by Plum Pascal
ROSE
BOOK 4 OF THE
HAPPILY NEVER AFTER SERIES
by
Plum Pascal
HP Mallory
Copyright ©2020 by Plum Pascal
Published by HP Mallory
License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your enjoyment only, then please return to Smashwords.com or your favorite retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Follow me on Facebook
Follow me on Amazon
ALSO BY H.P. MALLORY:
Paranormal Series: (Writing as HP Mallory)
Lucy Westenra Series
Mists of Magic and Mayhem Series
Lily Harper Series
Dulcie O’Neil Series (over 1 million downloads of the series!)
Jolie Wilkins Series (New York Times bestselling series!)
Sinjin Sinclair Series
Peyton Clark Series
NuLife Series
Reverse Harem Series: (Writing as Plum Pascal)
Happily Never After Series
Sacred Oath Series
F My Life Series
About Rose:
Fairy Tale Princesses Like You’ve Never Seen Them Before…
10 Champions destined to defeat an evil that threatens to wipe out the land of Fantasia...
Snow White, Goldilocks, Rose Red, Sleeping Beauty, Tinkerbell, Cinderella, Bo Peep, Belle, The Little Mermaid, & Red Riding Hood
Book 4: Rose
A pirate wounded on the open water and left for dead…
A loyal friend and merman destined to keep her safe…
And a royal prince contracted to be her husband…
Find out in the fourth book in the Happily Never After Series!
10 Chosen Ones:
When a pall is cast upon the land,
Despair not, mortals,
For come forth heroes ten.
One in oceans deep,
One the flame shall keep,
One a fae,
One a cheat,
One shall poison grow,
One for death,
One for chaos,
One for control,
One shall pay a magic toll.
Rose Red:
Nightshade,
Hemlock,
Aconite,
the Queen of Poisons she shall be,
and leach the life from a goddess,
who taints the world tree.
ONE
CARMINE
The hinges of the iron door squeak, even as I try desperately for stealth.
The lag between the changing of the guard is pitifully short. I don’t have the time I need to speak to him properly, but I don’t see many options. My Uncle Spyros is planning something large and extravagant for arriving dignitaries. If I’m to talk to him, it has to be now.
I take a cautious step inside the cell, and backpedal just as quickly, tripping on the long hem of my dress. The intense odor emanating from inside the cell is like having something sharp jabbed into my nose. I’ve always been sensitive to smells. Something to do with my mother’s heritage, or so Uncle tells me.
“Princess?” my maid, Elsie, inquires from further up the corridor. She has a white-knuckled grip on the stair rail, and her eyes make the circuit from my position before the cell and the stairwell behind her every few seconds or so.
The sight of her perched there, steels my nerves. My poor Elsie has risked so much for this clandestine meeting already. While I’d done the fairly simple job of pilfering the wine from supper one night, my lady’s maid had been the one to go downstairs and ply the guards with spirits. The one who’d tolerated the pawing hands of drunken soldiers in order to steal and then copy the key to Draven’s cell.
Taking a drag of the stale air from the hall, I step inside the cell once more and wade into the murky interior. Straw and seed scrape beneath the low heels that Uncle insisted I wear beneath the ensemble. The ridiculously thick red dress is going to be stained with something by the end of the night, so it might as well be whatever foulness has clogged Draven’s cell.
The birdseed is a problem, though. It rolls beneath my heels and makes even the simplest step treacherous. The guards think it’s funny to pelt Draven with it, even though most of them know better. For the sake of the Gods, they shared the same barracks, ate at the same table in the great hall. I know at least one of them was being trained specifically by Draven for the honor of guarding me when Draven was away.
How things have changed…
After the attack in the Lordell Mountains, in a valley so remote and uninteresting that most of our maps had no record of it, now the place is unlikely to ever be forgotten.
It was the location where my mother and a small army of men met their ends. Draven was the only one to stagger back to Ascor, charred almost beyond recognition, but still alive after surviving a dragon attack. He should have been praised as a hero for returning and delivering the account of the attack to us.
Instead, Uncle clapped him in irons and threw him into the dungeons to die. And there Draven has remained. The guards cast lots on whether starvation, infection, or thirst will take him first.
I begged to know the reason why Draven had been treated so poorly day and night for a week, until Uncle forbade any further talk on the matter, punctuating the order with a sharp slap.
I haven’t had the courage to ask again, sure I’ll receive more than a sting in my cheek next time. I feel remarkably fragile without my steadfast huntsman at my back.
I find Draven splayed in the furthest corner from the stairwell, where the light rarely hits and enough water runs down the stone after the rains to soothe his burns. He’s fortunate it’s been a rainy summer in Ascor—he has a shallow pool to lay in often enough.
My steps falter a few feet shy of Draven’s only visible limb. A foot, bare and blessedly free of blisters. Shifter healing can be remarkable, but Draven’s has been stymied somehow. Something my father did or the result of dragon fire? I can’t say.
