It made a refreshing change to be the one giving orders and making demands. Not that it changed our dynamic at all. I was still his servant, with an unknown fate. And I wasn’t stupid enough to ask for my freedom in exchange for doing this on his behalf. He’d just hit me with more vague replies about the whens, wheres, and hows of my liberation, and I’d be left hanging yet again.
“I will.” He slowly rose to his feet, dusting himself off.
“Use everything I’ve told you, and get your girl back,” I urged. Making sure Kaya and Erebus got back together was vital to me getting out of this engagement, and if I needed to pay a visit to slimy Doncaster to make that happen, then so be it.
Eighteen
Finch
Well, streak these cheeks with blue paint, slap me in a kilt, and call me Braveheart. Freeeedooooom! It had never tasted sweeter. After driving myself nuts in that damned room, Nash had finally relented and given me a chance to stretch my legs, mainly to stop me from journeying farther into Bonkers-ville, population me.
A few corridors down, the initial rush morphed into nerves. I was on my way to see Ryann, and this time, I wouldn’t leave until I’d spoken to her. Nash had given me his usual “Give her space, give her time. She’s trying to do the right thing” speech, but I wasn’t buying it. I needed to see her. Period.
About a labyrinth and a half later, I stopped in front of the door to the communal drawing room that Kaya had given my friends to use “for their leisure,” as she had put it. I didn’t know what that entailed, exactly, or how much leisure had actually been going on. But at least I knew Ryann would be here. She was always here. She just wouldn’t see me. So why did I think this time would be any different? Well, this time, Nash had let slip that Melody and Luke were with her. They’d let me in… right?
I didn’t bother knocking, since it might’ve given Ryann the chance to scramble for the door and bolt it shut. I gave the handle a tentative twist, and… the door swung right open. Adrenaline powered through my veins. Yes! One step closer!
“Fancy seeing you all here.” I breezed into the room, and my eyes locked on Ryann. She stared right back, scrutinizing me. I mean, she knew it was me. Nash would never have said something like that when entering a room. But she didn’t move to kick me out. Instead, she stayed sitting on one of the oh-so-plush sofas.
“You persuaded him again?” Luke puffed out a sigh. “I knew he’d give in. Nash might look tough, but he’s way too soft on you.”
I grinned with more confidence than I felt. “You just have to ask nicely.”
“Do you want us to leave you alone?” Melody swept in and pulled Luke off his sofa. “We don’t mind, do we, Luke? Actually, we have some research to do, and I was being a terrible procrastinator, so this is perfect timing. We’ll just swing by the library and look over a few aisles, and then we’ll come back. How does that sound?”
Smooth, Winchester. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.
“That sounds… fine,” Ryann replied. She didn’t sound like herself. She didn’t look like herself, either. Maybe it was rude to think it, but the dark circles under her eyes were the kind you’d see after a twelve-round boxing match. It hurt to see her like that, knowing I was the cause. Even if it was Lux making her like this, Lux had only taken over her body because Erebus had dragged me down here. All roads led back to it being my fault.
“Okay, good. Excellent. We’ll get out of your way and get started on something useful. Don’t mind us.” Melody bumbled around, dragging Luke across the room. He didn’t protest when she hauled him through the door and into the hallway beyond, but I heard him protest when the door closed.
“It’s not a good idea to leave them alone, Melody.”
“Oh, hush, you. If anyone has earned some time together, it’s the two of them,” Melody said. A weird sound followed, like a suction cup getting pulled away from glass. And I swear I heard the manliest of giggles right after.
Are they… kissing? With my own love life a colossal mess, I hadn’t had much time to think about their blossoming relationship. I was all for it, even if Luke could be a little… wooden at times. But hey, maybe that was why he and Melody suited each other. She added a rainbow of color to his otherwise gray personality. And who didn’t want that?
“I’m surprised you haven’t got a barf bucket on hand, if they do that all the time.” Call me a ten-ton polar bear, because I was sure as hell trying to break the ice.
