Now I was faced with the real Byron, and whatever ancient thing Byron actually was. I felt it, seeping into me like the cold.
Jasper shut the door on us, but he didn’t go far.
Oh yes. There was no light in the frozen tomb now.
I was shivering in the darkness, and Byron’s prison of ice began to glow softly. His voice came from his old body.
“Helena,” Byron said. “Do you trust me?”
That had always been a difficult question. Byron wasn’t like the other men who stood beside me. He led us all while he was unable to say much. Since he could never tell us what he was really about, all I had to go on was my gut.
Byron was, without a doubt, the most beautiful man I had ever seen, every inch of his body from his golden eyes and long lashes to the classically strong, statue-perfect lines of his nose, mouth and chin. From his sculpted body and broad shoulders to the hands that knew just how and where to touch me. And the taste of him…the feel of him inside me…I would never forget any of that.
But what faced me now was death. And this was not about getting with a gorgeous man. This was about what I knew, deep down, to be right. During these months I had been faced, time and again, with the evils of the wizard council. My family had been a part of the ruling class for longer than we could even trace—and we could trace our ancestry awfully far.
Byron didn’t win my trust with his incubus charm. He had simply shown me that something must be done, and could be done.
My gut knows, I thought. It always has. After all, I wanted Billie to be my friend when I first met her. My sisters turned me away from her, but here we are crossing paths again. Hell, we could have been sharing house flipping tips and stories and helping each other out all these years. And the Sullivans—I would never have been allowed to know them. I was ashamed to love them. Sometimes I still struggle with it all.
That has to stop. My heart knows who it wants.
“I trust you, Byron,” I said.
“And I trust you,” Byron said, his voice a whisper in the shadows. “Will you be my queen, dearest?”
“What are you really asking?”
“I’m asking you to save me.”
I took a deep breath. “I will be your queen.”
The cold air closed in on me. The world turned on its head. And everything went black.
CHAPTER FOUR
Helena
“MY LADY HULDA. MY LADY HULDA!”
“Huh?” I woke up in a large carved wooden bed, and…whoever the hell I was, I definitely wasn’t who I’d been. Or where I’d been.
“My lady Hulda, you must get ready for your wedding! You have slept long enough.”
I guess I was Lady Hulda. I was wearing a plain white nightgown and I had braids practically to my knees. Whatever language this girl was speaking, I understood it, but it wasn’t English as I knew it.
“I would not sleep in if I were you. You are marrying one of the strongest of demigods who still deigns to walk with mortals.”
Strongest. Strengest. I remembered that as one of the first words of Cyprium, the old language that Byron translated for me. “Oh!” I breathed. We’re speaking Cyprium!
“Indeed, it will be quite a day!” the servant girl said. At least, I assumed she must be a servant. I decided the best thing for ‘Lady Hulda’ to do would be not to ask any questions. Clearly I was reliving something and…
Am I marrying Byron?
I looked around the room and saw that I was in very primitive surroundings, all stone walls and rushes on the floor, no glass in the windows, not much furniture, but what I did have was all carved or painted or gilded. The most ornate thing in the room was an altar with a scrying bowl, a cup and knife for simple spell casting, and some small icons. I also saw a staff leaning against the wall.
So I am a witch, then…
I must be in the eleventh century. Very little was known about this older history in the magical world because at this time, wizards guarded their knowledge fiercely and would rather burn their books than let them fall to an enemy. This era had some terrible wars so that didn’t help at all, but it wasn’t until the 1400s or so that wizards finally decided that preserving all their knowledge was better, even if it meant giving up some secrets.
I was a little fascinated but also definitely a little scared. But I would see Byron soon, hopefully. I wondered if he would know who I was.
