His reptilian eyes met mine. “Seems like I just make you vomit everything. Cupcakes. Feelings…” He looked down and kept digging. There was no actual reprimand in his tone.
I was embarrassed for a moment, but then I realized he was actually making light. A joke.
“You’re not wrong.”
He grabbed my hand, and I gasped.
“Are you afraid of me?” he asked, his terrible voice low and soft, which made it all the more awful.
And all the more appealing.
I shook my head. “No. I’m afraid for you. It’s just…they don’t call me Snow Blight for nothing.”
He nodded. “Apparently, I’m immune. I guess that means you’ll insist on being friends.”
Again, I got the idea that, even though his tone was serious, completely dry and put upon, that he was making a gesture.
“Because the fairy paid you?”
“Because I find you interesting. He paid me to make you a garden that can double as home security, not to be your friend. I don’t really have friends, so I don’t know if I remember how to do it…”
“I suppose being friends involves letting me bother you occasionally. And, sometimes, you occasionally bothering me.”
“Sounds perfectly awful, but maybe I could try it. What would I bother you with?”
I debated how to answer this. “If you wanted company tending your garden. If you wanted to sit quietly on the porch when the stars come out and drink hot chocolate.”
“Oh, I see.” He eased Julie down into the hole he’d dug for her. “And what would you bother me with?”
“Tips on taking care of Julie. I like to talk, so I might chatter at you a lot. But you’ll deal with it, because we’re friends, and you don’t want to hurt my feelings.”
“Hmm. What if your chattering makes me want to turn you into a gummy?”
“Then I’d say we weren’t really friends.”
“This real friends thing is important?”
This had to be the most surreal conversation I’d ever had. “It is to me. I don’t want to spend my breath talking to you if you really don’t want to hear it. But it’s kind of amazing that I can talk to you. Touch you. And you don’t die.”
Shit, I’d said too much again. Most of the Charmings of my acquaintance would take that as an invitation.
“I see. Touching is important to you, like this chatting thing?”
“It is.” I bit my lip. Why his sudden interest? I decided to ask him. “You seemed pretty determined to hate me last night. What changed?”
He took my hand again and pressed it to Julie’s stem. The plant purred like a cat. “Julie likes you. If a wraith plant likes you, there’s got to be something to it.”
“That’s it? Just a wraith plant? Not that you think I’m funny, or you want to know what I think, or that I’m pretty? Just… a wraith plant likes me?”
“You’re a princess. Even cursed, of course you’re pretty. You know you’re pretty. You don’t need me to tell you that.”
“Well, it’s nice.” I tried not to be defensive.
“Who actually cares?”
Me. I cared. But why did I care? I didn’t have an answer for myself.
“Do you want to talk to me more because of how I look?”
I wanted to deny it, but I couldn’t. “Yes.”
“Really?” His gasp was almost matronly.
“You have… disturbing features.”
“I’ve heard that. Yes.” He nodded and helped me push the dirt around Julie’s roots.
The gummy whined, and he snapped his head toward the thing sharply. “You shut up.”
The thing was silent.
“I like your face,” I confessed.
“Now that, I haven’t heard. That is disturbing to me.”
“Why?” I couldn’t imagine being disturbed because someone liked my face. I was even more curious about his experience. His curse. His insides.
“I don’t quite know.”
“See, as friends, we can tell each other these things. We can talk about everything. That’s nice, right?”
Grendal nodded. “Yes, I suppose it is. If you want to look at my face, I guess I don’t mind. At least you’ll be quiet.”
It was another of his half-jokes. “No, I probably won’t.”
“It’s strange, but I don’t find you irritating in the least.”
“Thanks?” Yeah, not really a compliment.
“Just don’t vomit on me again, and we’ll be okay, I think.”
“Words, or other stuff?” I teased back.
“Other stuff, never. Words… it would be great if you could limit those.”
“I can’t make any real promises,” I teased.
The corner of his mouth turned up slightly. It could’ve been mistaken for the beginning of a smile, but it was gone as quickly as it had come. “And this is the teasing, right?”
“Yes.”
“I like it.” He handed me a Tupperware container. “This is enough food for Julie until the seedlings come. You may come bother me for more.”
I didn’t want him to go. I didn’t want him to stop touching my hand. A fat earthworm squirmed too close to my hand and turned to dust.
He cocked his head to the side. “That was unfortunate.”
“Happens all the time.”
“Be careful with Julie. Her roots like to eat earthworms between feedings. Among other things. Your trees on the property will actually be much healthier and protected once her seedlings spread as well.”
“Does she sing?”
His eyes lit up. “Sometimes, if you sing with her.”
“Oh, I shouldn’t. You might be able to withstand my touch, but maybe not my voice.”
“We are speaking now.”
“My singing voice has been known to kill, too.”
“You’ve had a very hard time, haven’t you, princess?” The full force of his gaze was suddenly on me. Or maybe I was just more aware of it.
“Just call me Snow. I’m going to have to abdicate my crown, being cursed and all.”
“Why?”
