Happily Ever After: A Contemporary Romance Boxed Set

by Piper Rayne

  I could hardly believe what I saw when Darian finally did come to visit. Hers was the single friendly face I had seen since being captured by the fairies. She did more than visit. She helped me again. Above all else, she managed to get my staff permitted in my fight. Having something familiar evened things out. If I could manage to not get my throat cut, it sounded like maybe I’d have a crazy chance to make it through this. All I had to do was make that fool Simon yell ‘yield.’

  I got to express my admiration of Darian to her before she left me. I was glad for that. I could not believe anyone would think Lily was more attractive than her in any way. I couldn’t believe how down on herself such a lovely girl could be all the time. Prince Zane and his insistence she wasn’t a princess and the stupid pea they made her sleep upon and thought she knew nothing about. It was all ridiculous. I wished I could do more for her. Before I could, I had to survive…

  Later that afternoon, I was ushered to a waiting area. After hearing the chamberlain give a speech, I saw Simon enter the arena and show off for the crowd. When my gate opened, I took a couple steps out and stood there just looking up for her.

  Simon hovered in the air as my eyes fell on Darian sitting in a balcony. However this went, I hated that she was going to see it. She gave me a little smile and wave and I could tell she was wishing me well with all she had. Simon looked back at her, then landed.

  “I knew it!” he said when he was near enough. He’d seen the glance between the princess and myself. “I knew you two were sweet on each other.”

  “What do you care?” I asked.

  He gave a sly shrug. “Oh, I don’t, really. You might care to know though, she happens to be one of my favorite fuck toys.”

  My grip tightened on my staff as I remembered the bitterness that had crept into her voice when she was telling me about him. “He’s tormented me my whole life,” she’d said.

  “She spent the whole day with me yesterday actually, instead of visiting you. Five times, I think. Buddy, she couldn’t get enough.”

  I just waited, sizing him up as he rambled on. He knew nothing of me, of my martial arts training, or the fact that I’d been travelling with my grandfather’s lucky staff since I was sixteen years old. He could underestimate and mock me all afternoon long. In the end, I’d walk out of this arena.

  “I’m just saying, I hope you’re not planning on anything with her. The poor thing is practically in love with me. Not that any of our women would touch you. Not even the ugly ones. Too bad our princess is betrothed to Zane.”

  When he realized I wasn’t buying into talking to him, he struck. A clumsy blow from the side almost made me laugh. I deflected it and gave a counterstrike as he tried to regain his balance. Then, I gave him a good jab in the throat. He fell backward with his hand to his neck, coughing. I looked up at Darian and the expression on her face was one of the most rewarding sights I’d ever seen in my life.

  I turned my attention back to Simon, still struggling to catch his wind. “What the devil do you think you’re doing?”

  “Fighting,” I said. “Didn’t you want to kill me? I wasn’t supposed to make it easy for you, was I?”

  He stood, now gravely serious. “I’m not going to make it easy on you, you filthy beast! I’m going to cut you until you can’t move. Then I’ll take my time, giving you little cuts and pokes, so you die slowly. Right in front of her.”

  Then came another clumsy swing, this time overhead. I deflected it to the ground and jabbed him in the ribs to gain some distance. He was so off balance that I moved in and struck again. Then again and again.

  He came after me again, in a fury this time. He actually ran straight at me with his sword pointing out in front of him, yelling. I sidestepped him, keeping my staff up on guard and tripped him. As he fell, I dropped my staff and followed him down, grabbing his arm and putting it in a joint lock. He struggled and realized quickly how well I had him. “Say you yield,” I said.

  “Ha! To a mortal? Never.”

  I increased pressure and he cried out. This one was not used to pain. “I said yield. Or I’ll break your arm.”

  “You wouldn’t dare.”

  I added more pressure. Calmly, I said, “I’ll see how far it goes before it snaps.”

  “Yield!” he screamed, and the crowd went absolutely wild.

  “Good people!” the chamberlain yelled over the cheering. “I can’t believe what we have seen here today! Who knew what fury rested in the heart of the beast?” He talked on. I didn’t care. I was free now. I looked up to Darian. She had her hands to her face and was crying.

  Darian

  * * *

  I couldn’t believe it. I had been so certain I would see the traveler die. It seemed illogical for a mortal to defeat an immortal. What a surprise he gave Simon! He moved fast, far faster than even our best fighters. Simon was one of the best himself, after all. After Sebastian blocked his first blow, I thought of the pile of thorns he had snapped off the briars. None of us could do that, we would need a saw. What was the extent of his strength? No matter how Simon attacked, Sebastian made his defense and counterattacks look effortless. Just when I was wondering when Simon would yield, Sebastian manhandled him to the ground and made him.

  I wept with joy because Sebastian had survived. I wept with satisfaction since no matter what happened for the rest of my life, at least I would always be able to treasure the image of that bastard getting beaten up. By someone I cared about, at that. Mostly, I wept with relief. I didn’t have to see my friend slowly murdered in front of me.

