by Abbie Lyons
I couldn’t say I wasn’t at least a little intrigued. Did my arrival really have that much of an effect on him?
Clearly, Delilah could tell she’d hit a nerve. “Aww, Em, you’re blushing! Look at you! It’s all true, though. The day you arrived he looked like a new man. Much sexier, if you ask me. Now he’s a certifiable hunk! If I were you, I’d be doing everything I could to bag that piece of meat.” She lowered her voice. “And don’t you think the whole vow of celibacy thing makes it even hotter? Damn!”
She might’ve been crazy, but it definitely was a sexy thought. The idea of somebody finding me so irresistible that they renounced their vows? That was the stuff of dirty romance novels. It made me feel like the most desirable girl in the world. But did Gage truly think of me that way?
Shit, the food.
I pulled the basket out of the fryer, but it was too late. The not-mozzarella-sticks were thoroughly burnt.
“Sorry to get you all hot and heavy there,” Delilah said, looking down at our failure with a frown. “But which one of them are you going to choose?”
“Excuse me?” I asked.
“Don’t give me that ‘excuse me’ bullshit,” she snapped, suddenly seeming genuinely angry at me. “You know exactly what I’m asking you!”
That much was true. I did. Might as well give her my honest thoughts so she didn’t throw a temper tantrum. Delilah trusted me and felt like she owed a life debt to me and yet, what she’d told me was true. She couldn’t always control herself.
“I think I prefer Gage’s—” I started.
“You prefer Gage’s body,” she correctly completed my thought. “Plus there’s that whole sentimental thing. That ain’t nothing. But when it comes to charm, there’s nobody like Prince Tarian. Especially if he’s a flight risk outta here and wants to take you with him. And me, of course. Chivalry ain’t dead. Ooh, does it turn you on knowing he poisoned a bunch of his rivals? It’s kind of hot, right?”
“Actually,” I said, bracing myself for a strong reaction, “I think he’s innocent. He didn’t poison anybody.”
She giggled. “Oh, wow, he really does have you hooked, huh? Yikes. I’ll have you know that my little birdies tell me he’s guilty as sin!”
I didn’t dare ask who exactly her “little birdies” were.
“Another question,” Delilah said. Now she was staring directly into the fryers, her eyes growing wide. “Do you ever think about putting your hand into the frying oil? You know, just to see what would happen? Or is that just me?” She took a step back. “You don’t have to answer that. I know it’s just me!”
Babs strolled over to check up on our progress. She was always in such an upbeat, positive mood. Like Wes, without the cheesiness.
“Looks like you ladies couldn’t complete a second miracle,” she said, observing the burnt food. “There’s always next time, you hear? I believe in you! Remember I’d be happy to give the both of you more complicated cooking lessons, if you’d ever like that.”
Delilah gave Babs an animated slap on the back. “I love you, but you should know by now that I’m never gonna get the hang of this whole cooking thing.”
“That’s the truth!” called one of the trolls over by the sinks. “She probably couldn’t even manage to pour milk in cereal!”
That was stupid of him. Within half a second, Delilah was marching over to him. All I’d gathered in my time in the kitchen was that his name was Bartholomew, and he’d had his job as a dishwasher for the last twenty years. That must’ve meant he was in here for something really nasty. And yet even he backed up, a look of fear in his eyes as Delilah approached. It probably didn’t hurt that she had at least a few feet in height on him.
“You’re lucky I don’t hurt you!” Delilah screamed. “That is, so long as you say you’re sorry to me. Go ahead! Say it!”
He gave in without a fight. “I’m sorry,” he said, looking down at his feet. “It was a terrible joke.”
“No, it wasn’t,” Delilah corrected him. “It was hilarious! And so true! I’m a terrible cook.”
With that, she returned back to the fryers, and dumped in another bag of food, ready to give it another go.
“Just promise me one thing, Em,” she said. “I know Tarian’s a charmer. And he might be our best way—well, you know. But I’m good at reading people. That’s how I knew I could trust you. And I don’t trust that guy for a second, you hear me?”