“Draven,” I venture cautiously, speaking as loud as I dare, with the guard rotation so close at hand. “Draven, can you hear me?”
A soft moan in response and then his foot twitches, withdraws back into shadow and I hear the clink of the chain sliding against itself as he moves. He’s not imprisoned in a cell, but he’s fastened to the floor, probably unable to so much as stand.
My heart thumps harder as a shape begins to shuffle half into sight. Draven has never actually moved toward me, too injured or incapacitated by fever to respond to my attempts to speak to him.
And this time is no different, it seems.
The shape that slides from the darkness and peers up at me isn’t Draven. It’s not even male. It’s one of the prisoners of war that Spyros has been holding for trial. She’s pretty, I have to admit, even after spending Gods knows how long in this dungeon with little to no washing. She appears to be a woman in her prime, with milky skin whose beauty isn’t dulled by the thin layer of grime. Lips as pink as cherry blossoms, color high in her cheeks—a flush of red, like a rose.
In fact, the more I look at her, the more she appears like a floral mural. Eyes like purple dahlia, a shade that escapes being black by the prese
nce of light. Skin lily-white. Hair as pale and muted as silver ragwort.
I dislike her at once, though the reasons for my animosity are ridiculous. But she’s beautiful, even unwashed and a little feral-looking. She reminds me of Neva, who was beautiful even as a girl when I was (and am) so woefully plain, just like mother. The reminder of Neva is a jab of pain just under my ribs. I’ve missed the anniversary of Neva’s passing. Again.
But the true reason heat flushes into my cheeks and shame wriggles in my belly is petty.
She’s here with him when I can’t be.
“Who are you?” I ask a little tartly.
“An excellent question,” the woman mutters, more to herself than me. “I wish I knew.”
“What do you mean?”
She sighs. “Last I can recall is Elysium fields, a dark sea, and swimming, screaming bears.”
I blink down at her in shock, most of my enmity evaporating when I realize this poor, condemned woman is quite mad. She scrambles for the other corner when I continue to stare.
“Ignore the rambling,” Draven croaks from the gloom. “I think she’s a Wonderland native. She’s not going to make any sense.”
My heart strains the prison of my ribs in an attempt to get to him. He’s speaking. Finally! I’ve missed hearing his voice.
But the same time, this isn't his voice. Draven’s voice used to be a pleasant baritone, a rich, melodic thing that never failed to sing me to sleep on lonely nights. I’d so often been a naughty girl, calling him into my room not to put me to sleep, as I claimed. I’d spent those evenings peering at him through my lashes, watching his mouth move and letting his voice caress me. Because it was the only part of him to ever touch any part of me, no matter how ardently I wished otherwise.
Now his beautiful voice is gone. He’s hoarse, deep, and scratchy, like the voice of the raven form he can assume.
Back to the woman… If she’s from Wonderland, Draven is quite right. She won’t make any sense as all the Wonderland inhabitants are insane. “What is her name?” I ask.
“She calls herself Ia when she’s lucid.”
I nod but I can’t say I care much to discuss the mad woman any longer. Instead, I want to figure out how to free Draven, how to help him escape this awful place. I sink down onto my haunches, extending an imploring hand toward him. “Draven… how… how can I free you?”
“You can’t,” he scoffs.
“There must be a way! I’ll free you… I can get the key to your chains…”
“And then what?”
I swallow hard because I haven’t thought that far ahead. “I’ll… I’ll take you away from here. Far, far away. We can…”
He laughs, though it sounds more like a cough with his new, gravelly tone.
“Go where? I’m little better than Ia. Lucidity comes and goes and I... I’m not well. I can’t protect you. And I won’t have you venturing into danger for me.”
Giving up the pretense of politeness, I drop my gloved hand back down to my side and shuffle into the dark and smelly corner. I have an inkling what my uncle has brought the dignitaries here to discuss. I can’t face the prospect of a loveless marriage until I’ve seen Draven one last time. Until I’ve kissed him. Until I’ve loved him.
The last, errant thought causes blood to rush into my cheeks. I’m truly a wicked girl, to think such things. He’s injured. And even if he weren’t, he will never care for me as I care for him. He’s been my protector since I can remember. He’ll never think of me as anything more than Leon’s child, the poor, orphaned princess. To ask anything more of him is wrong.
I stagger a step when I encounter something warm and solid in the darkness. I lose my footing and sprawl on top of the shape, skirts flying wide like a scarlet fan. My legs tangle with the shape and I realize, with a jolt and warm flush of desire, that my legs are wound between Draven’s, my thighs straddling one of his and the knee of the other leg rubbing deliciously against my clothes.
His hands shoot out to steady me, coming to rest on my waist. He raises himself slightly from the ground. His breath fans across my neck and ruffles my hair when he speaks. Goosebumps riot across my skin. He’s so close. It would be so easy for him to hike my skirts and take me like this. I don’t care that he’s covered in filth. He’s Draven, my unrequited love and I will take whatever he offers me.
“Are you alright, Princess?”
“I’m fine. Did I hurt you?”
