Contents
Disclaimer
GOTTWA GLOSSARY
FAELI GLOSSARY
CHARACTER CHART
Prologue
1. York House
2. The Political Match
3. The Preparations
4. The Mothers
5. The Royal Dinner
6. The Little Brother
7. The Filigree
8. The Leaf Portal
9. Faerie Jail
10. The Fanged Flower
11. The Ghost Town
12. The Pack
13. The Glass City
14. The Rubble
15. The Inn
16. Standards
17. The Bathrobe
18. Locked In
19. The Tornado
20. The Wreckage
21. Neverra
22. The Confession
23. The Cage
24. Second Chance
25. The Return
26. The Nightmare
27. The Explosion
28. The Girl
29. The Survivors
30. The Beetles
31. The Fourth One
32. The Revenant
33. Forgiveness
34. The Apple
35. New Clothes
36. The Caves
37. The Tremor
38. The Ambush
39. Bite
40. Goodbyes
41. The Wait
42. Firsts
43. The Wake-Up Call
44. Home
45. New Regime
46. The Talk
Epilogue
Want more Paranormal Romance from me?
Acknowledgments
Also by Olivia Wildenstein
About the Author
Disclaimer
The Gottwas are an invented tribe, loosely inspired by the Ojibwe people. I did not want to cause offense to Native Americans by writing about customs that aren't mine.
GOTTWA GLOSSARY
aabiti: mate
abiwoojin: darling
adsookin: legend
bagwa: jackass
baseetogan: fae world; Neverra; Isle of Woods
bazash: half-fae, half-human
bekagwe: wait for me
chatwa: darkness
debwe: truth
gajeekwe: the king’s advisor, like a minister, wariff
gassen: faerie dust
gatizogin: I’m sorry
Gejaiwe: the Great Spirit
geezhi: day
Geemee: Uncle
gingawi: part hunter, part fae
giya: daisy
golwinim: Woods’s guards, fireflies; lucionaga
gwe: woman
Iba: Dad
ishtu: sweetness
kwenim: memory
ley: light
ma kwenim: my memory
maagwe: come with me
maahin: come forth
Makudewa Geezhi: Dark Day
manazi: book
mashka: tough
mawa: mine
meegwe: give me
meekwa: blood
Mishipeshu: water faeries, Daneelies
mika: beauty
naagangwe: stop her
Neenee: Aunt
nockwad: mist
nilwa: defeater
Nima: Mom
pahan: faeries
tokwa: favor
twa: men
zava: love
zavagingwi: I love you
FAELI GLOSSARY
adamans: glass flowers as tall as wheat stalks
alinum: rowan wood
amoo: darling, my love
astium: portal, door
calidum: lesser fae; bazash
caligo: mist
caligosubi: one who lives below the mist, aka marsh-dweller
caligosupra: one who lives above the mist, aka mist-dweller
calimbor: skytrees
capra: slithering Neverrian creature with rubbery skin that can paralyze prey for days
captis: magnetize
clave: portal locksmith
cupola: cage of nightmares
Daneelies: water faeries, Mishipeshu
daffos: tall trumpet-headed flowers that grow in shrubs
dias: day
diles: venomous Neverrian creature, a cross between a frog and a crocodile
draca: first guard; wariff’s protector (dragon form)
drosa: type of Neverrian rose
duciba: council made up of a member from each faerie race
duobosi: coupling ceremony
enefkum: eunuch
fae: sky-dwellers
forma: underground-dwellers, bodiless, Unseelies
fias: child
gajoï: favor
gladeberry: sour berry that grows beside the Glades.
hareni: grotto
kalini: fire
lucionaga: faerie guards
lustriums: clusters of stars
lupa: wild dog
mallow: an edible plant, faerie weed; doesn’t affect humans the same way it affects faeries, and Hunters are immune
Massin(a): Your highness
Massini: your highnesses
mea: mine
mikos: Neverrian snake coated in sharp quills
milandi: marvelous
Neverra: baseetogan; Isle of Woods
octas: octopus-like Neverrian creature with eyes at the tip of each tentacle
obso: please
pistri: shark
plantae: plants
potas: I can’t
Prinsis(a): prince(ss)
quid est: who is it?
quila: Neverrian eagle with sharp talons and curved beak
runa: Neverrian gondolas carried by faeries
Seelies: light faeries, Fae
sepula: ceremony of the dead
stam: giant flat shells that bob in the Glades
ti ama: I love you
tigri: striped wild cat that lives in the jungle beyond the Glades. Medium-sized. Exist in a variety of colors.