I wasn’t convinced. Tarian didn’t act like a guilty man. But Delilah was right about herself. She was nothing if not a good judge of character. So it was good to be reminded that I needed to make sure I didn’t throw my life away for Tarian and his escape plan. I’d only just met him. I should do my best not to let his considerable charm cloud my judgment.
As if it were that easy.
Chapter Nineteen
USUALLY, AFTER LUNCH, Gage would take me back to my cell, where I’d be able to choose from a variety of enriching activities, like painting, dance classes, college-level human education courses—
Joking.
No, what I’d really do was just sit around my cell and mope, or “think about my crimes.” I could conjure any books I liked from the Enchanted Penitentiary library, but I’d determined there was nothing worth reading early in my second day here, because not only were there no human books available (the only good ones, if you asked me; I loved me a trashy YA novel now and again), the Fae authors they had were the super sappy, moralizing type, who wrote books like “Little Fae Lost and Found” or “A Wing and A Prayer” that were all about the power of resilience and believing in yourself and all the kind of crap that sounded really nice, but wasn’t actually very conciliatory for those of us Fae trapped behind bars.
But today, it seemed I wasn’t even going to be doing that.
“Health examination,” Gage said.
“Why?”
“Enchanted Penitentiary is not an institution of torture,” he said, like reading off a brochure. “We work hard to ensure that the inmates stay in physical health. Especially if they’ve been...injured recently.”
“Ah.” I nodded. “Well, uh, lead the way.” I smiled, trying to get him in on the joke—get it? Because I can’t go anywhere without you! Ha ha ha, hilarious.
We headed for the infirmary, somewhere I was hoping never to have to visit again, although admittedly it wasn’t as bad when I wasn’t bleeding—and when it was Gage, and not Cobalt, taking me there. When we passed through the entrance and into the sick ward proper, a line had formed snaking its way back from the desk up front.
“Great,” I muttered. Even in prison, I couldn’t escape waiting rooms.
“I apologize for the inconvenience,” Gage said, with just the tiniest smile.
I gave him a bigger one back. “It’s not your fault, guardsman.”
His smile grew, just a fraction of an inch.
As we stood together in companionable silence, I thought back to what Tarian had said: about Gage, about Cobalt, about everything. On the one hand, I totally understood why the Azelorians would be pissed off: if you’d trained your entire order to offer impenetrable protection, a series of rapid-fire murders right under your nose would make you look really shitty, and if you know exactly who to blame—or who you thought was to blame—then yeah, it’d be hard not to let that color your opinion of the guy. But on the other hand, being straight-up vicious to Tarian like Cobalt had, the way Tarian had looked when he’d laid on the bed that was now just a few paces away from where I stood in line...well, that was its own kind of messed up.
I knew I could trust Gage to protect me, but maybe not because he was an Azelorian. Just because he was Gage.
When we came to the front, Nurse Clodia sighed as soon as she saw me. “Oh, you again.”
“Emerald Jones,” Gage said, the rich sound of my name in his voice making me feel pleasantly warm.
“Indeed.” The nurse flicked a finger over a blank sheet of parchment that populated quickly with spidering, shimmer
ing runes in some Fae dialect I couldn’t quite read—presumably something encrypted so that only medical Fae could read it. Nice to have some doctor-patient confidentiality, I guessed.
“Follow me,” Nurse Clodia said, getting to her feet. She snapped and a tall, rectangular portal with bright buzzing edges conjured itself just to my right. I went to follow her, giving Gage a little goodbye wave, but Nurse Clodia stopped me.
“Guardsman?” She looked at him expectantly, arching a deep silver eyebrow.
“Pardon?” Gage stepped forward, head slightly inclined.
“You’re coming too,” Nurse Clodia said, with a look that said something like you really think I want to be left alone with this hardened criminal?
“Oh, yes.” Gage nodded. “Of course.”
“This your first intake guardianship?” Nurse Clodia muttered. Gage’s cheeks went pink as he strode to my elbow and followed me through the portal.