“Not badly.”
“I’m sorry, I should move.”
I try to scramble backward. I’m still not sure what madness possessed me to visit him tonight without being better prepared. If I’d been thinking, I could have stolen into the cell with shoots of my aloe plant. I can feel the burns now, shiny and swollen, on parts of his body. There are herbal remedies I can concoct that could heal them in short order.
Stupid, stupid girl not to have thought of any of this before it was too late.
Before I can move more than an inch down his thigh, Draven catches me. He sits up, hauling me into his chest, lifting me slightly off him and arranges me so I’m straddling him properly.
“Don’t move,” he mutters into my ear. “You can’t imagine how good it feels to have you with me. Stay still just a moment, love.”
And though I know he doesn’t mean anything by the word, my mind still spins out an elaborate, delicious lie that my handsome huntsman truly does feel the same way for me.
“I’m hurting you,” I argue weakly, even as I settle my head into the hollow between his shoulder and his throat. “You’re injured.”
“I’ll bear it,” he replies shortly. “Stay.”
I can’t argue with that, so I curl myself as closely as I can with the ridiculous red skirts in the way. I’ll definitely have to change before supper tonight. I don’t mind. Not with Draven’s arms wrapped around me. Even the smell of the cell is bearable now, with him holding me tight.
I gently skim my fingers over his body, assessing the injuries by feel. They mostly appear to be burns, though I’m afraid a few patches have become infected. Sores pop along the joints, where he’s forced to move the injured skin. There are a few deep score marks, like he was cut with a blade or a very determined man with a whip.
Tears prick my eyes. He must be in so much pain and I can’t even free him from this prison. My oldest and truest companion is rotting while I do nothing. If I’m to marry, I’ll assume the throne soon with a foreign king at my side. Elsie tells me men will agree to many things while inside a woman. Perhaps I can coax my new husband into releasing Draven? Even if I can convince him exile is best, I’ll have saved Draven’s life. As a huntsman, he can survive anywhere and can return to the House of Corvid without incident.
“I’m going to get you out,” I whisper. “I swear it to all the Gods, I’m going to get you out. I won’t let them hurt you any longer.”
Draven presses his face into my hair, inhaling deeply. His fingers push into the slick material of my dress, his hands as hot as brands, even through the fabric. The burns, or just my own fevered imagination?
Imagination, I decide, because I swear he turns his head just a fraction to kiss me. His lips certainly brush the hollow beneath my ear. The contact is so intimate, it sends forbidden pleasure zinging through me. I buck a little in surprise.
Then he releases me, hands falling away from my body, curling in on himself like a boy being chastised.
“I’m sorry,” he croaks. “I shouldn’t have put my hands on you, Princess.”
No! I want to argue. No, I want his hands on me. Fingers in me. I want him. But I don’t get a chance to say or do more because Elsie appears in the doorway of the dungeon, quivering and pale as a ghost.
“They’re coming, Princess,” she whispers, flicking her gaze toward the far end of the hall.
Sure enough, if I strain my ears, I can hear the thud of heavy feet and the rattle of armor as a group of them move quickly toward our position.
“Go,” Draven says s
oftly. “And don’t return, Princess. Whatever punishment you suffer, isn’t worth it.”
Lies. A beating is the worst my Uncle is likely to subject me to, and I’ll take it for Draven, gladly.
“I’m coming back for you,” I promise him, though he laughs at me as though I can’t keep my word. “Don’t you dare die before I can spring you from this... this...” There’s no delicate word for it. “This shithole. Stay alive for me, Draven.”
Then I turn and pelt up the corridor as fast as my ridiculous shoes will allow.
His whispered reply is almost whipped away on the wind.
“Princess...”
TWO
CARMINE
I’m covered in filth. And dirt is the least offensive stain on the silk. Uncle will be upset to learn I’ve ruined it, but I’ll be damned if I tell him why. I’m not eager to be struck again.
Elsie is set to guard my door while I wriggle my way into the less extravagant but still beautiful blue silk gown Uncle commissioned for my last birthday. It’s almost the precise shape and color of a bluebell, flaring out dramatically around my ankles. I’m secretly glad to wear it. I prefer it to the red.
The rose water in the corner is meant to perfume my chambers, but I use the softly scented stuff to scrub my skin free of dirt. It’s strange, but I can make out Draven’s fingerprints on my arms and on the material of my dress. I’m almost reluctant to scrub myself, as it’s the only tangible evidence he’s finally touched me.
You’re too sentimental, Carmine, I chastise myself with a frown. Leave the dirt and there will be questions. Scrub up now.
But still, I hesitate over the skin of my forearms. Draven touched me. I can’t shake the phantom feeling of his fingers pressing into my skin. He was probably delirious with pain or fever. Perhaps he’d gone a little mad, stuffed into a dark cell with only a raving woman for company. It probably had little to do with me at all. He’d have clutched at Elsie the same way. Perhaps more ardently, as he’d have no compunctions making love to a mere maid. I’ve known him to do so before.
