by Nissa Leder
Heat soaked into Scarlett’s face. She remembered trying to leave the castle, the creature sinking its teeth into her leg and the searing pain that followed. Then everything went blank. Whatever happened next, she couldn’t remember.
“You’re awake,” Cade said.
She must not have gotten very far.
“How’d I get here?” Scarlett asked as she opened her eyes. Cade sat on the edge of the bed. She was back in her room in the castle. So much for getting away. Night had come and gone and so had her chance to escape.
“You must have wandered off for a while. I found you in your bed with a ripped dress and dirt all over you.”
Scarlett pushed herself up and leaned against the backboard. Her body was sore and her head hurt a little, but she felt mostly normal. Somehow she’d survived the attack and made it back inside the castle. If Cade hadn’t helped her, who had?
“I have to go to battle practice, but when I get back, I want to show you around the grounds,” Cade said. “I’m not going to lock you in. But I hope you’ll wait for me.”
After he left, Scarlett peeked out the door. She wanted to check if he was telling the truth, and it seemed he was. Her last escape attempt was an epic fail, so, for now, she’d stay put. If she got herself killed, she’d never make it home. While she waited, she decided to clean herself up. Whatever she’d done last night had left her caked in dirt.
Someone had to have brought her to Cade’s room. Had she passed out? And what happened to that thing that attacked her? It had wanted to eat her. Scarlett was thankful it hadn’t.
She went to the bathroom and drew herself a bath. Her excursion had left her skin and hair dirty. When she dipped her feet into the claw foot tub, the temperature was perfect. She let her whole body sink into the hot water. The warmth relaxed her. After rinsing out her hair, she lifted her left leg.
On her calf, two round punctures swelled her skin.
Those were definitely new.
What else had happened last night, and why couldn’t she remember?
Chapter Twelve
Scarlett had bathed and dressed in one of the gowns Cade had put in her closet. Not as fancy as the dress she had ruined last night, this one was various shades of green, its top tied together with a forest green ribbon. Scarlett would find a way home; she was determined. But in the meantime, this world made her curious. The magic, the ritual. The fact that she actually felt the emotion of someone course through her. She wanted to ask Cade if that was normal for a human, but she was pretty sure it wasn’t, and that it meant something she didn’t want Cade to know.
Or perhaps she simply wanted it to mean something else. She’d always felt out of place in life. Besides Natalie, she had no close friends. She and Ashleigh hadn’t been close since they were children. Anytime she got close to the guys she dated, she pushed them away. Now, after losing her mother and fighting with her sister, she wanted nothing more than to belong somewhere. Could her mind be playing tricks on her in a pathetic attempt to convince herself she was more than a forlorn mortal who’d run away like a big, fat chicken?
Cade kissed her fingers before he took her arm in his hand and they began their day out of his room. Their first stop was at the top of one of the corner towers. A guard stood in front of the door, but he let them through.
Inside, weapons covered the walls of the round room.
“This is where I train.” Cade let Scarlett look around the room.
Most weapons she recognized. Swords, staffs, daggers, a huge bow and arrow. Not that she’d ever seen any in person. “Can I touch them?”
He nodded.
She took a staff from the wall. It was wooden and light. She twirled it through the air. She wasn’t sure how much good it would do against a metal sword that could chop it in half with one slice, but it felt less intimidating in her hands than a big sword.
Some of the weapons looked like the ones she’d seen on television. Some looked fancier, though, decorated with silver jewels. “Why do some have these?” Scarlett pointed to the jewel on the sword. It looked like a mini crystal ball.
Cade grabbed the sword by the handle and the orb’s color glowed aqua. “Fae magic makes it faster and more powerful.”
As Cade played around with the sword, Scarlett gripped the handle of a dagger. As her skin contacted the cold metal, its orb flickered violet. She released it, dropping it to the ground with a banging sound, and stepped away. It shouldn’t have changed colors. She didn’t have magic.