The servants caught me in a whirl of preparations. A small breakfast was followed by a chilly bath in a basin, with the servants bringing up hot water in pails. This was all sort of weird but I just went with it. Who cared itfservants saw my naked body? I wasn’t even me, although besides how long my hair was, my body still looked like mine. Then there was a lot of hair combing, braiding, pinning, face painting, undergarments, lacing of the dress, jewelry, shoes, and so on. It was very strange to be getting all the fuss of a wedding when a moment ago I’d been stomping around a 1970s house, already ripping up carpet mentally.
The girls went on about how handsome my husband-to-be was, but how strange, and how they hoped I would be happy in the magical realms, and that I could handle a massive cock. I guess the 1000s was before prudery was invented. I wasn’t sure how Lady Hulda should act so I just laughed nervously and said, “I’m sure I will manage.”
I realized I was starting to get tingly all over, nervous and excited, thinking that I would soon see Byron the demigod, whatever that would mean.
“You are all ready. Your lady mother will see you now.”
“Oh…thank you.”
My lady mother? Shit. I didn’t want to deal with someone who knew me—or rather, Lady Hulda—that well.
There was a hand mirror on the table, probably the best mirror available for Lady Hulda at this time in history. I looked at my reflection, with my long braids bound with ribbons, and pearls and jewels adorning my hair and throat and ears.
I looked like my own distant relative. My hair was lighter and my face powdered so my blue eyes stood out intensely. I looked a little more inbred, maybe. Not the European blooded mutt I was in the real world, with ancestors all the way from England to Romania. But I wouldn’t be surprised if I was related to Lady Hulda. A thousand years is a long time.
“My daughter.” A woman opened the door, in a dominating way, and swept in to sit beside me. The woman was tall and beautiful but in a very stern way. The family resemblance was strong, although the mother’s hair was swept up into a cloth that covered her head. A wimple, I think. She still didn’t look very old, but despite her utter lack of wrinkles, she had an authoritarian personality. I trembled a little when she walked in and she wasn’t even my real mother.
Although…there was definitely a resemblance there, too.
I immediately sensed that I didn’t have to worry about a close family bond. Hulda’s mother seemed too distant to notice if her daughter had been possessed by a 21st century girl. Besides, I could summon royal manners.
“My lady mother,” I said, bowing my head a little.
Her cold hand forced my chin up. “You look beautiful. I hope you’re prepared for what is to come.”
Oh, like demon dick? Yep. I can only hope this dream lasts that long. “I believe I am,” I said.
“I’ve brought the poison,” she said.
Wait—what? “The…poison.”
“If you slip it into the beast’s cup tonight, then you should only have to stall for a brief time before he perishes, so you must ask to see the map and as soon as he dies, break it apart. Your uncle’s army will arrive at midnight.” She pressed a tiny glass vial into my hand.
Hold up, Lady Mother. So you married me to Byron ‘the beast’ just so I could get close enough to him to assassinate him? And break apart the map?
I realized what was going on here. I was supposed to separate the three realms by separating Pandora’s Box. Byron probably needed to marry a human girl, like demons often did to keep power. But the girl’s family wanted to betray him. So was Lady
Hulda’s uncle’s army the men who were killing demigod Byron and sewing his mouth shut?
And here I was, in the shoes of the girl who was expected to lead him to his death and the shattering of the magical realms. It was a super secret plan, I would guess, judging by the way the servants went on about how hot the wedding night would be. They seemed clueless.
“Oh, Mother.” I looked toward the window, trying to look stoic and brave, but also like a compassionate young woman who might need just a tiny bit of assurance (and detailed information). “This is not how I imagined my wedding night…to take a man’s life. I know I must be brave, but…”
“You must remember what is at stake. If you do this, we can keep our magic safe. We can keep the demons out forever. And you shall have your pick of husbands! I know he is a charming half-beast, but it’s what he protects that we must have. This is our only opportunity to get ahold of the Ethereal Paths. You know what careful diplomacy it took just to convince Lord Adras’ei to come to our realm for the wedding.”
“I understand…”
Well, I did. So that’s it. They must have been trying to steal this map for a long time and they used this wedding as some sort of excuse to make him bring it to the Fixed Plane.
