by Casey Bond
She glanced up at me, pausing her stitches. “No, it doesn’t. It makes everything worse, not better. Hiding your problems or pretending they don’t exist is not the way to handle them. But it’s Rule’s way.”
“Is that why you’re here and not with him?”
“Yes,” she answered softly. “Don’t get me wrong – I hate that witch of a mother of his, but his decisions are what tore us apart. He had the chance to be with me, to move away from her control, but refused to take it. He hid me away so she couldn’t hurt me, but it was a selfish thing to do. Because now, I’m alone. I can never leave this place, and only he can visit.” She glanced at the ring. “Until you. What’s your name, girl?”
“Arabella.”
“Arabella,” she repeated, tasting my name and staring at me like she was trying to decide if my name fit my face.
“He caged you,” I guessed, feeling both despair and anger in her words.
“Yes. He didn’t want her to kill me, because he knew she would have. But he never asked me if I wanted to live like this.” She pursed her lips together. “His mother has been trying to find me for centuries. It’s only a matter of time until she finds a way. And this time, she just might have.”
“He’s probably watching right now,” I noted with a start. “This is all part of the game.”
Esmerelda shook her head. “He’ll see what Coeur wants him to see, and she won’t want him to see her trick. He’ll never even know you were here. When you picked up that ring, he probably saw it as a plain silver band. Coeur is a master of manipulation. But I guess you already know that if you’re a player in her game.”
Her dark skin was beautiful, a mix of chocolate and honey. I could see her with Rule. She was even more beautiful than he was, and that was saying something. The two would make a lovely pair. If only Rule would stand up to his mother and take his heartmate back.
“I could tell him what you just told me. In private.”
She shook her head. “You are tethered to him, too. I can smell him on you.”
“My heartmate is my partner. His life is at stake, too. If you could help us win the game, maybe you and Rule could finally be together.”
She shook her head. “That would require a desire that I no longer feel for him,” she reasoned. “He made his choice a long time ago, and I’ve long since made mine. I couldn’t help you anyway. I can’t leave this place.”
“There’s no way out for you but through Rule?”
“There’s also Coeur,” she granted. “If she found me, she’d drag me out of here and behead me in front of her court just to hurt him. She’d make an absolute spectacle of it.”
The image of O’Hare’s head flashed through my mind.
“There is one other way,” she began hesitantly.
“How? Tell me, and I’ll try to make it happen.”
“He came here just yesterday, asking if I would break our tether if I could. Was he hoping to break yours, too, I wonder? What game is he playing at?” she mused. Then, struck with a thought, she clutched her measuring ribbon. “I have an idea.”
Her crimson eyes followed the tick marks on the ribbon as she measured the circumference of my head. “Six and three-quarters,” she proclaimed with a smile. “Perfect.”
On the back wall were racks of hats. Some tall, some dainty. Some with ribbon and some with plumes on the side. The one she chose for me was emerald with black lace laid over the green silk. “He will know where you’ve been now, and he’ll know what his mother is searching for. As much as I hate being caged, I do hope for the chance to one day fly away. That will never happen if Coeur finds me.”
The hat was tall, a top hat made for a woman, and fit as if it were made for me. “The color of the day is black?” she asked.
“It was when we left,” I answered, rolling my eyes.
She grinned and waved her hand, and the dark leather suit I’d worn upon entering the day’s game turned into a short, black lace dress. “No shoes?” she observed.
“It pisses Coeur off.”
Esmerelda chuckled. “I’ll remember that. Tell the Queen I said hello.”
With a conspiratorial grin, I removed the ring and was pulled back into the throne room, landing awkwardly in the ocean of rings. Carden was still there, and with my sudden arrival he gave me a quizzical look. “Where have you been?”
But before I could answer, a deafening roar echoed all around us. It reverberated in the room, in the halls, probably outside the castle. We covered our ears and waited for it to end. The rings turned to liquid, cool around our legs, and drained out of the room via a drain at the base of the clock. The hands were moving in the right direction now. I hoped it was a sign that we just might get out of there.
Rule was looking for a way to cut a tether. I could only hope that he wanted to be free of his mother as much as we did.
“We need to find a way out of here. Now,” I said urgently.
“How?”
“Hurry!” I pulled him toward the doors that had suddenly reappeared. “While they’re distracted.”
We pushed the double doors open and ran like hell. We raced down the hallways, hoping we could get out of the castle.
ORYN
I’d been watching the woods for days, ever since that orange-haired fellow appeared in mid-air, only to kill and cut the heads off two fae soldiers and take them with him as souvenirs. I’d been watching the spot where he came from in case anyone else came through or showed up to open whatever door he’d come out of. If this was the way into the world of the fae, I needed to sneak in. I had an uneasy suspicion Arabella might be trapped there.
All night and all day, nothing happened. I was starting to think I was crazy, when a bright shimmer waved across the air, filling it with the stinging scent of magic. I ran for it. The shimmery slit began to close, but I dove inside and hit the ground hard, knocking the breath out of me.
