by L. K. Rigel
IV. Cissa
Cissa had left the dancing and gone out onto the veranda. The music had stopped and the band was on a break, but in a far corner Dandelion was still dancing with Beverly, his wings extended around her, their feet not touching the slate surface. Cissa wasn’t disturbing them; though she was close enough to hear their conversation, they were oblivious to everyone and everything but themselves.
“I thought I loved you when I first saw you,” Dandelion said to his mate. “And then I loved you so much more when we married. But even then I didn't know what love was. My feelings now are so much more, a hundredfold more intense and wonderful than I ever thought possible.”
“I love you, Dandelion,” Beverly murmured. “It just keeps getting better.”
Cissa moved away from the couple to the edge of the veranda. For the first time, she found that she didn’t mind their love. She was happy for her brother. And to her surprise, she was happy for Beverly too. How could she deny anyone else happiness when she was about to realize her own?
But where was he? It was midnight—she could hear the final chimes of the hour through the open doors—and he wasn’t yet here.
Why did he not come? Was this forever to be her plea?
The full moon shone brilliant against the black night and seemed to stare down at her. Moonbeams—invisible vibrating magic coursing through pulsating white light—drenched the world in the mystic, and she heard a faint thrumming that quickened her heartbeats.
It was like the sound of blood rushing in her ears, but it was out there. And getting closer. Calling to her. Singing to her heart… to her soul. She stood at the edge of the veranda, her hands on the cool stone of the half wall. Something was coming… someone was coming.
But wait. She’d heard that sound before… a song. She laughed and clapped her hands. He was coming! It was his song.
Bathed in the mystic moonlight
On the night of a goblin ball
Look to the moon at midnight
When true love will free us all.
Her prince. It was really and truly him. He burst into the garden, as handsome as she remembered, and so tall, more than six feet… and he was coming for her.
His dark gaze found her, and she couldn’t move. She couldn’t breathe. There were four others with him, his courtiers, perhaps. Three men and a woman, all almost as tall, almost as beautiful.
But Cissa only had eyes for her prince.
He came to her, bounding up the veranda’s stone steps two at a time. With an amused look at her necklace, he held out his hand.
“Shall we dance?”
She melted inside. His voice was smooth and rumbled through her, like velvet and fire all at once. Her hand was so small in his, and she felt instantly whole and safe in his ambient strength. She remembered him pushing her against the wall in his bedroom, his lips, his tongue, his shoulders, his arms…
He led her inside to the ballroom just as the JimmyRoos launched into their version of “Into the Mystic.”
How wonderful it felt to be here in his arms at last! She laid her head against his chest and listened to his heart beating, let him guide her, let the world fall away. There was only here. There was only now.
The song ended, and another began. They danced for an hour and more without speaking. “Who are you?” she said at last.
He smiled and said, “Guess.”
“What are you?” He obviously wasn’t human, but he wasn’t fairy either—no fairy from Dumnos, anyway. “Where are you from?”
She received the same answer. “Guess.”
His name didn’t matter, nor did she care what species of fae he was. He was her love, and he was here with her, just as the abbess had said he would be. Cissa desperately wanted to tell him how much she loved him.
But she was afraid. What if he didn’t return her love?
He desired her. That was in no doubt. But love? All indications were that he did not. Not true love, like Dandelion and Beverly shared. Otherwise, how could he have left her alone for over a thousand years?
She kept silent and waited. If he truly loved her, then he would say it first.
The night passed in a blur of happiness. Though the dancing was lovely, when the novelty of it faded Max’s absence began to niggle at her. It wasn’t right that he should miss out on the party.
“Happy?” her prince said.
She looked up into his gorgeous dark eyes. “Of course.” Her body screamed at her. Kiss him! Kiss him now, while he’s here!
But she couldn’t stop thinking about Max. They’d had so much fun the past several months, dancing in the Blue Vale, drinking stout, and watching the sun come up. It would have been nice to dance at least one song with him tonight at Lexi’s ball.
“Excuse me,” she said. “I have to… I have to find the powder room.”
She moved through the crowded dance floor. So many happy couples—Lily and Cade, Dandelion and Beverly, several human couples. Several mixed couples. She found Lexi at the punchbowl, watching her guests.
“Are you sure Max is coming?” Cissa said. “Have you seen him yet?”
“I haven’t,” Lexi said. “But he said he’d be here. You know Max always keeps his word.”
“He does, doesn’t he.” Cissa said.
“You’ve been busy,” Lexi nodded toward Cissa’s prince charming. “Is there something you wanted to tell us all?
This was all wrong! Cissa should be gushing with happiness, like Beverly or Lily. Instead, she felt guilty and disappointed. This wasn’t at all what she’d envisioned. She was so confused.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I have to… do something.”
There was no one in the powder room but her own reflection in the mirror. She fingered the glittering emeralds and thought of Dandelion and Beverly… of Lily and Cade. She’d been wrong to think Lily would be better off when she turned fae and didn’t care about other people so much.
So wrong. The kind of love Lily and Cade shared was far, far better than a flash of desire for a shiny object.