“A princess’s prime purpose is to breed the next king.” I couldn’t believe I had to explain it to him. He should know how this worked.
“Well, that’s just about disgusting. I’d think your prime purpose would be to rule your kingdom.”
“Yeah, one would think. But no.” My shoulders sagged. “But in this case, I understand. I couldn’t rule effectively. If I can’t touch anyone, or if the sound of my voice causes blight to infect crops, everyone I was responsible for ruling, they would be in danger.”
“I suppose that part is acceptable reasoning, but the rest, no.”
“You’re an interesting mix of opinions.”
“I’m the most pro-social anti-social you’ll ever meet.”
I started to wonder if he didn’t like people because he’d had to teach himself to live without all those things everyone else is just used to. Things I had to live without, too.
I bit the inside of my cheek. Mostly to remind myself what was real. It would be stupid to paint him in pretty colors or drape a hero’s cape on his shoulders just because I could touch him.
Hadn’t I learned there were no such thing as heroes? Making him into something he wasn’t was dangerous for us both.
He was a warlock after all. Probably terrible in bed.
I glanced at the squirming gummy. He was evil. I mean, that gummy had once been a human being. Probably a shitty human being, but still, you don’t get to just fiddle fart around the countryside zapping people into gummies, then enslaving them to guard your doorbell.
But I was still intrigued. I wanted to know more about him. About his curse. About those creepy, yet sexy eyes… Maybe even what his hands would feel like on my body.
Maybe we could come to some kind of agreement.
“You are looking at me strangely, again.”
“I am.”
“Why?”
&nbs
p; “Because I’m having strange thoughts,” I admitted.
“Is this another friend things where you tell me what you’re thinking? Do I want to know?”
“Probably not, if we’re being honest.”
“I think this part I can actually figure out.”
“Oh, really?” I hoped not. I was embarrassed about how desperate I sounded even in my own head.
He took my hands again and helped me push more dirt around Julie. I won’t even try to say that it didn’t send jolts of red hot lust straight to my core.
“Of course. You’re touch starved. You meet someone you can touch. You want to be touched.” He looked up at me and met my eyes, his hands still over mine, but no longer moving. Just touching, seemingly for the sake of touch. “Logical.”
“Uh-huh.” My brain had started to shut down. The beginning and ending of everything in my world had diminished to one single sensation—the contact of his hands on mine.
This was bad.
Very bad.
Here was someone who could actually be my friend. Who wanted nothing from me. Someone who could be an oasis against the loneliness of the rest of my long days, and I was about to fuck it up asking for something he so obviously had no interest in giving.
I should just be grateful for the beginnings of friendship he offered.
Sure, I had other friends. Poppy and Fin. But… this was different. They had each other. And, while they’d both been cursed, their curse wasn’t like mine.
Grendal’s was, in its own way.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled.
“Don’t be. Like I said, logical.”
Except there was nothing logical about where we were. Nothing logical about how close he was to me. About the way he’d leaned closer.
About how his lips were almost touching mine.
“Is this part of being friends?” I squeaked.
“I think it can be, if that’s what you want.”
If it was what I wanted? I wanted everything. I wanted him to throw me down and kiss me, touch me everywhere, I wanted to touch him everywhere. I wanted to see what he looked like under all those robes.
I wanted that strange apothecary-like, yet still masculine, scent of him in my nose.
I wondered if I’d smell like dark magic afterwards.
“What I want? What about you? I don’t want to do this and not be friends.”
“Is that common? Should I no longer want to give you food for Julie if I touch you? Should you no longer want to talk on the porch and drink hot chocolate if you touch me? Perhaps it’s best that I do not feel love, because I don’t understand it.”
“Is that why you were cursed, do you think? Because you don’t understand it?”
“I wish I could say yes, but no. I did a very cruel thing. I suppose you want to hear about it before the touching, yes?”
I didn’t really, but I knew I should.
“It will make you not want my touch, I’m sure.”
“You don’t know that. Tell me.” He tried to pull his hands away from mine, but this time, I wouldn’t let him.
This time, it was me holding his hands.
“I made a fairy fall in love with me so the potency of her blood would be stronger for a wealth spell.” He shrugged. “I didn’t think I was hurting her. She’d already agreed to give me the pinprick of her blood that I needed before I cast it. And she knew why I needed it. But after I had her blood, the love spell backfired. Nature’s checks and balances, I guess. And she cursed me.”
“Is there any way to break it?”
“I’m assuming someone has to love me the way I am. Awful and all. With no expectation of breaking the curse.”
“Gross. That’s a tough one.”
He nodded. “So, you see, I don’t have many friends. Or lovers.”
“I do see.”
“Do you still want me to touch you?”
“Oh yes.”
“I suppose being touched by evil is better than not being touched at all?”
I laughed. “You’re not actually evil. Not with the capital letters. A bit shitty, but most people can be.”
“Honesty. I like it.”
“If you were evil, you wouldn’t.”
“Yes, I would. The best, sharpest weapon in the world is truth, if you wield it correctly.”