Or did she?
Cade picked up the dagger for Scarlett and put it back on the wall. “Wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself.” As he laughed, his eyes squinted. Sometimes Cade looked like a Norse god or an angel, but, every once in a while, he looked nearly human. A gorgeous human, of course. That’s what made him so dangerous. He could put on a pair of jeans and a band t-shirt and have a whole sorority swooning over him at a frat party. He wouldn’t even need to use any of his fae power. But if he did, no girl had a chance. He could make Scarlett forget her own name when he kissed her neck.
What made Scarlett melt so easily to his will? Was she just weak? Or was his fae-ability too strong for her to fight against?
After the training room, Cade took Scarlett to the courtyard. When she was there last night, it was dark and empty. Everyone was enjoying themselves elsewhere after the feast. Today, people strolled through hedgerows and around bushes. Women dressed in gowns. Little girls and boys running around. On the far side of the courtyard was a market where they passed through tents. There was a store that sold fruit that Scarlett had never seen before, one that sold wooden toys shaped as unrecognizable animals, another with swords, daggers, staffs, and other weapons. Cade stopped at a store with clothing and accessories. He grabbed a headband made of tiny lilac colored flowers Scarlett had never seen before.
A silver-haired woman dressed in a gray dress that was torn at the bottom sat in the corner of the tent. “Only nine silver coins for a handsome man like you,” she said. She must not know who he was. Scarlett wondered how many fae had never even met the people who lived in the castle. In the human world, everyone knew who the president was but he didn’t know most of them. In a world without television, people probably never saw the royals.
Cade tossed her a gold coin. “Keep the change.” He put the headband on Scarlett’s head like a crown. She felt like a hippy. All she needed now was some weed and a peace-and-love attitude. Cade grabbed her hand and tugged her along. When their fingers touched, she felt a surge of emotion hit her like when the servant spilled the drink on Kassandra. Nervousness swirled with determination, topped with lust. Were those Cade’s feelings or her own?
Something was happening to her, she just wasn’t sure what.
They meandered through more of the shops. No one seemed to recognize Cade. A lot of girls stared at him, but no one treated him like he was fae royalty. People eyed her as if she were a black cat there to bring them a thousand years of bad luck.
Scarlett wanted to think it was because she looked so awesome in her dress and flower-crown, but she was pretty sure it was because she was human and was waltzing around hand in hand with Mr. Gorgeous. All the fae around had a certain beauty, an inhuman quality to their skin, hair, and eyes. Scarlett was flawed by comparison, but she was the one with Cade, not them.
“How come no one recognizes you?” she asked as they neared the end of the shops.
“I’ve glamoured myself to look different,” he said. “To them, I look like someone who might work at the blacksmith’s shop. Just an average Summer fae.”
“Then why are they all staring?”
“Ahh, because they sense you’re human.”
Just as she suspected. Only, she wasn’t sure she was human. At least not a normal one, or else the orb on the sword wouldn’t have changed color when she touched it. But Cade could be wrong. Surely, it was some weird coincidence. Scarlett was just looking into things too much.
Did she hope she was something m
ore than human? Or would it make her life even more complicated than it already was? The idea of magic excited her. How many times had she wished for the ability to make the remote fly through the air to her when it was across the room? But even more importantly than that, she used to wish she had the ability to heal her mom’s sickness.
As a kid, every year she wrote Santa a letter asking for a special pill to make her mom better. And every year, she was disappointed. Did the fae have the ability to heal humans?
Once they had visited all the shops, they turned back and walked down the street toward the palace. A group of fae women watched Scarlett, their bright eyes scanning her up and down. She linked her arm with Cade’s and pulled him closer so they’d really have something to stare at.
Her mood was surprisingly good today. She couldn’t remember the last time she felt this alive. She thought of home—of her mom, Ashleigh, her friends. Pressure built in her chest, threatening to burst. Then slowly, as if being syphoned out, the heaviness dulled and her cheerfulness returned.