Cissa tore off the necklace and exchanged it for the bracelet in her hidey pouch. When Max showed up, he had to know she cared. She wanted him to ask for a favor. She wanted him to want anything from her… she wanted him to want everything.
She returned to the ballroom, feeling so much lighter. Had the necklace been that heavy? She needed to find her prince and ask him to wait while she looked for her friend, but though she looked everywhere, she couldn’t find him.
And to her shock, she discovered that she didn’t mind. The band started playing “Save the Last Dance For Me,” and as she looked again at all the dancing couples in love, she knew there was only one man she wanted to save the last dance for.
Max!
It didn’t matter that he was ugly or short. He was Max. Her Max. And now that she knew what she knew, she couldn’t stand the thought that another hour—or another minute—would pass without him knowing she knew it.
She flew through the French doors, out onto the veranda. She had to find him, but it was nearly morning. If he wasn’t here by now, he wasn’t coming. He must have stayed home. He must be at the Blue Vale.
II. Max
Max had never understood the dark fae’s attraction to sadomasochism.
Until now.
Dancing with Cissa tonight had been sheer pleasure and raw pain wrapped into one throbbing, relentless sensation. It was killing him, but now he couldn’t imagine his life without it.
Morander was having a time of it with Boadicea. He felt sorry for the treesap, having to endure such sticky, grabby, enchanted love.
He had the feeling they might get past this to something real, now that the gob’s shyness and the goblady’s bitterness had lifted. But would Boadicea continue to love when their ugly bodies returned?
For Max knew now that the curse would not be permanently lifted. Cissa had strong feelings for him in his natural, beautiful state—that he believed—but she didn’t love hi
m.
“Hey, Ma… mate!” Drang stopped himself before saying Max’s name. He was dancing with a human woman, and he had a huge grin on his face. They each seemed eager to find out the other’s finer qualities. Good.
That’s what he wanted from Cissa. True love. Love that depended on the truth.
And the truth was, he might go insane if he heard her say she loved him while he was in this fine form. He didn’t know which was his true form anymore, but so many years knowing Cissa as an ugly man counted for something.
Counted for almost everything.
The ugly man was the man she knew. The ugly man wanted her love. Max couldn’t remain at the ball, not like this, even if it meant being forever cursed. If they were doomed to be forever just friends, he could live with that. At least then their relationship would be real.
He fairly ran out of the ballroom and crossed the veranda. Going down the stairs, he lost one of his stupid loafers—perfect name—but he didn’t stop. He cut through the gardens of Faeview, left the wagon for the others, and headed toward Mudcastle’s portal.
Cissa didn’t love him in his ugly form; that he already knew. But she didn’t love him in his handsome form either. What had he been thinking? She was a fairy! She didn’t—or couldn’t—love. He would love her for eternity, but he’d never break his heart over her again.
He was free.
Passing the lake, the screech of an owl made him glance up, and above the Temple of Joy and Wonder he saw the morning star. How stoically it gleamed against the black night, relentless, enduring, in dispassionate judgment.
He inhaled the mist-laden air deep into his lungs, and the cold bit at his insides with welcome pain. He stared at the star which delivered his fate. The familiar aches and hot twinges returned, his shoulders hunched, his back bent, and his legs shortened.
Unblinking, he said, “It is come. So be it.”
His muscles settled, and the hot pain in his sinews receded as the lines in his face set. He wiped away the tear that rolled down his cheek.
It was over.
II. Cissa
Cissa raced down across the veranda, down the stone stairs, and tripped. She fell to the bottom of the steps. “What the…?”
She’d stumbled over something… one of her prince’s shoes. How weird. Absently, she stuffed it into her hidey pouch to give to him later. But she had no time to go back now. She had to find Max.
She flew across the garden, into the fading night. She would take the portal at Mudcastle and be in the Blue Vale with the sunrise.
She only knew one thing: she had to find Max and tell him… tell him how she felt.
And then there he was, standing before the Temple of Joy and Wonder, looking a bit stunned, a bit sadder than usual.
“Max!” she cried. “Max, wait! It’s me!”
He looked at her as if she was crazy, and maybe she was. He came toward her, and she flew to him and flung her arms around his neck and kissed his rough, wrinkled forehead. She hugged him so close he had to push her away lest she suffocate him.
“I’m sorry.”
She felt her face go red, but in the moonlight who could tell?
“Why didn’t you come to Lexi’s ball, Max? Look.” She showed him the bracelet. “I wore it for you.”
He smiled, but his smile was still sad. What was wrong? He was breaking her heart.
“Did you think of what you wanted for a favor yet?”
“It’s too late,” he said. “Too late.”
“Of course it’s not too late?” She took his hand. “We’re immortal. There’s no such thing as too late.”
“The ball is over, Cissa. The morning star has risen.” He turned away. “I’ll always be ugly.”
“Max, you’re not…” She refused to let go of his hand, jerked him around and made him look at her. “The truth is you haven’t been ugly for a long, long, long, long time. Not to me.”
By his squint, she knew he didn’t believe her.
“Not inside, Max. Not where it counts.”
His doubting squint intensified.
