“You taste of fear,” he whispered. Slowly, he handed the bag over. “I wonder what fearless Luna could possibly be worried about?” he mused.
“Not having enough time to end my sister once and for all, for starters.”
At our last visit, Malex warned that if I didn’t sever the tie before our eighteenth birthday, my sister and I would be forever linked. That meant this was my last chance. He said I couldn’t do it while she slept, which meant it had to be done in autumn. Another stipulation was that we both had to be awake, so the timing had to be either right before dawn or at dusk. When spring came again, all hope would be lost. We would come of age, and our powers would peak. If this didn’t work, we would be bound together forever.
And it had to work.
Right now is the time to strike.
He flashed a feline smile. “No, this fear seems direr than your tumultuous relationship with Aura. You’ve been orbiting one another since birth.”
I shrugged.
“You also taste of heartache. Surely you don’t still pine for your human prince.” His brows furrowed. “And there’s something else... I can’t quite put my finger on it.”
“Guessing the hidden flavor should keep you busy for a long while.” I turned my back to him and grabbed my broom. “My emotions are none of your concern,” I said sharply. “I’ll be back with the ingredients. Be ready for me.”
He smiled, tucking his hands in his pockets. “I always have time for you, Luna.”
I walked out of his cave and into the inky darkness. Rain sprinkled from the sky as I took flight. My lips and the cheek he kissed still tingled. Suddenly, I knew. He marked me.
That bastard marked me.
PHILLIP
An owl hooted just outside the window. Then another and another, their calls echoing eerily through the forest. The sound of a tree crashing to the ground came from just beyond the front porch. It was still dark, and Luna said she wouldn’t be back until just before dawn.
“Luna?” I called out, easing toward the door. I could still open it. She put a protective spell around the house, so as long as I didn’t walk outside onto the porch, nothing could get in. Right?
I looked at Ember. She stood between me and the door with her back arched and her claws sticking into the floor boards. “You don’t think it’s her?” I asked as if she could reply.
She let out a squall.
“Phillip?” a voice cried from outside.
It’s Luna! It sounded like her, anyway. Ember squalled again, setting my teeth on edge.
I opened the door an inch and peered out. Luna stood in front of the house, looking out at the woods. The owls hadn’t stopped their incessant hooting and screeching.
“Come out here with me,” she said, smiling over her shoulder.
“Make them stop,” I replied, jutting my chin toward the woods.
“I like their cries,” she said, turning back around.
Suddenly it hit me. “You aren’t Luna.”
Whatever it was, it bent its neck at a strange angle, the vertebrae popping as it rolled its shoulders. And then it was in front of me. I hadn’t even seen it move. It smiled and shook its head like a dog shakes water from its fur, Luna’s skin and hair fading away to reveal little more than an emaciated corpse. I could see through patches of its skin.
“What are you?” I asked, horrified.
“Not Luna,” it answered in a scratchy voice.
Ember jumped onto my shoulder, reaching out an arm to claw out at the thing.
The thing clawed back, finding the barrier spell Luna had made. It shrieked at the contact, grabbing its hand and backing away.
“Nice of you to stop by!” I yelled to it as it ran into the forest.
Some of the owls stayed on their branches, but I could hear the beating wings of others chasing the monster farther into the woods.
I grabbed Ember and slammed the door, sinking back onto the wood.
LUNA
I flew to the castle, hovering at Aura’s window. She lay on her plush canopy bed, eyes closed, hands folded demurely over her stomach. Pieces slept quietly on a perch in a cage beside her bed.
Some of the servants were still buzzing around the interior of the castle. I could hear pots and pans being scrubbed, firewood being thrown into hearths, footsteps on stone. Sounds I hadn’t heard in a very long time. My heart ached for all that Aura had forced me from and taken away.