Scarlett took in the world around her. The bright colors of the fae clothing, the rich azure color of the sky above—much deeper than the sky in the human world. Even the weather was perfect, the temperature pleasantly warm with the softest of breezes. Like a dream world. Why rush home? She was happy here, much happier than she’d been in such a long time. For once, the only person she needed to worry about was herself. For as long as Scarlett could remember, she’d felt like a parent to an unruly child. Her mom tried to mother her, and at times—when she was on her medication—things were great. But the cycle always continued. Her mom felt great. She didn’t need her pills. Normal people didn’t take something that altered their minds and her mom was normal.
When Scarlett tried to remind her that she felt good because of the pills, her mom would freak out, throwing things across the room, threatening to kill herself—because that was totally normal behavior.
And off the pills, things were worse.
She wasn’t fooling herself. Cade wanted her for what her emotion could do for him. So what? She wasn’t here to fall in love with a prince. But if he could keep her from the pressure she’d felt in her chest every day since her mom died, was it really so bad?
As they approached the castle, the guards eyed them. Cade nodded and the gates opened. Had he removed his glamour?
“Could someone use their glamour to pretend to be you?” Scarlett asked.
“Yes, but our guards have a gift that allows them to see through glamours.”
She stored the tidbit away with everything else she’d learned so far. She’d taken Peony’s advice to heart. Even if she’d decided to enjoy her time here, she needed to be prepared for whatever came her way. The more she could learn, the better her chance to escape would be when the opportunity presented itself.
Rather than going inside, Cade led Scarlett around the castle. Along the fence that surrounded the grounds, she looked for the gate she’d gone through the night before but it was nowhere to be seen. Had she dreamed it?
Last night, she hadn’t noticed all the roses that hedged the outside of the courtyard. She admired the flowers as they passed, the tips of the buds fading into a new color. Fuchsia roses turned orange on the ends, red to violet, yellow to white. After a bit of a walk, they made it to the back of the castle.
The fence continued around, trees towering on the other side. Why had Cade brought her here? There was nothing to see but grass. Then an iron gate appeared in the fence.
“How…” Scarlett asked as Cade, arm still linked with hers, led them through the gate.
Chapter Thirteen
Cade couldn’t help but chuckle as surprise covered Scarlett’s face. He inhaled the fresh smell of the salty sea. The boom of waves crashing roared as he and Scarlett left the shadow of the tress. The sand sank beneath their feet. As quickly as footprints had formed under each step, they disappeared with the next.
Since Scarlett’s trip outside with Raith, Cade worried she might demand to be taken home. With his father’s rule—fae weren’t allowed to keep mortals against their will—he’d have no choice but to obey her request. She could ask if he’d take her home a million times and he didn’t have to, but if she demanded that he must take her home, he’d have no choice. He could keep threatening her with the pain she felt, but maybe a different approach would be better. The fae world offered many luxuries, and, as a prince, he could give her almost anything. Much more pleasant than the alternatives. So, here Cade was, showing her all Faerie had to offer.
But he made no mistake; he would do whatever it took to keep her.
“You have an ocean here?” Scarlett watched as waves rolled onto the shore. “That’s crazy!”
Cade thought of a blanket from inside the castle and it appeared in front of them, spread out across the sand. He unlinked his arm from hers and sat on the blanket. She removed her shoes and floral headpiece, setting them next to Cade, and jogged toward the sea. Before her feet found the water, she lifted her dress.
Cade watched her spin as she laughed. She was stunning and not just for a human. A spark emanated from her—like a star in the night’s sky, shining brightly, unaware of its innate allure. He’d been careful today when feeding from her emotion. He didn’t want her fully detached. Instead, he wanted her to be free from the intensity of the pain but still herself. While he’d never admit it should anyone ask, he enjoyed the human’s company. Unlike many of the fae women he’d spent time with, she wasn’t obsessed with his position. Things would only get worse if he won the battle against his brother and became King of the Summer Court. Even now, as prince, he was a prize to be had. The status of any woman he wedded and her family would rise upon marriage to him. But as the king’s wife, she would become the second most powerful fae in the Summer Court.