She stomped her foot. “All right. What can I say? I’m a fairy. Hell, I’m the queen of the fairies! I love beauty as I love life. But Max.” She moved closer and touched his cheek. “Tonight I discovered I—”
“But it’s too late, I tell you.” Max broke away. “The morning star, it’s already up.”
“What does that matter?”
But she wasn’t looking at the sky. She was looking at Max’s feet. The feet that had one shoe on and one shoe missing. And by shoe she didn't mean boot.
“Max,” she said. “What are you wearing on your foot?”
“Oh, I… um.”
“And where is the other one?”
“I guess I lost it.”
“And I found it, I do believe.” She produced the shoe from her hidey pouch. “This one matches the one you’re wearing.”
“What a coincidence.”
“Isn’t it just?” Cissa said. “Try it on.” She pushed the shoe against his chest. What was going on here? She knew it was going to fit.
And it did.
“Are you my prince, Max?” Again she touched his cheek. “Was it you all along?”
“It’s too late,” he repeated. “The morning star is up.”
“What are you talking about?” She looked up at the sky. “Besides, how can you tell?”
Moments ago, all had been clear, stars blazing. But now the mist came rushing in, unusually early, and unusually far inland. All was obscured, as if someone purposely did not want her to see the morning star.
“I think Brother Sun and Sister Moon are watching us,” Max said.
“Let them,” Cissa said. “Let them be my witnesses. Max I started to tell you something. I do love pretty things. I can’t help who I am. I love beauty, but Max… I love you more.”
And then she kissed him, and it was wonderful. He was her Max, and she loved him.
“Cissa—”
“I love you, Max.” She didn’t mind his rough skin one bit. In fact, she loved it—because it was his. His heat and power and… his love surged into her.
It wasn’t like the time she’d been forced to kiss him in payment of some silly prank—though secretly she’d always carried the memory of that kiss fondly in her heart. This kiss was a combination of her first kiss from Max the goblin and the kiss from Max her prince so long ago.
Again a thousand tingling prickles danced on her lips, and the shock of desire flooded her senses, wave over wave. When he pushed his tongue between her lips, her knees went weak and her body warmed to his with needful urgency, and she returned his passion in equal measure.
And when she pulled away, she was looking into the eyes of Max, her prince. Tall, handsome, wonderful Max. He whisked her into his arms and carried her up the marble stairs into the temple.
“My love,” he murmured, and his honeyed baritone voice was as smooth as velvet. “My love, my love, my love.”
“What is this?” she said. “What happened?”
“Your love has revoked the curse,” Max said. “This is my true form.”
“Then you didn’t leave me all those years ago,” she said.
“Never.”
“You were with me the whole time.”
“Always,” he said. “Now kiss me and tell me you love me.”
Cissa just laughed and laughed. “Haven’t I already said so?”
And then she told him again, and she showed him again.
« Chapter 16 »
The Mystic
London. The Dorchester
As he entered the half-empty Promenade, Cade saw Lily’s old boyfriend sitting alone at the curved bar, brooding over a scotch rocks. The poor bloke looked pretty miserable. Cade walked on, past the pianist, and a few tables in found Duncan Edan seated with the Sarumens. They fixed on Cade in one movement as he joined the group.
Lord Sarumen, Jenna, her father, and Quinn—they were as intent as a nest of pit
vipers. Cade didn’t blame Lily for begging off.
Lily. She’d finally decided to reclaim her true name. He was glad; it fit her. She waved to him from a table further in where she and Cammy waited for him and Duncan. He gave her a wink before he sat down beside Jenna Sarumen.
“So you’ve won,” Lord Sarumen said. “You’ve come to gloat.”
“You called the meeting, Sarumen. And as to who won, I don’t feel like that guy.”
Not yet.
“The Clad,” Quinn said. “What did you do to it? It’s… normal.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” Cade said.
Ha. So Lexi’s spell worked.
“You know exactly what he means,” Jenna said. “You changed it. You ruined it.”
“I didn’t do a thing to it,” Cade said. “But…”
“What?” Lord Sarumen clenched his cocktail with so much force Cade thought the glass would break. “Tell me.”
“There is an Oracle in Dumnos once again. It might be that I heard down the pub that she intended to reverse the Great Wyrding.”
“And you conveniently sold out your shares at top price. I should haul you before the court on charges of insider trading.”
“With what proof? That I acted on the foreknowledge of witchcraft? Won’t the red tops find that delicious fun.”
“But why did you do it?” Jenna said. “We’ll lose our military contracts, and the shares will plummet as soon as word gets out.”
“Pity,” Cade said. “I should have thought the iron was quite valuable, even unwyrded. People will always need plowshares and… cauldrons. Look, why are we here, Sarumen? I’m utterly out of it now.”
“Then get in again. Buy the shares back,” Sarumen said. “All of them, yours and mine. You’ve always cared about the Clad for its own sake more than what its shares are worth. You sold at top, buy back now, and you’ll still have made a tidy profit.”
“True, but there’s a problem. You’re well aware that when I walked through that door the shares were down fifteen percent from last week, and all pressure is downward.” Cade leaned forward. “Someone told. Another leak in your boat?”