Coughing and sputtering, I rolled onto my side. Fiery pain raced through my middle and into my chest, and I was pretty sure I broke something. Shit. The ribs on my right side were on fire.
A woman suddenly appeared in the forest with striking white hair, dusky skin, and blistering red eyes. She smiled, grabbed me by the hair, and started dragging me through the woods. “Stop, please!” I cried.
She wouldn’t stop. My chest was caving in and I couldn’t get enough air. “I’m hurt. You’re killing me. Please, stop,” I gasped.
The woman paused, letting go of my hair and looking me over. “You’ve punctured your lung,” she offered clinically, before crouching down beside me and pointing a sharp fingernail in my face. “I will heal you, human. But when I do, you’re going to tell me exactly how you got here, and if you leave any detail out, I’ll break your ribs all over again. And this time, I won’t just puncture your lung. I’ll gouge your eyes out with your own rib bone before I carve you apart… slowly.”
“Help me,” I panted, squeezing my eyes shut against the pain. The healing powers of fae were legendary, and I knew she was just as deadly as she threatened to be.
Easing her fingers over my skin, the bones deftly popped back into place and knitted themselves together. I could feel the moment when my lung filled back up with air. When she sat back and growled, I spilled everything I knew.
“My sister’s missing. I’ve been trying to find her for days, so I wondered if she might be among the fae. I used to deal with this guy named O’Hare. He used to give me faery dust in exchange for killing a few fae he said owed him favors and wouldn’t pay up.”
“Used to?”
“I’ve put his calling symbol into the earth more times than I can count since she went missing, but he hasn’t replied.”
“How is it that a simple human can manage ‘to kill a few fae’? Most fae are stronger and faster than any human. Even one as fit as yourself.”
; She thought I was fit? “He’d tell me what their weaknesses were. It was just a matter of using them to my advantage.”
“Said the lion to the lamb…” she quoted.
There was something feral in her expression that set me on edge. Of the two of us, she was definitely the lioness. But I was no foolish lamb.
“You tracked your sister into this forest?”
“I left her in a safe spot and just went to get water from a nearby stream. She wouldn’t have left without good reason, and I wasn’t gone that long. I tracked her footprints through the woods until they opened into a huge, empty field. On one of the tree branches that surrounded the field, I found a ripped piece of her skirt. I knew she’d been there, but I could swear…”
“You could swear what?”
“I heard her yell my name. Her voice was muffled and it sounded strange, but it was her. I know my sister’s voice. Maybe the faery dust I wore helped heighten my senses. I don’t know, but I knew she was nearby.”
“But you weren’t able to find her.” She said it as fact, staring into the space between us as if she were seeing what I saw, as if she knew exactly where I’d been and heard Bella yelling for me.
“There was a male faery in the forest a little while ago, the first I’d seen in days, so I followed him and saw him disappear into thin air. I camped out where I saw him and waited. After a while, he reappeared in the same place and killed two fae soldiers that must have been trailing him, though they didn’t hide themselves very well. He... he was vicious.” I shuddered. “I knew better than to ask him about Bella, but I need to find her. I’m supposed to look out for her, you know. She’s my baby sister. So, anyway, I waited in the woods to see if he came back.”
“He did not return,” she announced confidently.
“No, no one did. But just a few minutes ago, I saw a shimmer, like a crack in the air. When I ran to see what it was, it started closing up and I jumped into it and landed hard. That’s when I met you, and that’s all I know, I swear. I just want Bella back. I mean you no harm.”
“Bella. Your sister is Arabella?” she asked, ticking her head back.
A sudden burst of hope flashed through my chest. “You know where she is?” I stood up, brushing the dirt and leaves off my pants.
“I know she’ll be dead by morning.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CARDEN
Guards filled the corridors, spilling out of every door behind us. We ran, the green hat Arabella had come back with spilling off her head and landing somewhere in the chaos. “There’s a door ahead!” she yelled. We pushed harder and ground to a stop just in time to pull it open and duck inside. I grabbed a wooden chair and jammed it against the door handle. The action was futile; we knew a guard would beat it down and splinter the damn thing to get to us.
Bewildered at the wild pace of events, I asked Arabella, “What did you do?”
“I met Rule’s heartmate,” she answered, equally breathless.
“So, Coeur sent you to her,” I deduced. “Then why is she so angry?” Remembering the deafening roar we heard, I assumed it must have been the panther. “And why is Rule mad?”
“The Queen didn’t want him to know where she was sending me, because apparently, she’s tried to hunt his heartmate down before. However, his heartmate makes hats, and she sent me back wearing one so he’d know where I’d been.”
I watched the door. There were no noises on the other side. The knob wasn’t being turned. No one was beating on it.
“I think we’re okay,” she quavered, but I knew she didn’t mean it. We were in deep trouble, and needed to take this opportunity to catch our breath and plan for the inevitable. Coeur was going to kill us. I was surprised the guards hadn’t already dragged us into the throne room.
I looked down at the plush burgundy carpet. My toes sank into it as I turned in a circle.
“This room is amazing,” she marveled, staring upward at the walls. Books were everywhere, lining every space, even stretching across the ceiling. No doubt they were held up by fae power.