Unseelies: dark faeries, bodiless, Forma
vade: go
valo: bye
ventor: Hunter
Wariff: equal to Gajeekwe
wita: faerie dust, gassen
CHARACTER CHART
Ace Wood: King of Neverra; Catori’s husband
Addison Wood: Ace and Lily’s mother; Linus’s wife; Amara’s grandmother
Adsookin (Sook) Geemiwa: Lily and Kajika’s son; Giya’s twin brother; Amara’s cousin
Amara Wood: Ace and Cat’s daughter
Aylen: Nova’s sister; Cat’s aunt
Bee: Beatrice; owns Bee’s Place; Blake’s grandmother
Blake: Bee’s grandson; Cat’s friend
Cassidy (Cass): Cat’s best friend in Rowan; Etta’s daughter
Catori Price Wood: Ace’s wife; Queen of Neverra; Amara’s mother
Charlotte Locklear: mother of twins Cole and Kiera, and Danny; Earthly Daneelie
Cole Locklear: Charlotte’s son; Kiera’s twin brother; Earthly Daneelie
Cruz Vega: fae; friends with the Woods family; Lily’s ex-fiancé; Lyoh & Jacobiah’s son
Derek Price: Cat’s father; Nova’s husband; coroner
Faith Sakar Farrow: Stella and Gregor’s daughter; Silas’s wife, mother of Remo and Karsyn
Giya Geemiwa: Lily and Kajika’s daughter; Sook’s twin; Amara’s cousin
Gregor Farrow: current fae wariff; soulless narcissist; Faith’s father; Remo and Karsyn’s grandfather
Gwenelda Geemiwa: Huntress; first to awaken; absorbed Nova’s soul; Menawa’s wife
Joshua Locklear: Daneelie; Cole and Kiera’s little brother; Charlotte’s son
Karsyn: Faith and Silas’s son; Remo’s little brother
Kiera Locklear: Charlotte’s daughter; Cole’s twin sister; Joshua’s older sister; Earthly Daneelie
Lily Wood Geemiwa: fae; mute; Ace’s sister; Linus’s daughter; Cruz’s ex-fiancée; Kajika’s wife, mother of Giya and Adsookin
Linus Wood: ex-King of Neverra; Lily and Ace’s father
Milly Price (Nana Em): mortician; second wife of Derek Price
Nova Price: Catori’s mother; Derek’s beloved first wife
Quinn Thompson: Earthly Daneelie; Forest Press owner; Charlotte Locklear’s cousin
Remo Farrow: Faith’s son; Gregor’s grandson; lucionaga
Satyana: Aylen’s daughter; Shiloh’s twin sister; Cat’s younger cousin
Shiloh: Aylen’s daughter; Cat’s younger cousin; Satyana’s twin sister; has the sight
Silas: draca; Karsyn’s father; Faith’s husband
Stella Sakar: part fae; daughter of Astra; sister to Cometta (Etta); Faith’s mother
Veroli (Nana Vee): Ace and Lily’s nanny, then Amara’s.
Sometimes, you must fall to know where you stand.
Prologue
CATORI
Earth Year: 2034 / Neverra Year: 806
A hand stroked up and down my trembling arm. “Cat, we need to stop. This needs to stop.”
“I . . . can’t.”
“You also can’t go through this again, amoo. It’s too much. For your body, but also for your heart.” The mattress dipped and then Ace’s body curled around mine, his arm falling over my empty abdomen. Weeks had gone by yet the pain lingered. “And for mine.”
Five months. This had been the longest a child had held on.
A sob raced up my chest and spilled into my damp pillow. Outside our bedroom’s sliding glass doors, steel clouds coiled over Neverra, darkening our kingdom, muting its beautiful colors. At this rate, I would drown our people in my sorrow.
“I’m so sorry, Cat.”
A slash of lightning painted the floating garden upon which we’d built our stone and glass nest garishly bright.
“Why?” I whimpered.
Ace sighed. “You know why.”
I turned in his arms. “I wish I could give up all my powers and just be human.”
He slid a lock of long black hair behind my ear, his turquoise eyes raking over my tearstained cheeks. “And deprive Neverra of its weekly sound and light show? How dull.”
In spite of my smashed heart, I smiled. “The farmers are complaining that your wife’s temper is ruining their crops.”
“My wife has a temper?” His features were taut with grief and yet his ability to pluck humor from terrible things hadn’t waned.
There were many things I loved about this man, but it was his wicked humor I loved best. Perhaps that was why we kept losing our babies. Not because their tiny bodies couldn’t bear the combination of so many powers, but because we’d somehow reached our quota of happiness and weren’t permitted more blessings.
I attempted to push away my longing, but as the Pink Sea raged beneath our hovering bungalow, its whitecaps scudding across wood, I knew I wasn’t ready to give up. “One more time, and then I promise, never again.”
He kissed the tip of my nose and tucked me closer. “Cat . . .”
“Please.”
“Willful wife.” He released a resigned sigh. “Fine. Use me for my body.”
I swatted his chest, then climbed onto one elbow to better see the glorious man who’d walked into my life three Neverrian years ago, armed with unrelenting humor, irresistible charm, and an inordinate amount of patience. He traced the sharp ridges of my face with one finger before weaving his hand through my hair and towing my head back toward his.