I felt terrible for Byron. What a dirty trick. The fact that Hulda’s mother called him a “charming half-beast” suggested that Hulda may have already met her future husband and liked what she saw.
“Don’t be frightened,” Hulda’s mother said. “Everything rests upon you, and we women are not weaker than our men, are we? You must be up to the task or you will live a life of shame. Your uncle will be there to rescue you.”
Yikes. No sympathy there. Hulda had to murder her husband and suck it up. I definitely felt for the girl.
Of course, right now I was Hulda. I certainly wasn’t about to give Byron the poison. I wondered how much of this I would have to play out.
I was led out of the bedroom and to a castle courtyard where an entire retinue was waiting to proceed to the church, with knights on horseback, ladies in fur-trimmed gowns, and banners with the family coat of arms. This all seemed to blur by like a dream as I was brought to a litter, a claustrophobic box that swayed as it was carried by four burly servants. The church was not far, at least. I wondered where in the world I was. What sort of name was Lady Hulda? Saxon? My dad would have been spouting off about it immediately, and he would have recognized the castle’s architecture and the clothing and the knights’ armor, but I had never cared about any of this.
I felt a little woozy and the world seemed to recede as the litter swayed, and suddenly I was about to walk down the church aisle, with flowers scattered everywhere and incense and perfume combating for the attention of my nose.
At the end of the aisle was the demigod I had seen in the Arcana.
Byron?
I tried to find my Byron in him as I walked down the aisle but this man was more than Byron. He was nearly seven feet tall, not including the single black horn that curved out of his forehead. He had one black demon wing and one shimmering feathered wing. His face had a beauty that was almost fae, with high cheekbones, eerily perfect pale skin, and golden eyes with a slightly feline slant. His hair was black and a little longer than Byron’s, just past shoulder length, with a little curl at the ends. Although combed, it was hair that never really cooperated. He wore a red coat-tunic thing with a deep V-cut in front and back to make room for his wings, and a black shirt beneath it with a collar that wrapped around the back of his neck and buttoned at his throat, but was also open around his wings. A demon tail curled up a little out from under the skirting of the coat. His black leather boots came up to his knees, so only a little of his black hose was visible.
He seemed to almost glow, his presence taking up the entire altar, and no one could take their eyes off him.
This wasn’t the Byron I knew.
This was the demigod in the Arcana, but definitely…way hotter in person. Well, when was the last time you looked at Medieval paintings and thought, He’s hot. In the little paintings, the mismatched wings and single horn looked weird, but in person, I was into it. I’d never seen anything like the real Byron before.
No, this man wasn’t an incubus. He really was something beyond that. His side of the church was attended by demons, Ethereals, and fae, none of them human, and none of them hiding how strange they appeared.
When he looked at me, his eyes seemed reassuring, as if he knew I might be intimidated by him, and he wanted me to relax.
What I didn’t see was any sign that he was Byron, and that he knew me as Helena.
It’s just a dream, I guess…but I’m trapped here.
I realized I had been waiting to see Byron. My Byron. I thought he would tell me what was going on. Now I knew that wouldn’t happen.
The ceremony blurred. I kept looking at the different magical beings assembled for Byron, all sitting together. Seven foot tall demons dressed in black with fearsome curving horns. Fae wearing cloaks of feathers and elaborate tiaras of silver leaves and acorns. Ethereal spirits in shimmering white with hair long enough to brush the ground. Nothing like this was ever seen in modern memory.
“Princess Hulda of the House of Cyprium…do you take Lord Abiron Ter Adras’ei to be your husband, to love and obey?”
I swallowed. Vows were never to be made lightly, not even in a dream. In the magical world, you had to assume that every oath would be taken seriously.
Even if it turned into a shit show, I didn’t dare agree to this vow.
“I can’t obey any man,” I said. “But I do love him.”