I was thinking about him wielding all sorts of things and none of them were truth, justice, or the American way.
Maybe I was painting him with hero paint again. But maybe it didn’t matter. Maybe I should just take him to my room. I might not get this chance again.
“You’re a virgin. I’ve heard there can be discomfort.”
“As long as you’re considerate, and not bumbling oaf, it should be fine. That whole tearing of the veil thing is just a myth. There is a thin bit of flesh there, but it doesn’t have to tear.”
“Then I shall endeavor to be considerate.”
He leaned forward, and I knew in that moment, my whole world was about to change.
A Kiss in Time Saves Nine
His mouth crashed into mine, and for a moment, I thought for sure it was the end of days.
Everything exploded around me in a cacophony of light, colors, and sounds.
And then I realized it was just a kiss.
There was no symphony. No celestial event.
This was kissing. What normal people got to experience.
It was over all too soon. He pulled away, looking at me like I was some kind of strange bug he’d found crawling around on his beloved Julie.
I’d been pretty sure he was just going to take it all the way right there in the garden.
Instead, he stood, and planted the squirming orange gummy near my door. Then with a wave of his hand, I had a moat, with strange black snake-like beasts with mouths full of teeth that made the water pulse with their frenetic energy. They looked for all the world like bits of slimy black licorice.
Was he not sure what had happened to him, either? That had to be it.
After he was done, he did the most unexpected thing. He didn’t kiss me again. Or even just flee the scene of the crime.
He hugged me.
A long, slow, languorous full-body hug where he just hugged me. Then he kissed my cheek and walked back to his cottage, leaving me standing there like I’d just been struck by lightning.
Actually, lightning would’ve surprised me less.
My whole world had changed in a single moment, and I was the only one affected.
When his cottage door closed, it was like a crack of thunder that reverberated through me. I was suddenly glad we lived out in the middle of the forest away from everyone else. That way, no one could see me standing there like a star-struck dumbass.
I made my way back inside, and I realized my mirror was buzzing.
It was Poppy, of course.
“The Cymaru are pissed, but Fin is running interference. He has a meeting, which really isn’t a meeting. It’s more of him presenting his royal self and telling them tough—what the hell happened to you?” Poppy demanded, eyes narrowed.
“The evil warlock kissed me.”
Poppy squinted harder, which didn’t seem possible. “Is he dead? I mean, it’s no big loss. He’s bad news.”
“No.”
“What?” she whispered.
“I know.” I found myself sighing heavily. “He didn’t die at all. He kissed me. Then he hugged me. It was weird.”
“Hugging isn’t weird. It’s normal. Well, maybe not for evil warlocks. Damn it, Snow.”
“I know.”
“I guess you’re gonna bang him, huh?”
“Well, he is the only option at the moment. My curse isn’t going anywhere.”
“Neither is his. He can’t love you.”
“I don’t need him to. You love me. Fin loves me, even if he doesn’t admit it. That’s enough. But this touch thing? I want it.”
“Gross.” She coughed. “I mean, you know he’s going to disappoint you that w
ay. Warlocks are notoriously shitty in bed.”
“I’m so touch-starved, I doubt it’ll matter. Poppy, when he touched my hand in the garden, I thought I was dying. When he kissed me, it was all explosions and symphonies. I thought the world was ending. But it was just a kiss. Just a thing that other people can have whenever they desire.”
“Oh, honey. You shouldn’t have to settle for some shitty old cursed warlock.”
“I’m not settling. I like him.”
“I guess someone has to.” Her sigh mirrored mine. “I don’t think he’s going to break your curse.”
“Let’s be honest, Pop. No one is going to break my curse. This is what it is.”
“Fin said he paid him to build you a security system?”
“Yeah, I’ve got a creepy gummy, a moat, and even a carnivorous wraith plant named Julie. I’ll introduce you to her next time you come over. She’s neat.”
“Neat?” Poppy laughed. “Okay, that actually sounds really cool.”
“She’s going to have seedlings soon, and I’ll have a whole garden of protection.”
“He gave you one about to seed? That’s interesting.”
“Is it?”
“Wraith plants only seed once.”
“Really?” Something flipped in my stomach. I wasn’t sure what it was. Desire? Joy? Anticipation? So many things I hadn’t felt before.
“He must actually like you, which, I guess is a big deal, since he can’t feel love.”
I could tell from the tone of her voice, something had changed for her, too. “So, you approve now?”
“It’s not for me to approve or disapprove.”
“Well, you’re my best friend. All I’ve got for family. So, it kind of is.”
Poppy laughed. “No, really. If you see something in him to enjoy, it’s not for me to tell you no as long as he treats you well. If not, well, then Fin can smite his ass.”
“I appreciate you aiming your husband like a canon for my benefit.”
“Always, punkin. Always.” She coughed. “So, I guess I should shut up so you can go get your warlock?”
“No. He retreated. I’m going to let him.”
“Don’t let him hide from you too long.”
“We agreed that we’d bother each other from time to time. It is my turn to bother him, but I’m going to give him some space.”
Snow Blight Page 3