Ryann gave a faint smile. “I think it’s sweet. Besides, they don’t kiss much around me. Melody worries it’ll upset me, I think, which is nice of her, but she shouldn’t keep her hands off him on my account.”
“You might change your mind pretty quick if they start pawing at each other twenty-four seven. But I don’t think Melody’s the pawing kind. Luke, on the other hand—he might be a dark horse.” I clenched my hands into fists and removed the sheen of Mimicry. I hadn’t come all this way to speak to her as Nash. If I’d wanted that, I’d have just sent the man himself with a message.
“Did Nash tell you the door would be open?” Ryann changed the subject so quickly it made my head spin.
I fidgeted. “Uh… maybe. Do you mind?”
She shook her head. “No, I don’t mind. Lux has been quiet for a few hours. I think she might be resting, so I’m not as concerned about her popping up. She’s super happy about Erebus being thwarted in the suitor race, though, so… there’s that.”
“At least someone’s enjoying this,” I replied somberly.
“Yeah.” She offered up an empty laugh. “When she heard about the announcement the other night in the hallway, she almost jumped out of her skin. My skin, I suppose.”
I nodded, wishing I had the Braveheart freedom to say more. But we couldn’t exactly get into the nitty-gritty of how I planned to slip out of this wedding malarkey, even if Lux was apparently resting. We still didn’t have a full grasp of the parameters regarding what she could and couldn’t hear, and if she got a hint of dissension in the ranks, she’d definitely take action to prevent it.
“Can I come and sit with you?” I tried not to look too much like a desperate puppy.
She patted the seat beside her. “I thought you’d never ask.”
I’d been waiting for this moment since the last time we were alone together. Well, as alone as two people could be, when one of them had a Child of Chaos camping out inside them. I crossed the room and sank onto the sofa beside her. Weirdly, I sank back into my old habit of being hella awkward around her. This was like introduction-to-the-parents awkward, where I had no idea what to do with my limbs or how to sit like a normal human being.
“How are you holding up?” She laid her arm along the back of the sofa and gently brushed her fingertips against the nape of my neck. Tingles, like shorting fuses, sparked through me. I liked the sensation… very much. Still, I checked her eyes, in case this was some kind of Lux seduction trick. “You didn’t say much the other night when we saw you. I guess you couldn’t really talk, with Kaya being there and all.”
“Oh, that I can explain.” I pushed away the lingering anxiety. We didn’t have time for schoolboy bashfulness. Plus, her touch went a long way toward making me feel more comfortable. Now, how to say this safely? “Ovid put a silencing spell on me, in case I tried to ruin his daughter’s big moment. I guess I’ve developed a bit of a reputation, even here, for saying things when I shouldn’t. That was why I didn’t talk. I literally couldn’t.”
Her eyes widened. “Did you try to say something at the announcement?”
“Uh… no. I know better than to flap my lips with a horde of spear-wielding guards around me.” The hesitation in my words made her smile, and I got the sense she was reading between the lines. I couldn’t just come out and say that, yeah, I damn well tried to say something, in case it pissed off the sleeping dragon.
“I’m sorry I kept shutting you out.” She dropped her gaze. “I didn’t want to make things harder for you.”
I reached
over and tilted her chin up, determined to keep those eyes on me. “That doesn’t matter now. I’m here, and you’re here, and… I just want to forget everything else that’s going on. I don’t want to think about Kaya, or this engagement, or where we are. I don’t want to think about Lux or Erebus, or anyone else. This is all that’s keeping me sane—the thought of you and me, together.”
Her eyes sparkled with that bittersweet mix of happiness and tears. “We wasted so much time. If we’d gotten our asses in gear sooner, maybe…” She trailed off, and I knew she couldn’t continue. It would hurt us both too much, to be honest, with everything hanging so precariously in the balance. I didn’t know if I could swing this by getting Kaya and Erebus back together. I didn’t know if there was a real way out of my impending marriage. So it was better not to raise hopes, only to have them dashed later.