Easing to the ground, I tugged on the twine that held the burlap sack closed and began to sprinkle the dust all around the castle’s exterior, careful not to break the circle. If she tried to exit through a door, it would stop her. If she tried to climb out a window, her feet would not touch the ground. If she burrowed beneath it... well, I wasn’t sure if that was possible, and while she may be able to get around the dust that way, it would take her a long time to dig far enough for it to matter.
If I gave Malex a few more kisses, I could be rid of her forever.
If only that were the case. Malex wanted a favor, and I had a feeling that when he called it in, I would regret agreeing to it. My lips and cheek still tingled. I wondered what his mark looked like.
Phillip is going to see it.
Pushing him and his possible reactions away, I finished sprinkling the dust and took up my broom again. I didn’t care what the Prince thought, anyway.
The search for Malex had taken too long. The sky was no longer dark and comforting, but lightening by the second, the deep blue fading quickly away. Sleep was tugging at me and soon it would be tearing at my mind. I would succumb when the sun rose, no matter where in the world I was. And I didn’t want to be here when it happened.
I also didn’t want to leave Phillip alone in my cottage. I told him I’d be back at dawn, and that he could go home this evening. He’d worry and probably leave the house, and my protection, when he did.
I sprinkled the last bit of dust, closing the circle and trapping Aura inside her own palace. She’d always wanted the palace to herself…now she’d really have the run of the place.
When the hoots of owls erupted through the forest, the smirk fell from my face. Something was near the cottage. I rushed toward Phillip, flying as fast as the wind could carry me. Raindrops stung my skin, carving paths off my skin and soaking my hair. One more night and day, and then I would see him home safely. He could take up his crown and marry a beautiful princess who would bear auburn-haired babies that bore his beauty mark and smiled like him.
Phillip would be happy. Safe and happy.
I needed to go faster, which meant I needed to get higher. But the higher I flew, the more the sky turned purple and the clouds turned to gold. The sprinkling rain stopped and the clouds scattered across the sky. My grip on the broom became weaker. I became weaker. But the small clearing in the wood was just ahead. I just had to hold on.
One more moment.
Crashing to the earth with a loud thump, I groaned and looked up at the sky. It was almost dawn. Even though I pushed hard, it still wasn’t fast enough to beat the sun. I heard the bang when the front door was thrown open, ricocheting against the house. Ember meowed loudly, running to my side.
“Luna?” Phillip rushed from the porch.
“NO!” I yelled, smelling the bird nearby, but it was too late. Pieces saw him and flew off in the direction of Aura’s castle. My heart thundered. She’ll know about him! She’ll come for him! I may have bound her, but she had other powers at her disposal; powers over dream and mind. I knew, because I wielded them, too.
She could enter Phillip’s consciousness and will him to come to her in Virosa. And then she would hurt him just to hurt me.
I couldn’t crawl or walk, so I reached for him. “Help me,” I rasped.
He was off the porch and at my side in an instant, lifting me into sure and strong arms. “What do you need?” he asked tenderly, his brown eyes begging to help.
“Sleep.”
“I’ll carry you to your room.”
“
Stay inside today. Stay with me. Don’t leave me.” I was begging at this point because I knew he wasn’t safe outside. With Aura, he wasn’t safe in Grithim either. He wouldn’t be safe anywhere but with me. At least then I could watch him and enter his mind, if need be, to thwart her attempts to draw him to her. I muttered a curse. I failed Phillip and I failed William again by putting his brother in danger.
“I won’t leave you. I promise,” he vowed. I glanced at Ember, who knew to protect him, too.
“I’m sorry,” were the last words I spoke before slipping away into the comforting darkness.
“You’ve been keeping secrets, sister.” Aura pushed my hair away from my face. “Whose mark is this on your lips and cheek? You let a dark fae mark you, and yet a handsome young man is staying at your cottage? Funny. He looks a lot like William.”
She conjured him then; a vision of William standing with his hands folded behind his back. The angry stitches holding him together glared at me. “He says it’s his little brother,” Aura whispered. “Phillip? Is that his name, dear?” she asked William.