  Then, “Look out!” I yelled, but too late. Simon had grabbed his sword from the ground, and swung at Sebastian, catching him on the wrist. He pulled his hand away, looking at it in annoyance. He grabbed his staff, but Simon had already fled through the gate, which they closed immediately after him. The traveler looked at his hand again, dripping blood.

  “Stranger from another land, you may leave the arena and go revel in your victory!” a voice over the loudspeaker called, reminding me of a circus ringmaster like the kind my mother had taken me to see when I was five years old. I watched Sebastian until he was out of sight, then ran to my room. I knew he would want cloth for his wound. I knew he’d never leave without me too. I wasn’t sure how I knew these things; only that our story had just begun. It started now. Now was our one and only chance to get as far away from Peabody as possible. For me, it would even mean joining the humans. I was terrified and elated all at the same time. Adored and hated all because of my mother’s blood, I could finally understand her need for adventure and missed her more than ever.

  Part II

  The road to the happy ending…

  Two years later

  Darian

  Status: Free

  * * *

  It sounded like the perfect happy ending. But it wasn’t quite that simple. There was still Zane and my father to contend with. And I can’t say Simon was all that forgiving either. While he never dared touch me again with Sebastian nearby and checking on me, it took nearly a year for us to fully be free of them. While my tiny friend healed, he had to return to the horrid witch to lift her curse. From what I heard, she’d done it willingly. He was, after all, the legendary mortal who’d escaped a certain death. Thinking about it now almost made me laugh. I knew, when he came back for me, he’d be in his original, human form. We’d be a sight to see – him six feet tall and me a fairy with purple wings. Perfect circus freaks. At least he’s willing to be little for me as circumstances dictate. But that was nothing compared to the stories they’d tell about me for years after that day with Sebastian in the ring.

  You see, it wasn’t the fight that made history. Sure, people spoke about the mortal who fought himself free. But what they spoke about more was what happened after. I never made it out of my room with the cloth. I wasn’t able to help stitch Sebastian up. For when I reached my room, the briars were there for me. With the crowd already gathered, it was decided by my father—who’d been warne
d by Simon—that we’d need to move the wedding up. With Zane’s family in the crowd for the festivities, the royal court ushered me back to the arena where I was grilled by my intended groom. From questions about how I could possibly be a true princess and why it was that I ran the way I did instead of using my wings lasted for what felt like hours. Wanting to scream ‘yield’ myself, I stuck with it when I saw Sebastian watching me quietly from the darkest corridor at the side of the stands.

  “She can’t be a real princess!” someone screamed. “She hasn’t complained about the pea!”

  “Shhhhh!”

  “Don’t tell her!”

  “She’d have sensitivities!”

  “She’s not a princess! Where did she come from?”

  “Is she mortal?”

  “And what of her mother? Where is she?”

  “Hush! She is my daughter,” called my father from the balcony.

  A silence fell over the crowd. Now was my chance. It was a test of sorts. I could confess that I’d known all along and explain that it was one of the very reasons for my wings always being so sore, or I could fight back.

  Faking shock was my staff. My brain and all I knew of the kingdom, the throne, and what was at stake became my fighting stick.

  “I don’t know what pea it is you speak of!” I yelled back. They weren’t worth it. It didn’t matter what they thought of me. All I wanted was out of the Kingdom of Peabody – with Sebastian.

  “Imposter!” someone screamed.

  They ushered me out quickly. I could hear my father’s lectures and knew I’d be sent to the stocks indefinitely. I could almost hear Lily laughing at me, ever jealous that she wasn’t the birthright full-blooded princess. Little did she know that she, too, slept atop a pea and her wings worked perfectly. I didn’t care. In giving Zane that shred of doubt, I might even be able to avoid a loveless marriage built only on mutual family greed. With me denying the pea, a wedding couldn’t happen – not today anyway.

  I was ready when Simon came for me. Something in watching Sebastian fight him gave me strength. This time, I went straight for his throat. And, with him lying flat on the ground in surprise, I spelt it out and then some. “I fucked him. His human size is delightful. Nothing like you or yours. I fucked him all along,” I said, spitting the words like venom. “Can you smell him? Can you smell him on me? I told him to go for your throat too. I wanted to watch him kill you. Too bad you yelled ‘yield!’”

  Again and again, I tortured him. This time, he did not cry ‘yield,’ but did. And when he finally left my cell, I smiled in the satisfaction of it all. To this day, when Sebastian and me, who sleep on a human thing called a Temperpedic mattress, speak of it, we still laugh. He was right about him. Simon really was a very little man.

  Sebastian

  * * *

  I could not comprehend why my girlfriend would possibly want to leave that horrid kingdom in the forest to, what? To join the circus? The entire thing was ridiculous. Yet, here we were. She’d begged me to find the Peabody witch again simply to be cursed, un-cursed, and cursed again. As a little man with a tiny fighting staff, and her with her wings, we could be stars. I’d done everything possible to reason with Darian. But she had a point. And she was set on it – with her only vivid memories of her mother being that one time she snuck her into the human world to take her to the show. Since leaving the forest, we hadn’t gotten very far. Both with minimum wage jobs, real life after the fairytale, even with a true princess, hadn’t worked out to be what happy endings are made of.