Passing through the portal felt like walking through the world’s quickest wind tunnel and when we were out on the other side, my hair had blown all over the place. I smoothed it down as I took in my surroundings: a small, stone cubicle-like room with a hard wooden bench covered in a piece of medical paper, which was at least pink and rose-scented—a nice touch. A wall-mounted shelf full of various vials of potions and instruments hung to our right, and a full-length mirror in a silver crenelated frame hung to the left.
“Undress,” barked Nurse Clodia.
“Excuse me?” I said. My arms folded reflexively around my chest, as though I were already naked.
“Undress,” she repeated. “I may have magical medicine, but I don’t have X-Ray specs, child. And I certainly don’t have all day!”
I felt my jaw drop, but snapped it shut. Of course, I looked to Gage right away. Gage—because he was good, sweet Gage—had his eyes trained studiously forward, as if nothing could have been more fascinating than the silvery flaking stones that made up the opposing walls. But there was no hiding the furious blush in his cheeks.
Goddess. This was as hard for him as it was for me.
If Nurse Clodia noticed anything tense or charged in the room, she totally ignored it. She clucked her tongue over what I presumed was my medical chart, the shimmering runes, and tapped her peacock-feather quill against the parchment, humming a tuneless song.
I swallowed. Okay, Emerald, it’s just a doctor’s appointment, I told myself. I’d had them before when I was a kid, of course. No big deal. Gage wouldn’t do anything creepy—goddess, of course he wouldn’t.
But still. The fact that I was about to be almost naked in the same room—the same very small room—as Gage Tremalt made my throat go dry. And not in an entirely unpleasant way.
“Ahem!” Nurse Clodia snorted, in a totally unsubtle way. I rolled my eyes, partially to conceal my nervousness. I could see the muscles in Gage’s arms trembling slightly as he kept them locked to his sides.
Slowly, I reached for the hem of my prison-issued top. It felt rougher than usual as I brought it slowly over my stomach, the scratchy hem grazing over the ever-hollower curve of my belly that had been diminishing with every day of unappetizing prison meals. I shrugged it up further, slipping it over my shoulders and blocking my view for a moment, the cold air creeping up around the super unflattering prison-issue bras that they gave us (plain black, no lace, padding, underwire, no nothing). I almost wished I could stay there, just hide my face and never re-enter the real world.
But Nurse Clodia had other plans.
A sharp, jerking motion yanked the shirt the rest of the way over my head.
“Seven hells.” The nurse’s face loomed in front of me as my vision cleared. I yelped a bit in spite of myself, folding my bony arms around myself. Nurse Clodia rolled her eyes.
“Child, don’t be shy. He’s an Azelorian, don’t you know? They don’t...do that,” she said, chuckling in a way that was honestly kind of unprofessional. “Shame, though, for this one.”
Gage’s cheeks flushed harder. Goddess, Gage, I’m sorry. I don’t like this any more than you do.
“All right,” Nurse Clodia said briskly. “You need my help with those pants as well, or are you a big enough girl to do the rest on your own?”
“Rude,” I muttered. As slowly as I felt would be acceptable, I hooked my fingers into the elastic of my prison pants and shimmied them first over my hips, then to my knees—which looked super bony, ugh—and finally down to the floor. I stepped out, now dressed in nothing but my midnight-black prison underwear and bra, plus the thick prison socks that were actually pretty comfortable.
“There,” Nurse Clodia said. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
I shook my head, then closed my eyes and inhaled deeply as she started prodding and measuring various parts of my body and scribbling with her peacock quill.
The room was too small for Gage not to see me. No matter how attentively he trained his eyes elsewhere, my almost-naked body was going to be at the edge of his vision. And he had to, in no uncertain terms, not look at me.