“Yes,” he answered in his deep timbre voice, his eyes still fixated on me; the eyes that brought all of the guilt and pain to the surface once again. There was something strange about him. He almost looked... angry.
“I’d like to meet him,” she said nonchalantly, pushing her cuticles back.
“I’m afraid that’s not possible,” I said, sitting up straight.
“Why, Luna. Surely, you’ve learned your lesson about sharing by now. We are two halves of a whole. What’s yours is mine.”
“Not this time,” I gritted, willing the floor to fill with scorpions.
She raised her feet up onto the mattress and rolled her eyes. “Always so dramatic. Don’t you ever tire of the darkness?”
“No more than you tire of the light.”
“How did you meet him? You must tell me all about him. Is he very much like William?”
Was he like William? No, he wasn’t. William was... selfish. As much as I loved him, he loved himself more. It took time, distance, and seeing Phillip’s instinctual reactions to realize it. Maybe that was why it stung so badly now. I loved William more than he loved me, and I only now saw it because of his brother’s nature.
“I can pay him a little visit tomorrow,” she cooed. “I have to know more about the man who stole your heart.”
“No one has stolen my heart.”
“I beg to differ. Peace showed me your reaction. When he stepped onto the porch and you knew I would see him, you were terrified. If you didn’t truly care for him, you wouldn’t have responded in such a way. Yes, I think I’ll visit him. Perhaps we can chat about his feelings for you. And perhaps he’ll change his mind about you when he sees how poisonous you are,” she said pleasantly, shaking a scorpion off her white boot.
William waited patiently as the floor writhed, but I kept the creatures from him. I knew it wasn’t really him, but it didn’t matter. I would never hurt him. And I wanted her to know that even though she was the one who brought him here, it wouldn’t be me who harmed him. Just as it wasn’t me who tore him apart. It was her.
Inwardly, my anger turned to anticipation. Would she wear the same smile when she learned she was bound to her castle? Would her roses wither when she could no longer tend them? Would her killings stop?
As much as we were opposite, we shared a few of the same traits. Aura was tenacious. Determined. Stubborn and vengeful. She would find a way out eventually, and when she did, she would try to make me pay. Not physically, but emotionally.
She would strike at Phillip.
I turned the scorpions into serpents. Every shade of venomous species in existence slithered around her, writhing beneath her boots and stretching their bodies up onto the mattress. “Seriously, Luna. You have to stop this childish behavior.”
“I’ll stop when you stop,” I said sweetly, pushing her from my head. I hoped she bruised her ass when she fell from my dreams.
chapter nine
PHILLIP
Luna hovered in the air above her bed. Gone was the peaceful sleep I first found her in. Today she thrashed and fought against something, her chest heaving, teeth gritted, and her cheeks puffing with every exhalation. “Stay away from him,” she growled.
She’d been so desperate outside, afraid for me. The dove she’d warned me about had seen me, and like Ember, the fowl’s eyes were intelligent, calculating.
But Luna was so weak she couldn’t stand. She couldn’t even crawl toward the house. She tried, but was too exhausted. This strange cycle she was stuck in drained most of the life and energy from her. Her sister was stuck in a similar, but opposite cycle, if I understood it correctly.
While Luna slept, I read, pausing occasionally to digest the information. Aura was ruled by the day and Luna by the night, opposites that needed one another to survive. In the day, Aura thrived while Luna ruled in the darkness, each sleeping during the opposite times of day and in opposite seasons, Aura hibernating in winter while Luna slept in summer.
I moved one of the kitchen chairs into her room to watch over her.
Something must have happened last night.
Her lips were black and a dark crescent moon had been painted on her cheek. I knew she’d left to find the dark fae from reading her diary, but what did he do to cause these marks and make her fall off her broom when she came near the ground?
