A Trace of Moonlight

by Allison Pang

  I stared down at the slice in my palm. “What the hell just happened?”

  “You traded in a potential Evil Stepmother for an Evil Mother-in-Law,” Phin said. “I’ve never seen anyone quite so talented at digging a hole as deep as you do. It’s like you trained for it.”

  “I wasn’t asking you.”

  “I bought you some time on a technicality.” Talivar sighed, rubbing his thumb against his own cut. “The handfasting will only be for the standard year and a day. Assuming there are no children,” he added. “We can cross that bridge if we come to it, but as my wife you’ll be able to move about Faerie with a greater level of protection than you would otherwise.” He let out an embarrassed cough. “Technically you belong to me now . . . and for tonight, at least, that overrides the claim of the Queen.”

  “Hooray for women’s rights,” I retorted. “And children would only be a worry if we were sleeping together . . .” His brow arched and I flushed, heat sparking behind my cheeks. Well done, Abby. “. . . not that I’m suggesting you did anything dishonorable when I had no memory of you.”

  “No, I didn’t.” His jaw tightened. And I believed him. Even if things were still a bit hazy in places, I knew now that he’d had nothing but my welfare on his mind. But it still rankled that I’d had to be protected at all. On the other hand, my first independent act as an amnesiac had been to get myself murdered. Crapshoot, either way.

  “Sorry,” I murmured, squeezing his hand in apology. “But time is running away from me and I need to catch myself.”

  “Consider yourself caught, then,” he said wryly. “For all the good it does you.”

  “We’re going to have to talk about some things,” I warned him, yanking on Ion’s bells.

  “Yes. But not here. And not now.” Stooping, he snagged a few items of clothing off the floor, eying them critically. “We’ll get you something more appropriate later. Come on. I’ve got my horse saddled and ready to go.”

  “Where are we going?” I craned my head toward the door. “Surely they’re not going to just let us waltz out of here?”

  “Well, we could waste time consummating our union instead, if you like.” His brow rose knowingly at me and I flushed despite myself. He shook his head. “You want to hang around long enough to present our marriage to the Court tomorrow? The only reason we got away with this much is because of the guards . . . and Phin. Even the Queen can’t go against elvish protocol on a whim.” His expression sobered. “But don’t expect any such gifts tomorrow . . . I’d be surprised if she even let us get that far.”

  “Doubtful,” Phineas agreed, giving himself a little shake. “After all, as far as Maurice and the rest of the kingdom are concerned, you’re the Tithe. Announcing you as the wife of the prince will open the door to a lot more questions than she’s probably willing to answer.”

  “Right. Whatever Maurice’s game is right now, I can’t risk him coming to find you here,” Talivar said abruptly.

  “And where are we supposed to go?” I paced the length of the room, the walls seeming to close in on me like the bars of a tiger’s cage. “If I can’t travel the CrossRoads, that sort of limits us, doesn’t it?” Another thought struck me. “And what if she sends a pursuit?”

  “You’re talking to someone who spent nearly twenty years outrunning his father’s men,” Talivar said sadly. “We’ll manage.” I started for the door but he shook his head. “Through the garden. She’ll have put a guard outside my door, and I’d rather spare them any more grief than they’re already going to get.”

  “She won’t put anyone outside the gardens?”

  “She might,” he admitted with a sigh. “In fact, she probably will. Guess it’s a good thing I sent Moira on ahead to meet us outside the palace walls with my horse. Of course, that was before all this happened, so it’s a rather fortunate run of timing.” He pulled at his mouth wryly. “Between that and a certain secret passage, we ought to be gone before they realize it.”

  “I do so like a man with a plan,” I murmured, scooping Phin into my arms. The unicorn let out a snort but wisely said nothing.

  Talivar shrugged, cold amusement burning from his good eye. “Well, when you thumb your nose at the Queen, it helps to have options. Including a way to get the hell out of Dodge, as you mortals so quaintly put it.”

  “Then lead the way . . . husband mine,” I said, the word rolling strange and foreign on my tongue. With a self-mocking smile, the prince bowed and took my arm, leading me from the bedroom chambers that had been my home for the last several weeks and into the wildness of his gardens.