  I grunted at her, sipping my coffee and wishing she could understand how demeaning it was to live as a tiny man in the human realm. For her, who only needed to hide her wings to pass as an, albeit unusually short, human being, it would be more difficult for me. I couldn’t imagine what Zane and the other guys would say if they could see me now – considering going with her to the circus gates and begging for a job.

  Lusus Naturae. That’s what the place was called. It meant ‘freak of nature’ in Latin. Maybe that would help her toss this entire idea out, I thought, too dumb to know better than to shut my mouth. “You do know the circus is full of freaks, right?”

  Darian laughed. “And? Your point?” She expanded her usually dormant wings, almost knocking over a glass on the counter. “You don’t think I’m a freak? I’ve only been called that my entire life in the forest. And now I live among human beings. I’m even freakier here. Why not exploit it?”

  They were beautiful. I’d give her that. Translucent and in the shape of a butterfly’s, Darian’s wings were something she’d for years considered a curse. But to me, they were what made her different than the women I’d been with before - special, even.

  “Don’t start with that. You know how I feel about your wings.”

  Pulling them back down so I could no longer see them, Darian moved toward me. When she reached me, she pulled my chin into her hands and kissed me on the top of my head. “And I love you for it. You were the only one who didn’t care if I was a real royal princess or not. You didn’t try to change me and saw through everything, even my horrible family. Thank you.”

  I wanted to pull back. I wanted to tell her me pulling her out of that forest and doing my best to set us up with a chance to start over should be enough. But as she pulled her lips away from my head and smiled at me, I couldn’t argue. One day, she’d be my bride. And what kind of man would argue with a true princess? I could at least attempt to humor her. Someday, she’d see me as her king. Yeah, right. Not Darian.

  “Fine. You win. I’ll go back to Peabody territory. I’ll find the witch. But only after you are sure we can get work. I refuse to quit a job without having the next lined up. It’s how I ended up screwed in the first place. Had I not been bobbling around by the forest trying to live off the grid with that whole life coaching thing, none of this would have happened. I could have been killed. You too.”

  “And it all worked out. We are here now. If you hadn’t come to the forest, we never would have met. If you’re returning to Peabody, I’m coming with you.”

  “No. On that, I won’t bend. They’re still looking for you.”

  I knew, of course, that Darian got homesick and often left our bed in the blackest part of night to check on her sisters. But I’d never let on to it. A woman had her right to secrets. Like hell, though, I was allowing her to get tangled up with the witch. She was already cursed as it was. She was now, and forever more, stuck with a most-days broke and tiny man. Whether she knew it or not, she deserved better.

  Darian

  * * *

  I couldn’t possibly wait for him. I knew the moment Lusus Naturae herself saw my wings, she’d want me in. She wouldn’t care if Sebastian was or wasn’t a tiny man. Hell, they were advertising for a replacement for a new member of The Flying Moon 2.0 trapeze and flying act. Star, a well-known act, had retired in Escape, Colorado after getting married and the show hadn’t been the same since. Everyone knew that.

  I’d only been in the real world and far outside the reaches of the Kingdom of Peabody for a few months to understand this. It had only taken a season pass to understand all I needed to about the circus. It was our perfect answer. While it was cute that Sebastian wanted to protect me, he also forgot that I wasn’t exactly a damsel in distress – not anymore. In reality, I was of royal blood and always had been. I was also the sole true heir to Peabody. It didn’t matter in the real, human world, but it also told me that possibility and imagination could be endless; if only you believed.

  Days later

  * * *

  I waited for him to find his witch. That’s when I promptly marched myself to the gates of Lusus Naturae Circus. I wasn’t leaving until I had what I’d come for. Eventually, Sebastian would forgive me. Someday, when we were the show’s top freaks and we’d bought an RV big enough for the tallest of mattresses, he’d even thank me. A girl could believe and I did.

  Sebastian

  * * *

  Even the concept o
f returning to the putrid witch in the forest had my stomach in knots. While I’d followed my girlfriend enough times to check on her family, I sure as shit had never had any intention of seeing Regina again. Yet, standing at the entrance of the forest, I knew there was no going back. When Darian got her mind set on something she was impossible to reason with. I reminded myself of the perks of being a tiny man and knew that, in that way, Darian was right. I could make double the money in half the time if I was peculiar on demand again. The curse just needed a refresh. We’d spend a few years in the circus and, eventually, get the hell out. My someday-wife would go on to study human minds and I could return to my normal human form and get work again as a travelling carpenter soliciting jobs from random inns with the side gig on motivational speaking. Things would work out as they should.

  I stepped through a thick patch of trees and scanned the landscape for Regina’s house. More than the evil witch of Peabody, I was worried about fairies. If they saw me, I’d be captured. I was, after all, the one who ran off with an heir to the kingdom’s throne. While her family hadn’t come looking and seemed content to move their attentions to her nasty sister Lily, nothing was impossible in Peabody. The last thing I needed was to be returned to my cage; this time with no princess to check up on me and bring me my staff.