“Then let’s not waste any more,” I murmured, leaning in and guiding her chin higher. Our lips met. Fireworks went off in my head. Sparklers, big old whizz-bangs, the whole Fourth of July inside my skull. I’d never known it could be like this.
She lifted her hand to my face, caressing my skin with her thumb as she sank deeper into the kiss. I confess, I stole a creepy peek at her face, and smiled when I saw that her eyes were closed. I followed suit, enjoying the moment and letting everything else slip away. In the darkness, with only touch and sound and taste to go on, the world became an intriguing place. Her skin felt irresistibly smooth, and her lips tasted of some kind of fruit—sugary and tantalizing. As for the sound, the soft whisper of her breath did crazy things to me, making my heart beat a million miles a second.
“I wish we were home.” She pulled away for a second. A tear ran down her cheek, and I hurried to kiss it, wanting to take away her pain. The salt and the sweet combined on my lips, a taste unlike any other.
“I know. I do, too.” I grasped her waist and pulled her into my lap. Nothing sordid; I just wanted to hold her closer. I wanted to wrap my whole self around her and keep her safe from the world we’d dragged her into. Sure, she’d picked the magical side when she broke things off with Adam, but that didn’t mean she deserved to see how cold and cruel the magical world could be.
She cupped my face in her hands and stared down into my eyes, while my arms encircled her. “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have anything to be sorry about.” I fought back tears of my own, determined to be strong for her.
“I’m sorry you’re going through this. I’m sorry you’re being used. I’m sorry I can’t save you.” She kissed me with each utterance. First my forehead. Then my temple. Then my cheek. “I’m sorry we can’t walk off into the sunset together. I know it’s a cliché, but the moment you told me how you felt, on Eris Island, that was all I wanted to do. Leave that place and run away somewhere with you. I wish we’d done that. I wish we’d left.” Her lips touched my nose, my temple, my other cheek, and even my eyelids, as though she could kiss her hopes into being.
Now that would’ve been a magical ability worth having.
“That’s the problem with invisible chains—you don’t know they’re there until it’s too late, and you’re hauled away to a watery underworld with no way out.” I pulled her closer and laid my head against her chest. Her hands moved from my face and slid down my back, clasping handfuls of my shirt as she hugged me tight. I probably could’ve suffocated, but it would’ve been worth it to the last breath.
I lifted my head, and we just gazed at each other for a moment. I wanted to commit every feature to memory, in case memory was the only thing I had. Those three words, maybe the most important three words in the English language, teetered on the tip of my tongue. If I didn’t say them now, I knew I might never get the chance again. I had to make the most of the time we had. No more tiptoeing around the important stuff.
“I—”
That was as far as I got. She tilted my face up between firm hands and kissed me hard on the mouth, her lips moving in a slow yet frantic rhythm that I had no choice but to match. Her kiss stole the words away, but I still felt the emotions that went with them. I pulled her in and kissed her with everything I had, trying to reach that happy place where nothing else existed but me and her. Not the easiest thing to do with so many external factors trying to claw back into my brain. But if I focused hard enough on my senses, the outside world ceased to exist. A magic trick that not even the most powerful magical could emulate.
This moment wouldn’t last, but it was all we had. And we’d already wasted enough time.
Nineteen
Kaya
I was in dire need of some non-masculine company to ease my whirring mind, and with the Bestiary firmly within my contemplations, I walked the palace hallways until I was safely ensconced within that place of wonder and mystery. The Bestiary had never lost its novelty, from my first visit as an infant to now. I could have spent hours here without any sense of the time passing.
“Your Highness. I had hoped you might come today.” Iso appeared out of the shadows of what I referred to as the “bubble forest;” the silvered trunks bore the fruit of glass orbs, which held Purge beasts inside. She stooped to embrace me as old friends did. I held on a moment longer than usual, resisting the impulse to bury my face in her furred solidity, the way I had when I was a child.