  I did not look back.

  Five

  Icy rivulets of rain trickled down the back of my tunic, setting off another round of shivers. I ducked beneath the low-hanging branches of a pine tree, its needles made soft by the downpour. “I’m getting wet,” Phineas complained, his muzzle pressing against my neck.

  “I’ll make sure to punch your membership card when you leave,” I muttered, shifting him in my arms. “Or you could go back, if you wanted.”

  He shuddered. “No thanks. Some of those spiders were almost as big as me.”

  The “secret” passage through the garden was less an actual doorway than a slim tunnel through a moss-riddled break in the wall. The reason for the garden’s lack of upkeep became evident when Talivar had to cut through several feet of brambles just to reach it. The bioluminescence of the flowers seemed dim, but the bluish aura was enough to see by.

  “It seems smaller than I remembered,” Talivar mused aloud. “Or perhaps I’ve only grown larger since I last used it. I was only a lad then, after all.”

  Phineas had gone first, his smaller size ideal for making sure there was nothing waiting for us on the other side. I’d squirmed through afterward, contorting through the rocky passage with only a small amount of difficulty. Good thing I wasn’t claustrophobic.

  The prince collapsed the tunnel on his exit, a couple of muttered words resulting in a small rumble as the stones clattered into place. “Surprised it lasted this long,” he said, giving me a sideways smile from under his hooded cloak. “I bought the charm from a hedge witch as a boy so I could get out to court the village girls. Later on it served me well enough to escape my father’s wrath.”

  “Almost seems a shame to destroy it now,” I observed, peering into the darkness around us.

  “It served its purpose, Abby. That’s all I could have asked . . . and something tells me I won’t be returning.”

  There was a tightness in his tone that warned me not to press the issue, and I slipped my hand under his cloak to squeeze his hand. After a moment he squeezed back, kindly not mentioning the way my fingers trembled. We stole away in silence, finding Moira next to the withered stump of an ancient oak.

  The princess sat upon her mare, the reins of her brother’s stallion knotted at the pommel of the white leather saddle. She looked at us gravely as Talivar explained what had happened, her face troubled as she dismounted. “You don’t have much time,” she said finally, gathering the edges of her cloak around her shoulders to ward off the chill. “I shall attempt to stall them in the morning, but I fear the Queen will not be denied this.”

  She took my hand, staring at the cut with a sigh. “I’d nearly hoped this was merely a trick of some kind.”

  “Just think,” Phineas piped up from my arms. “Now you’re sisters twice over.” He ignored the sour look the three of us sent his way, giving an equine shrug. His beard waggled at us. “Calling it like I see it—you know what they say, right? If you can’t keep it in your pants, keep it in the fam—”

  He let out a squeal as I yanked on the offending bit of fluff.

  “That’s enough.”

  “Indeed.” A faint smile touched Moira’s lips, even as her finger reached out to trace my cheek. “I would not have wished this upon you for the world, Abby. Keep her safe, brother,” she murmured, giving us both a hasty embrace before remounting; she disappeared into the mist, the harness bells
fading into silence.

  Talivar stared after her a moment longer before getting me seated in front of him, our thighs pressed tightly together. One arm snagged me hard around the waist, and he clucked the horse forward, his heels pressing quick into the beast’s sides.

  It should have been romantic—the young newlyweds fleeing the kingdom upon a stolen steed, flanked by birdsong and their own pattering heartbeats. And perhaps it was, for a few hours. And then the rain began, the dampness seeping into my clothing until I shivered nonstop.

  Talivar pulled me closer, nipping at my ear. A flush of warmth raced through me. Of course, the effect was ruined by the flatulent unicorn in my arms.

  “What the hell have you been eating, Phin?” I coughed as his backside let out another unapologetic squeak.

  “The healers have been feeding me a lot of roughage. Supposed to give me strength or something.”

  “Or something,” Talivar muttered. “Maybe we should bottle it up and use it in the upcoming war with the daemons.”

  “I heard that,” Phineas said, blowing out hard. “Maybe I am a little ripe,” he admitted.