I saw Lady Hulda’s mother shooting daggers at me. I guess Hulda was just supposed to break her oath and kill her husband. I wondered what Hulda had chosen. It must have been hard either way. There was no way she wasn’t charmed by Lord Abiron.
The priest looked at Lord Abiron.
He smiled. “It is well with me. I don’t demand obedience. Nor do I expect I will ever need to…”
Some of the demons and fae laughed a little. The wizards seemed on edge.
“Lord Abiron, do you take Lady Hulda of the House of Cyprium to be your wife, to love and faithfully protect?”
“I do swear it,” he said.
“In the eyes of our lord and the high gods of the three realms, I now pronounce you man and wife.”
Lord Abiron slipped his large hands around me and drew me close to him, and kissed my lips, and as I shut my eyes I started to feel dizzy again. I clung to his clothes, digging my fingers into his solid flesh, as everything swirled around me and now he was still kissing me but we seemed to be alone in a room in the castle.
What is happening in these gaps? I’m only seeing what I need to see, I guess, but…
His body was folded over mine and he was very turned on, his erection pressing against my skirt. “My lady…”
I gasped as he pulled back from my mouth. “My lord…” I tried to roll with it.
“I said I wouldn’t demand your obedience…” He gave me a mischievous smile that was very Byron. I wondered if he’d been with the real Hulda a second ago. If so, Hulda was clearly into it.
“Oh, you certainly do not,” I said.
“Are you ready for me?”
“I—I suppose I will know soon.”
“You will have to manage somehow. I will go very gently with you tonight, my dearest. This is but the beginning of what will be demanded of you and I will have failed if you aren’t begging for more. I look forward to choosing a second together.”
“Oh…yes.” I must have looked confused. What was a second?
“I suppose you might prefer a fae to a demon. But perhaps I presume.”
“What…would you prefer?”
“Well, of course I would prefer an incubus,” he said, lifting my hand and giving it a kiss. “It will make the experience more enticing for both of us.”
This marriage was planned as a threesome from the start? “The drink tonight has muddled my head
,” I said. “What is the purpose of the second, again?”
He looked at me like he didn’t quite buy that some ale had made me forget something this important, but he said, “My child will someday be the guardian after me, of course, and as I have the blood of the three realms, so shall they. Since you are of Etherium, we must also have a second from one of the other realms, and so the seed of two houses shall mingle in the third house.”
“Like…three parents for one child?”
“Precisely. But the second is something we will both choose together and we will find someone we can love.”
“A handsome incubus…” I laughed. “You know, I might have already crossed paths with someone like that…”
“Truly? You surprise me pleasantly. I must confess that I was reluctant to wed a human witch, with all of the conflicts between our races as of late, but I think this might be the beginning of a very happy union.”
“The—the conflict has nothing to do with my feelings.”
When he drew back, I could see the room a little better, although it was now dark and just a few candles pierced the shadowy stone and heavy wooden furniture. It wasn’t hard to spot the triangular shape of Pandora’s Box, sitting on a chest in the corner. The three maps were fit together, and they sparkled, with little shooting lights running between the three pieces. It was like a living map of the stars.
“You brought Pandora’s Box with you,” I said, with a rising sense of dread.
“It is never out of my sight,” he said. “I am its guardian. Pandora’s Box? Is that what your people call it? It is more properly known as the Way of the Paths.” He brought it over to me and pointed at each of them. “This is Sinistral…Wyrd…and Etherium, the realm of your magic, my lady.”
“I see…” That made sense. Pandora’s Box must be more of a later code name to indicate that putting the maps together would open up a can of worms. “So they are all maps of the realms.”
“Yes. They are all separate but joined, as you see. Each touches the other two. If you look closely in the dark, you’ll see that there are thousands of lights. Millions, even. Every person in every realm has a light, some very dim, some bright, based on their power. Most are still, some are moving…and sometimes you can see them cross from one realm to the other.”
Phantom of the Library (Paranormal House Flippers Book 3) Page 3
