trees were silent.
There was nothing the trees could do for me now.
Chapter Twenty-two
GAWEN
Kill. Rip. Devour.
My prey, backing against the trees.
She bumped into a cedar, turning as if she was looking for a way to scramble up its trunk to safety, and I felt a laugh roar out of me.
As if she could get away from me.
As if she could climb high enough, run fast enough to outwit me.
There was nowhere for her to go.
I had her cornered.
All those dreams of catching her, my chase fueled by her scent—good enough to eat—and now I had her.
Somewhere, deep inside, a battle raged within me.
The curse, the beast, taking hold of my mind—but I, Gawen, was slippery.
I could not do magic, not when this curse was on my head.
The bones would not speak to me.
The trees treated me like any other animal.
But my mind… My mind was not the mind of a creature. Not yet.
And I resisted as hard as I could.
Prey.
No, not my prey—my love.
Food.
Not food. She has a name. Rosaline. Rosaline. Her name is Rosaline.
And her name is every other lovely thing that exists in the world—flowers, ribbons, a sunrise, the arch of her back when I kiss between her thighs, the smooth pink of a seashell, the first delicious bite into a freshly-baked loaf of bread, the gentleness of a whisper, the sound of someone singing.
Rosaline is all those things and more.
Dinner. Food. Prey. Kill.
The wolves had chased the villagers away. But now they turned to Rosaline, prowling closer—I thought of that first moment when I saw her, back when she was tied to the birch tree.
Wolves had surrounded her then, too—and I had saved her by speaking to the wolves, telling them to fall back, to leave her to me.
I tried to speak to them now, and all that came out was a snarl.
They no longer saw me as the alpha, the protector of the forest, a wild man who must be obeyed, no matter how much their little creature-brains resisted.
They saw me as competition.
And before they would tear into Rosaline, they would have to go through me first.
The beast within me levelled them with my cruel black eyes, an
d a wicked smile tugged my lips up, baring my fangs.
Very well.
A fight it is.
The first wolf jumped at me with surprising daring; I blocked it with my arm and sent it yowling back to the pack.
Two more attacked me, snapping their jaws into my flesh—if they were shocked to bite me and find fur, like them, they did not show it. They tore into me as if I was one of their own—brother against brother, predator against predator, beast against beast.
I ripped them off me, their teeth leaving tracks of blood on my forearm, but it felt like nothing.
Only a scratch, nothing to be upset about, nothing to keep me from charging towards her, ready to rip, kill, eat—
More wolves came, and I fought them all until all that was left of them were sorrowful whimpers and resentful growls. They hobbled back into the woods, giving us a respectful distance—they would be back later, ready to try their luck again after they had licked their wounds and regathered their strengths.
But for now, the wolves had left her to me.
This beautiful, simpering, frightened thing—oh, yes, the beast within me delighted to see her shaking, even though she was trying so hard to be brave.
The beast within me thought it was great sport to see her straighten against the tree trunk, jutting her chin forward, her eyes begging for mercy, as if I could recognize her anymore—
As if she was anything to me but a meal.
“Gawen!” Rosaline did not cower, but stood tall, her eyes finding mine. “Gawen, it’s me. It’s Rosaline. Think about when we met.”
Kill, tear, rip.
“Think about what we’ve shared—think about last night on the rug.” My cock went stiff, but I ignored it, prowling ever closer. The cold of the snow all around would only make her more delicious to devour.
“Think about what you mean to me—I would do anything for you,” Rosaline went on, her tone almost hysterical. “Oh, god, Gawen, please, I know you’re in there! Gawen, don’t leave me! Gawen, please!”