  “Yeah, well, don’t think you’re sleeping in my bedroll tonight.”

  “As if I wanted to be anywhere near you two,” he retorted. “Wedding night and all.”

  I let out a grunt, not sure I wanted to touch that particular subject. Though he did have a point. I elbowed Talivar in the ribs. “So . . . uh . . . just what are our plans for tonight?”

  “I’m flattered you think I’m going to be good for anything of that nature,” he said dryly. “We’ve got a long way to go—and we’ll be walking as soon as I turn the horse loose.” He chuckled at my questioning grunt of incredulity. “We need to disappear, Abby. A horse eats and shits a lot. Where we’re going we’ll move faster without him.”

  “Crafty,” I said lamely. I didn’t know the first real thing about living rough, so I was more than willing to let Talivar play Aragorn if it gave us a real chance of escape. So here we were, several hours later. He’d turned off the road at some indiscriminate location, stripping the horse of what looked to be a bedroll and some odds and ends, his bow slung lightly over his shoulder.

  Slapping the stallion on the rump, he sent it galloping down the road and into the mist, sighing as the darkness swallowed it up. “He’ll find his own way home. The mud will make it easier for the Queen’s men to track us, so we’ll take to the water,” he said finally, leading me to the shallow banks of a fast-running stream. “This isn’t going to be pleasant, but if we can get enough distance between us and the road, we’ll have enough breathing room to set up a camp.”

  “Camping on my honeymoon,” I muttered. “Hoorah.”

  “I’ll try to make it better than that,” he said slyly. “I know where the best hot springs are, after all.”

  “I’ll bet you do. Not that it matters.” I groaned as fire swept up the inside of my thighs, my muscles cramping. “If I ride anything else in the next three weeks it will be too soon.”

  He let out a noncommittal laugh and took my hand. Mountain streams run deep and cold even in the Faerie world, and this one was no exception. Immediately, water seeped into my boots, flooding through the tops when I stumbled into a deeper eddy, my trembling legs having forgotten the basics of movement.

  Time became a blur of damp and cold and darkness as we trudged through the woods. Or, really, I was the one who was trudging. Talivar stepped neatly as though he were dancing, each careful slide of his foot finding a quiet place. I might even have been jealous about it, if I could have stopped shaking long enough to put two coherent thoughts together.

  Phineas had passed out ages ago and the little shit was getting heavy. I’d have made him walk, but as deep as the stream was, he would have been swimming before long and I wasn’t going to be that cruel.

  Around and around, Talivar led us up and down and out of the stream and across the stream until I couldn’t have said which way we were going. For all I knew we’d been walking in circles for miles.

  My foot slipped on a pile of slick leaves and I staggered against him. He paused, letting me catch my breath for a moment. “There’s a small copse at the top of the ridge,” he said. “Just a little farther and we’ll get a chance to rest, Abby.”

  I grunted at him, too tired for words. I understood his methods. If I stopped now I wouldn’t start up again, but that last bit seemed to stretch on forever, until I lost myself in a trance of mechanical movement, each leg lurching as though there were anchors hanging from my calves. When he finally motioned that I could stop, I sank where I stood, my entire body quivering.

  Phineas slipped from my arms with a little bleat, his mane a drenched mess. “See you’ve fixed the château up nicely for us, prince.”

  The prince pulled back his hood with a sour look. “At least it’s stopped raining.” Which it had, with the exception of the excessive dripping from the trees. Talivar squatted down beside me, cupping my cheek tenderly. “I’m sorry, Abby. I hadn’t planned on taking this route, but I had to get us as far from the road as I could.”

  “Pretty goddamned out of the way, if you ask me.” Phineas grunted. “What are the chances of a hot dinner? I’m starving.”

  “Can’t imagine why you wouldn’t be,” I said. “After all that hard pulling you did to get me up the mountain.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Everyone’s a critic.”

  “Let me get the shelter set up first, and then we’ll see about something to eat. I can’t promise us a fire tonight, but if we manage to elude detection, we may be able to chance it tomorrow.”

  I mumbled something that could have been a blessing or a curse, my eyelids drooping with weariness.