My ears picked up the sounds of her muttering about the game under her breath. “Well, I’d rather be here than face being eaten by some beast… Not you, of course. Not the beast you become, I mean,” she stammered. “Damn it. I’m sorry, Carden.” Her shoulders fell and she shot me an apologetic look.
“It’s fine. I know what you mean, and I’d place me in that category when I change, too.” I felt the need to make her understand what it was like for me during the shift. “It’s different now. When I change.”
“How so?”
Marshaling my thoughts, I began, “At first, I was still me. I could hear my thoughts and knew what was happening, including where you were at all times. I could always feel the tether between us. And even though Coeur hated it, there was a part of me that would never let the beast hurt you.”
She walked around a leather-upholstered couch. “And now?”
“Now, me and the beast aren’t the same creature. When I’m him, I’m not me. When I’m still me, right before he takes over, I feel him rumbling, but can’t control the change anymore. I used to be able to hold him off, at least for a while. Now, I lose control. And when I’m him, I don’t feel you. I don’t think I even know you. It’s like his tether isn’t to you.”
Arabella had a puzzled look on her face, and then comprehension dawned on her features. “Maybe he has no tether. He’s part of you, but an absolute creation of Coeur’s twisted mind. That or his tether is to her.” She shook her head in frustration. “Maybe that’s how she’ll end it,” Arabella mused. “You’ll become the beast. You won’t recognize me and I won’t recognize you, and we won’t be able to finish the game together—that, or you’ll eat me and then she’ll kill you.”
I cringed. Coeur was cruel enough to do either one, and Rule was evil enough to let her. He’d probably stab his mother in the back while she watched the ending of her little show of horrors.
Arabella moved to the wall and scanned the books, letting her hands drift over their spines. I walked over to stand next to her and did the same. “Look –” she noticed, “none of them have a title.”
“That’s strange,” I remarked, pulling out a golden-bound book. Taking special care as I handled its brittle pages, I was stunned to realize all the pages were blank. I flipped through them, letting them fan out so I could see if anything was inside. There was nothing.
Arabella did the same. “They’re all empty!” she exclaimed. “Why would someone go through all the trouble of having an enormous room full of empty books?”
I suggested, “Maybe you have to be fae to read them?”
She frowned. “Such a waste.” Placing the book back onto the shelf, she stared at the door. “Where did the guards go? If she sent them after us, why did they stop searching before they got to this room?”
“Why does she do anything she does?” I scoffed. “Maybe your visit to Rule’s heartmate was part of her plan all along. Maybe she wanted to rile her son, and you were just the pawn she used to do it.”
“Maybe…”
She didn’t believe it any more than I did.
I watched her in my periphery. “You like to read?”
A smile crept over her face. “I loved to when I was younger, but I haven’t done it in a long time.”
“Then you realize this room is intended for you, right?”
She cringed. “I guess so. And now that she’s mad, that’s kind of terrifying.” Her eyes caught on something behind us. “Was that there a minute ago?”
Sitting in the center of the room was a large, rectangular desk. Beneath it was a matching chair. Flickering light from a dozen candles sent wavering light across its surface and onto the book laying open on it. A quill and a well full of fresh ink sat to the left of the book. “Are you left-handed?”
She n
odded once and slowly made her way to the desk and sat in the chair. “What do you think she wants me to write?” She looked up at me as if I had the answer. I wasn’t sure those existed in this place, and certainly didn’t have them if they did.
“I’m not sure. Maybe just print your name and see what happens?”
Arabella dipped the quill and glided the tip across the page. Her handwriting was beautiful; artful with swoops and swirls, indicating a fine education. I knew her family used to have money, but wasn’t sure when her mother had taken off with it all, leaving her and Oryn behind. I shook my head, still unable to wrap my head around her decision. Fathers sometimes abandoned their wives. They sometimes abandoned their children. But women? For the most part, a mother would rather die than leave her babies behind.
Thunder cracked outside. From within the wall of books, two large windows suddenly appeared. Tree branches thrashed against them as the first of the rain began to fall.
“Whoa…” Arabella watched as the book answered her. The words began to fill the page from left to right and top to bottom.
Arabella, she’d written. The book supplied:
Daughter of a liar. Daughter of a glutton. Sister of a murderer. Harlot…
She gasped, watching as the word Harlot was written in black across her chest. “Why is it on my skin?” she panicked, rubbing her fingers across her flesh. “It won’t come off.”
On the opposite page, new words appeared:
Prince Carden of Tierney. Son of a shadow. Son of a tyrant. Brother of a King. Coward…
As a burning sensation crossed my chest, I knew what I’d find if I looked down. The Queen was branding us with the labels she knew we would loathe. But how was Arabella a harlot? Was it because Rule was interested in her and Coeur wanted to drive them apart?
Another deafening roar echoed through the room, and then the earth began to tremble. This was it. The end of the game.
Lightning struck the tree outside the window. With a splintering boom, part of it crashed through the window. Shards of glass, swirling leaves, ragged branches, and stinging rain blew across the room.