“You know I would do anything for you, Kitty Cat.”
When our lips touched, the storm fuming outside our walls and inside me finally abated. I wasn’t done grieving for those tiny souls stolen from my womb. How could I when they all still existed inside my heart?
But love and hope crawled back into my chest and pushed away the residual anger. Perhaps I’d never have a child to cradle, but at least I had a man who cradled me.
York House
Amara
Earth Year: 2124 / Neverra Year: 824
The security-bot scanned my biometric bracelet to make sure I was of legal age to enter the bar. Since I wasn’t, I conjured up my dust to create interference and wrapped it around the piece of human technology faeries had adopted four Neverrian years ago.
The Infinity was brilliant. With a swipe of my finger, I could control my outfit and footwear, beam and receive objects to anyone outfitted with a similar band, as well as pay and comm people in the human world and in Neverra. Plus it never needed charging. Our pulse created an electromagnetic field that fueled its battery. So long as we were alive, our little piece of technology was too.
As the security-bot blinked and splashed red light over the line of humans forming behind me, I checked the sidewalk for my personal guards. I’d managed to give them the slip back in Neverra by pretending to go for a swim in the depths of the Pink Sea, the only place in the kingdom where they didn’t follow since they were Seelies, aka air fae, and not Daneelies, aka water fae. Before surfacing, I’d disguised my appearance with a heavy dusting of wita and soared toward the portal for Old York before my two assigned guards had even noticed I was out of the water.
A woman with turquoise hair tapped her spiky-heeled boot behind me and muttered something about how bots could be so useless. At least she didn’t fault me for the defective machine. “Any humans around?” she yelled. “Hello? A little help out here.”
A man dressed in head-to-toe denim finally emerged from the dusky interior of the bar and silenced the whirring machine. He glanced at me. After a slow sweep of my leather-clad body, he tipped his oval face to my wrist. “Try again, baby.”
I wasn’t a fan of being called baby, especially by men twice my age, but since I needed to get into York House, and fast—my guards were bound to grow impatient and look up my location—I clamped my lips shut and lifted my wrist. The bot emitted a shrill beep, followed by some more crazy red blinking.
Denim-man cursed the machine under his breath. “Stupid contraption.” Sighing, he made it stop screeching. “Just display your ID for me.”
Three rapid clicks on the shiny black surface, and my face along with detailed information about my physique leaped off in 2D.
“Um, sweetheart, you’re sev—”
The second his eyes locked on mine, I said, “Nineteen tomorrow. I know.”
The man’s dark eyebrows writhed, but his pupils swelled as he absorbed my false statement. Nodding, he scanned his own wristband, and the glass doors of the bar slid open. “Go right on ahead.”
“Thank you,” I said sweetly.
As I sidestepped him, the man inhaled a long whiff of air. My heart came to a standstill, worried he was fae and had smelled my deception, but fae couldn’t be influenced, so he had to be human. Still, I hurried through the short, mirrored corridor that reflected my waist-long black hair, blue-gray leather jumpsuit, and turquoise eyes from a hundred different angles.
Being the Neverrian king’s daughter afforded me privileges, but skirting human laws wasn’t one of them. My parents were always on my case about setting an example, to which I always rolled my eyes, because I’d heard plenty of stories about them. Most from Neenee Cass.
When Cassidy had a little too much faerie wine—a typical occurrence—she would tell me all about my mother and the trouble she got into. Nima would of course deny deny deny, but her tipped black eyes would always tilt a little higher, and eventually, so would her lips. However much she insisted my aunt loved storytelling as much as she loved sampling the casks of fae wine delivered daily to her Neverrian bar and club, I knew my mother wasn’t the goody two-shoes she
claimed to have been.
And my father. Well, Iba never pretended to be good. The only thing he ever declared being good at was infuriating my mother and loving us ut Rowan e retri. From Rowan and back.
Rowan was where my mother grew up. Smackdab in the middle of a cemetery filled with human and Hunter graves. My uncle Kajika spent two centuries in one of those graves, preserved by magical rose petals born of faerie ashes. According to his daughter, Giya, this still bothered him to no end.
My bracelet beeped with an incoming call.
“Speak of the Unseelie,” I murmured before tapping the wristband twice to deny the call.
My cousin wasn’t a tattletale, but if I picked up the call and she caught sight of my surroundings on the holographic feed that would rise from her band, she’d ask where the heck I was. Unlike my guards and my parents, she didn’t have access to my Infinity’s GPS.
GIYA: I’m at your house, but you’re not.
I touched the implant behind my ear to convey the answer scrolling through my brain, which appeared like magic on the holo-chat: I’m on Earth. Running an errand. Why are you at my house?
GIYA: Your father’s organizing a big revel tonight, so I came to get ready with you.
ME: Another revel? In whose honor this time?
GIYA: Have no clue, but apparently, the whole family’s convened. Maybe they have an announcement?
Reckless Cruel Heirs Page 1