  Talivar let out a soft chuckle and set about building a primitive lean-to with what looked like a leather tarp. “Look in the saddlebags . . . I’ve got some jerky in there if you’re hungry. I’ll set up a few snares before we bed down and get us something fresh for morning.”

  My stomach rumbled and I rummaged through the outer pockets, my fingers stiff. Phineas wasn’t helping matters much, thrusting his nose directly under my hand.

  “Dude,” I hissed. “You’re getting in the way.”

  “And you’re moving too slow. Some of us would like to eat before we pass out.”

  “Go nibble some violets or something,” I snarled, swearing as the knots finally untangled enough for me to get my hand inside. A triumphant sigh escaped me when I found the jerky and I quickly passed Phineas a handful before taking a bite of my own.

  A little stiff, maybe, but I would have eaten shoe leather at that point. Another quick investigation into the bag turned up Talivar’s usual flask of whiskey, and I sent a shot or two of pure elven spirits rolling into my belly. Immediately, warmth suffused upward, a flush of heat sparking into my cheeks. “See you packed the good stuff.”

  “Well, it is our wedding night,” he said dryly, emerging from the shelter. “Can’t disappoint my bride too much.”

  “It can only go up from here,” I assured him, taking another swig. “So what now? How much time do we have before they realize we’re gone?”

  “Midmorning,” he said after a pause, sitting down beside me. “Though I’m sure the Queen already knows. She’s not stupid . . . just bound by protocol.” His mouth crooked up. “If we had done things properly, I would have had you instated in my quarters, so I’m sure my sister will make a big production of getting that done. With any luck, it will be tomorrow afternoon before they come searching for us.”

  “Small favors,” Phineas said with a yawn. “But where the hell are we going? Can’t stay up here . . . indefinitely . . . Abby’s got things to do . . . plus . . . Maurice is still on the loosssss . . .” His voice drifted away and a moment later the unicorn was snoring.

  The prince and I exchanged a glance and he shrugged. “We’re pretty far off the beaten path right now. The nearest Door to the CrossRoads is miles away, so there shouldn’t be any surprises. Plus,” he ad
ded casually, “this is troll country. No one comes here to vacation, if you catch my meaning.”

  “Great,” I said, images of bridges and billy goats and being pulled into little bits of Ab-B-Que filling my head.

  “We’ll be okay. This time of year, they’re following their herds. Shouldn’t be too hard to avoid them, since they smell like rotting flesh.”

  “Herds of what? And ewww.”

  “Goats. Duh,” Phineas mumbled crossly, rousing. “Think maybe you two could shut up for a while? Some of us would like to get back to sleep.”

  I rolled my eyes. “By all means, hornycorn. I need to get out of these clothes anyway. I’m freezing.”

  “Hubba hubba.”

  Ignoring him, I let Talivar pull me to my feet. “Don’t suppose you’ve got an extra shirt or something in there?” I glanced toward the saddlebags hopefully. “I think I’ve got an entire pond in my boots.”

  “We’ll find something, but yes, you should get out of those things.” He cast a look to the sky. “The weather has turned. It should be a clear night.”

  I shivered, giving him a wan smile before heading toward the lean-to. I pried off my boots immediately, my toes pale and numb and wrinkled. Digging through his pack, the prince pulled out one of his extra tunics. It was long enough that I could wear it as a nightshirt, and I shucked off my wet clothes without a second thought. Sighing as the dry cloth hit my shoulders, I sank down to the comparatively luxurious bedroll, tucking my knees up to my chest and wrapping my arms around my legs.

  Part of me debated the wisdom of my current state of mostly undress, but my worry was less about wedding night jitters and more about the possibility of having to run bare-assed down the hillside, pursued by a grumpy troll. Besides, at the moment the only smexy time I was going to have was the sort that involved passing out and drooling all over my arm.

  The prince shook out my damp things and hung them over a tree branch. “I doubt they’ll get particularly dry, but at least you’ll sleep better for not being in them.” His face sobered as he looked at me regretfully. “I’m sorry,” he murmured. “Things shouldn’t have happened like this.”