A memory struck me then, as fresh and immediate as though it’d happened that morning. I was a kid, musing in my stupid kid journal about all the glamorous things I was going to do when I grew up. Move away from the Invisible Cities, that was definitely a dream of Baby Emerald’s. I wanted to cut my hair short and color it pink—well, mission accomplished there. But when it came to my romantic future, I thought very long and very hard before committing anything to my secret journal. There were plenty of boys around us, who I was schooled with or played with at gatherings. But Kristos was mean and pulled my hair, and Lucius smelled funny. The Corelli twins—bleh, as if. Really, the choice was clear.
That’s when I’d printed it, clear as day, in my little diary: And Gage Tremalt will be my husband.
Goddess, Gage, who’d’ve thought we’d re-meet each other this way?
My eyes opened, and I realized they were a little damp. I barely noticed whatever the nurse was doing—measuring the skimpy layer of body fat that covered my hips, plucking a single strand of hair from my head and dropping it into a fizzing vial, shining a candle-bright light into my eyes that made me blink furiously—because my focus was so attuned to Gage. He was the one thing that felt normal here, the one person who I felt I could trust almost unequivocally, the one who I’d thought one day I’d maybe spend my entire life with.
That child’s dream was such a long time ago.
I shivered. And in that same moment, as Nurse Clodia’s head was bowed over her notes, writing something I couldn’t understand, Gage’s head turned. He looked at me, completely unabashedly.
It couldn’t have been more than a few seconds; he wouldn’t have dared any more. But in those few seconds, I saw him drink me in with his eyes, look over all of me from head to toe. And I knew, just knew, that he didn’t hate what he saw. Even though I was undernourished and wearing absolutely nothing on my face, even in the embarrassing black underwear that was nothing special, nothing like what I’d have been wearing if I were trying, even though it was only the few seconds that he had to look at me and not longer, much longer, like I think both of us would’ve wanted...
He saw me. And that struck me in the chest like an arrow.
“Well then,” Nurse Clodia said, looking up. “Dress yourself, child. I’ve done my bit.”
As I pulled my clothes back on, barely aware of what I was doing, I thought about what Delilah had said. I didn’t think I could deny that Gage felt...something for me. It was impossible to know how deep it went, if he had this kind of intensity charged through his life and our relationship the way I did, but it was unmistakably there. And for that exact reason, it was dangerous.
Gage is an Azelorian, I screamed at myself in my head as I tied the front of my pants back in place across my hips. He can’t do this. He can’t ever do this. And you shouldn’t even think about it. You shouldn’t want this kind of thing.
But goddess, I did. I did want Gage, in every sense of the word.
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“You’re verging on underweight,” Nurse Clodia announced, bustling right into Gage’s personal space as she fumbled around for some official-looking seals and stamps. She lit a wax stick with a click of her fingers and commanded it to drip a pool of red splatters into place on my chart with another. “Are you eating?”
“Uh...” My head felt like it was full of clouds. “More or less. The food here’s not great.”
Nurse Clodia snorted. “Aren’t you on lunch duty?”
“I...” Well, couldn’t argue with that.
“Your aura indicates you haven’t been sleeping well either,” she went on. “Work on that. Any noticeable disturbances you’d like to report?”
You mean like the crazy ass visions I’ve been having of the night my best friend was murdered—and not by me? I was almost too eager to tell her. But no sooner had I opened my mouth than Gage caught my eye from behind Nurse Clodia’s back and shook his head.
No, he mouthed. And gave me the shh gesture in front of his lips.
“Uh,” I said. “No. I guess it’s just...being in prison.”
That seemed normal enough to the nurse, because she stamped her seal on the small wax puddle and nodded her head resolutely. “Very well. Nothing amiss. Just eat more.” She shoved my chart into Gage’s chest, who looked surprised, as though he’d been in a trance. “That’s for the Warden’s records,” she barked. “Now we’re done.”
The portal reappeared with a fiery snap, and she all but pushed us out to welcome in the next victim—I mean patient.
Gage and I were totally silent on the way back to my cell, because, well, what could we say after that?
But a few paces away from the entrance to my miserable little home, he snuck a glance at me. “You should eat more,” he said, almost in a whisper.