She didn’t look injured, just exhausted. But if he hurt her...
Luna whimpered and a sheen of sweat broke out on her forehead. I held her hand, rubbing soothing circles onto the back of it. She finally calmed and slept less fitfully, but the day was long, the longest I’d experienced, while waiting for night to bring her back to life.
When she finally calmed down, Ember did, too, although she refused to leave Luna’s side. “Are you hungry?” I asked.
She meowed, but didn’t move.
“I’ll bring you something.”
There was nothing in the kitchen, so I eased open the door to Luna’s secret room. She hadn’t locked it for some reason. I wondered in that moment, with my hand positioned on the doorframe, if she meant to leave it open. If she meant for me to find her diary and read it so she wouldn’t have to tell me about William.
I got Ember’s bowl and took it to her. It was full of some sort of shredded meat. Ember glanced toward the food, but she stayed near Luna. “Eat, Ember, and then sleep. You have to rest, too.”
She looked at me and I could’ve sworn she was telling me she was watching me, too.
“It’s daylight. I’m fine. Eat and then sleep, Ember. I’ll watch her.”
When Ember fell asleep, I sat in the doorway so I could have enough light to read by. I opened Luna’s diary.
I’m evil. If I’m Aura’s twin, and she’s evil, I must be, too. I’ve decided to leave the castle and go somewhere far away where I can be isolated. Where no one will stumble upon me.
Except me, apparently.
And where everyone will be safe from me. There are vast forests all over this land. I’ll choose one and call the heart of it my home.
I know I’ll never be able to get far enough away from Aura. She comes to me when I sleep, invading my dreams and bringing a vision of William along with her to torture me with. Seeing him makes it difficult to breathe. I just want her to stop.
There has to be a way to make her stop.
Is that what happened this morning? Her sister invaded her dreams?
AURA
Luna always ruins our visits. Without our dreams, I would never get to see her, and yet she continued to push me away, like I was a bother. I’d only ever had her best interests in mind, only ever cared for her and for our Kingdom. And that was what I saw it as: ours, not mine. We could both rule. In fact, I needed her to rule at my side. Dual queens. One of the light, and one of the darkness. One of the summer, and one of the winter. We would split duties during the spring and fall, or each choose the season we liked best and halve
the year.
We didn’t need a King; a man to rule over us, or even stand beside us. We had each other. William tried to tear us apart once, but I turned it around on him.
Our bravery and beauty would be spoken about throughout all the lands. Every Kingdom would speak of the fierce and terrible twin Queens of Virosa. I just needed Luna to understand her importance in my plan for us.
But she was so stubborn.
I’d forgiven her for refusing to hear me out about William and his games. After all, sisters fought. Sometimes it was over petty things, like men. We’d been so enamored by the young prince that we forgot who we were together. Sisters. Friends. The most powerful creatures in the land. Even more powerful together than apart.
But now there was a new man at her house. Always a man...
Always cleaving us in two.
We. Are. Sisters.
Blowing out a tense breath, I knew what would clear my head.
I needed to walk in my garden. Using William wasn’t working with Luna anymore. She’d barely reacted to him during last night’s sleep walk. But Phillip? Phillip was a tool I needed to think about how to wield more efficiently.
He was a useful puppet. Seeing through his eyes had given me insight into my sister’s innermost thoughts. The nosy man read her diary and told me all her important secrets. She was actually planning to try and sever our bond? I sniffed. I could only imagine why...
Pursing my lips, I thought about the young prince. She considered him a friend, at the very least, but maybe we needed to ramp up her feelings; warm things up a bit and speed them along.
Luna was a romantic at heart, in love with the idea of love, and had believed the sweet nothings William spouted to her without thinking twice. And that was all they were. Nothing. Empty promises.
William didn’t want her any more than he wanted me. He tried to fool us both, to trick us into thinking he cared about us, but neither of us was what he was really hunting for.
Savage Beauty Page 7
