by Laura Kenyon
Belle bent an eyebrow.
“Since when do you care about rules?”
“Hey, I don’t mess with doctors. They’ve got dibs on the ultimate red button.”
Belle frowned and reached forward—an action that sapped her energy almost instantly. She dropped her head back into the pillow. Fine.
“Can you at least tell me what happened? Is everyone else okay?”
She felt a pressure against her rib as Rapunzel leaned closer and exhaled.
“Gray’s fine. Letitia too. Just some bumps and bruises. Gray’s been pacing the hallways for hours. Just his luck that you wake up when I send him to check on Beast.”
“Oh thank goodness, Beast!” Belle’s heart clenched and then softened. “He wasn’t hurt?”
Rapunzel shook her head. “He’s having a grand old time at my place. Scratching my floors and whining up a storm.”
“Your place?” That was unusual. “Why is Beast at—”
“Everyone else is fine too,” she interrupted, “except … well, Kiarra Kane took a really bad blow to the head.” Belle tightened her eyes, suddenly forgetting what she’d been about to ask. “She’s here. But she hasn’t woken up yet.”
Rapunzel’s hand was cupping Belle’s cheek before she could even react.
“It’s okay,” she said. “The doctors are really optimistic. Penny and Letitia and Carter—they’re all with her now. They don’t suspect brain damage or anything. She just needs to work her way out of it, that’s all.”
Belle tried to comprehend this news, but it didn’t seem real. “And Donner?”
Rapunzel leaned back, unable to hide her scowl. “Donner? He’s … okay.”
“Why did that not sound convincing?”
Rapunzel sucked in her cheeks. “Well, he didn’t have more than a bloody nose, as far as I could tell.”
Belle looked at the door again. Nurses passing in their green scrubs. Visitors with tote bags. The right arm of a security guard standing erect outside her room.
“What aren’t you telling me, Pun?”
Rapunzel turned away and took an excruciatingly slow breath. She murmured something Belle couldn’t quite make out. When she finally came back around, her eyes were swollen and red.
“Okay.” She bit her lip. “Okay,” she repeated, talking to herself more than Belle. “You know how—”
“And Beauty awakes!” Dr. Frolick broke through the doorway with his boundless energy, followed swiftly by Gray, Ethan, Penny, Dawn, and a pretty brunette she didn’t recognize. The brunette was bouncing a baby in her arms and beaming.
Belle was thrilled to see them, but not half as much as they were to see her. After all, they’d had—what was it?—seven hours to fear the worst. She’d only had snippets of terror and a long, sheltered sleep. And judging from Rapunzel’s constipated expression, she was going to want to return there very soon.
Even as they swarmed around her—Penny cooing, Dr. Frolick prodding, Gray blinking with beet red eyes—Belle stayed focused on Rapunzel. The greetings all meshed together: “How are you feeling?” “Oh, Belle, we were so scared!” “Do you have any pain in your side?” The faces blurred. And all the while, Rapunzel just stared at her hands, looking like the world had just run out of alcohol.
“Please!” she finally shouted, cutting everyone off when she just couldn’t take any more. She needed to know. “Can somebody please tell me what’s going on?”
No one made a sound. It was as if, suddenly, the universe decided to pull its own audio track—to put their awful little existence on mute so all that remained were sunken cheeks and bowed heads.
Then Gray stepped forward. His eyes were swollen. He slid into the chair opposite Rapunzel and took Belle’s hand. His skin was warm and leathery. Just touching him gave her a small degree of calm. “What do you want to know?”
What did she want to know? Everything. Why did Donner go nuts? What had happened to everyone else at the inn? How was the inn? Could all this affect her baby? How much trouble was Donner in? Why did Gray come back? Had anyone spoken to Ruby? Could someone please tell her what her choices were now?
But she was too afraid to ask the questions out loud, so she just stared into his eyes. She didn’t need words with him.
With a sigh, he brought his other hand up and cupped hers at the base of his chin—holding it how a child would teddy bear. Then he began to talk. He told her about Kiarra Kane’s coma, and how Carter was holding vigil by her side. He told her that the Waldorf Plaza was putting all the Phoenix’s guests up—pro bono—for the remainder of their stay. The inn itself, he said, was uninhabitable. The middle of the woods is not easy to reach in a hurry. Nor is it a great place to fight a fire. It had burned almost entirely to the ground.
“And the insurance agent’s coming tomorrow,” Rapunzel added. “So don’t waste energy worrying about any of that stuff. It’s handled.”
Belle gave a tiny nod. “And Donner?”
Gray’s fingers twitched around hers. “He could have killed you.”