Breathless, Scarlett plopped down beside Cade. “I’ve always loved the ocean.”
“I can tell.” He closed his eyes and felt the ocean breeze graze his skin.
“Don’t you?”
“I do. As a child, my brother and I would sneak here and play in the waves. Mother would have thrown a fit if she knew, but we were careful. Once she caught us sneaking in, our pants soaked from the sea, but my brother thought quickly and told her we’d been playing in the courtyard fountain.”
“Did she believe him?”
“Yes, but we still got punished, he more than I. Mother blamed his influence as my older brother. Apparently, I was too young to have such a devious plan.”
“And now you have to battle him for the crown?” Her eyes were both curious and sad. He reached out his power and searched her for sadness. A small amount had surfaced inside her, but he left it alone.
“It’s what I must do for my people.”
“Raith wouldn’t make a good king?”
“Mother doesn’t think so.”
“What about you?”
Cade wasn’t sure what he thought. He remembered the brother who would always take the blame if they got caught somewhere they shouldn’t be. The brother who helped him practice after their magic class as their magic was developing because he was having a hard time controlling his but didn’t want to disappoint their father. He wasn’t sure when things changed, but they did, and now Cade wasn’t sure how Raith would rule.
“I don’t think he really wants to be king,” he said. “And I can’t risk it. Not with the Summer Court at stake.”
Scarlett rolled up the sleeves of her emerald dress and hiked up her skirt so her calves and lower thighs were warmed by the sun. Cade slipped off his boots and socks, but left his clothes as they were.
“Do you visit the sea much?” Cade asked.
“I used to, then life got busy.” Her eyes were closed as she leaned back, propped up by her elbows. Her long, chocolate hair flowed behind her, waving slightly from the breeze. “Is this beach just for the Summer Court?”
“It borders both Summer and Spring. Faerie is an island, but the other courts are bor
dered by mountains.”
“Is there a court for each season?”
“Yes, unfortunately.” The Spring Court was tolerable, but Cade could do without the others. “The Autumn and Winter Courts can be…problematic.”
“Oh?” Scarlett twisted to her side, now using her elbow to prop her head as she looked at him.
“Faerie used to be completely separate from the mortal realm, and, a very long time ago, there used to be only two Fae courts: the Seelie and the Unseelie. Eventually, the Unseelie King found the connection between realms and let his creatures go exploring. Needless to say, it wasn’t good for humans. But some Seelie fae crossed realms and decided that humans needed protection. Not all the Seelie fae agreed. Many thought humans should fend for themselves, that it was beneath them to worry about mortals when their lives were barely a breath to us fae.”
“How chivalrous.” Scarlett huffed. “So, there were two and now there are four courts?”
“Six. Some of the Seelie and Unseelie fae preferred the human realm and so they built their courts amongst the mortals. They learned quickly that human emotion was especially potent. See, before the realms were connected, the fae fed off of the emotion of each other. Once they found the humans, that all changed. But the nobles of the Seelie and Unseelie courts were greedy and didn’t want all the fae to stay in the human realm, so they each created two courts to remain in Faerie, each tied to the realm by a season.”
“So, you can’t leave Faerie?”
“We can, but if our allegiance belongs to one of the seasonal courts, we must return to our court at the very least for our season.”
“Your season?”
“Like in the human world, the seasons change here in Faerie. Each court has its chance to rejuvenate its power and be at its strongest.”
“Do the human realm courts follow the seasons?”
“No, they are uninhibited in their power. When they left Faerie, they bound ours. Each court was given a strength and each individual one part of that strength.”