“Is all well?” I murmured. A laughable question, considering the failing state of the Bestiary.
She released me. “As well as it can be. Did you come to discuss further measures we might take? I have reached the bottom of my well of ideas, so any more would be welcome.”
“I did not, though I suppose that was imprudent of me.” I gestured to the bubble forest surrounding us. “I merely wanted to wander a while through the Bestiary to try and clear my mind. It is hard to find a peaceful sanctuary in the palace now that the engagement has been announced. And the Bestiary has always been a sanctuary I can rely upon.”
Iso’s feathered wings ruffled slightly. “And you are certain that this surface dweller is the husband you desire? I hold no judgment. I only encountered the man once, and he seemed pleasant enough, if a little too free with his words. But it is my duty to protect you and your family through the ages, and I want to make sure you are happy in your choice.”
I wonder if people will continue to ask me this even after Finch and I are wed…
“I am sure, Iso. He is the Luminary. I grow more assured of that fact with every passing day,” I replied, for I had already mentioned my thoughts about the legend to her when I last came here.
“If that is true, we are fortunate indeed.” Iso flashed her fangs in a smile. “He did not seem all that impressive when I met him, but perhaps that is an aspect of the legend—the Luminary does not have to be a remarkable individual of evident mythos and repute. It would be much too convenient if he were.”
I nodded slowly. “Those are my precise thoughts when the naysayers comment upon it.”
“Your father, you mean?”
“Yes.” I laughed dryly. “So I suppose, in a manner of speaking, I have brought further measures to help prevent the Bestiary’s current situation. Well, Chaos brought such measures to me, and I intend to use them to aid Atlantis.”
Iso put an enormous paw upon my shoulder. “You always were resourceful, Your Highness. I knew from the moment you were born that you would one day lead Atlantis to further greatness. But… will you be happy?”
“The love spell will take care of that,” I answered, a touch too swiftly.
“There is no chance of love without it?” She peered at me with her gentle eyes. I had always marveled at how a beast with such might and imposing stature could be so graceful at the same time.
I looked away, to where black mist swirled inside a nearby orb. “No… I do not think so.”
“Because of—”
“Yes,” I interjected before she could say his name. “Even if I wanted to love Finch without the spell, I would not know where to begin. My former endeavors into the baffling world o
f love have stunted my romantic development.”
Iso grumbled in the back of her throat. “I do not think Erebus stunted your ability to love. I think it is more likely that you still harbor feelings for him, which makes the idea of loving another an impossible task. For what it is worth, I despise that creature for what he did to you, and for laying claim to your love.”
“I wish I could forget him entirely.” I gazed out across the bubble forest and looked upon the Purge beasts who had swirled out of their black mist to listen to our conversation. Five gargoyles squabbled for the best view—Finch’s gargoyles. They had provided much-needed additional energy to the Bestiary’s resources, even though the glitches continued. I could not even fathom what state we might be in, had it not been for the timely implementation of those five slavering beasts. Another sign that Finch had come here for a reason.
Iso’s body language morphed into sudden defensiveness, her feline eyes gleaming with anger at something over my shoulder. A growl vibrated in her throat while she curled her lip at whatever approached.
“If only he would make it that easy for you, Your Highness,” she hissed.
“Is he…?”
“Behind you. Yes, he is.” Iso’s lips lifted to reveal the full extent of her fangs. “My apologies, Your Highness. I do not know how he entered without alerting the wards. I tweaked them to sense his Chaos signature after his arrival. Would you like me to remove him?”
I sighed. “No, that will not be necessary. I cannot continue to avoid him.”
“I don’t see why not,” Iso shot back. “I could lock him in one of the orbs. No one would know.”
I chuckled. “Something I will keep in mind.”
“You just say the word.” Iso folded her arms across her chest, her shoulders hunched.
Harley Merlin 15: Finch Merlin and the Everlasting Vow Page 17