She swallowed. They were just five words, but she’d never heard Gray speak with such … hatred. He’d always shrugged that stuff off. Gently, Rapunzel leaned forward and edged him back with her eyes.
“Belle,” she said. “They know about Donner.”
“Know?” she shook her head. “Know what?”
“They know about his magic.”
“What?!” Belle voice cracked up her throat. It felt extraordinarily sore. “Who knows?”
Rapunzel pressed her lips together and gave no answer, which, of course, was the loudest answer she could give. Everyone knew. Donner was in jail and everyone now knew that his mother, the former Queen of Braddax, had been hiding her pureblood status for years. They also knew Belle had covered it up. They knew her baby would exceed Parliament’s arbitrary threshold for fairy blood content, and would have to be monitored for the rest of his life.
And they knew—now, according to Rapunzel, they had proof—that Donner’s curse had come back full throttle. Only it was a whole different animal this time.
“What do you mean it’s a whole different animal?” she asked.
Dr. Frolick scrambled forward with a clipboard that reached from his pelvis to his chin.
“Ah,” he said. “Yes, well let’s see now.” He ran his stubby finger down a list. “CBC, SMAC, TSH, T3, T4, T7. Yup! Your husband’s blood work shows testosterone levels off the charts. Magnesium’s basically nonexistent. Red and white blood cells just … well, basically, he’s a walking hormone bomb. I’ve never seen levels like this in any human being—fairy blood or no. Had I not known who these sheets belonged to, I might have thought someone tested a wild boar! Haha. Imagine that.” He glanced up at Belle, but not even he could conjure a grin this time. “Anyway. He looks the same on the outside—no tusks or anything. But there’s something going on inside that’s got no explanation in the medical world. That leaves only one possibility, yessiree it does.” He whipped his finger into the air. “Magic! Looks like it’s not extinct after all!”
A horrible pressure was building in Belle’s chest and expanding up her throat. She swallowed it back and panned the room for something—anything—to distract her.
Her eyes settled on the brunette in the corner. She was wearing knee-high boots, a cropped jean jacket, and a chunky necklace that was doubling as the child’s teething toy. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Have we met?”
The woman looked at Belle, looked at Rapunzel, and then burst out laughing.
The sound was unmistakable. “Snow? Wow. Rapunzel said you looked different, but … I didn’t even recognize you.” She stared at the baby, taking another moment to process. “Oh my gosh! The adoption agency finally came to its senses? Come here! Let me see this little one!”
Belle summoned her forward and stretched both arms toward the child. Snow looked at the others, as if for permission, and moved slowly forward. Taking Gray’s chair, she placed the baby at the edge of Belle’s mattress and held him upr
ight at her side.
“Well hello there, handsome,” Belle cooed, examining his chestnut brown hair, bronze skin, and eyes black as night. The little boy burst into smiles, forcing Belle to do the same. Amid such horrible tragedy, it was amazing how the slightest bit of good news could swell out over everything else. His tiny mouth hung wide as giant apples sprung up beneath his cheeks. Belle felt his mushy hand curl around her fingers. She waved it excitedly back and forth. “Oh, Snow. He’s gorgeous! I knew everything would work out.”
Then she paused, hesitant to ask whether she’d been able to adopt all three triplets, as originally planned. Instead, she continued babbling to the little angel and said, “Just a few more months and you’re going to have a partner in crime, you know. I think you and my little guy are going to be great friends—just like me and your mommy. Right, Snow?”
She couldn’t say for how long the little cherub had stolen her attention, but when Belle finally looked up, all she saw was gloom.
Her hand flew over her mouth. “Oh, no!” She gasped. “Snow, I just assumed! The adoption agency didn’t—”
Snow shook her head but said nothing. Rapunzel leaned forward on the other side of the bed and rested her hand on Belle’s leg. Dawn gravitated closer, her face whiter than the walls. From the corner of her eye, she saw Gray cross his arms and focus, intently, on what was about to happen.
“No,” Snow said, her voice fading like the tail end of a birthday blow. “It’s not that.”
Someone said her name as Belle’s head began to shake and she translated what no one wanted to tell her. Her hand shot out for her belly.
Rapunzel pinned it down before it could reach. “Belle. Look at me.”
But she didn’t want to look. She couldn’t. She knew what was coming. To hear it would make it real. Right now, the pain was subdued, locked behind a mental wall tempered with the tiniest hope that this could all be a nightmare. The inn wasn’t in ashes. Donner wasn’t in jail. Kiarra Kane wasn’t in a coma. And her baby … her baby wasn’t—
Rapunzel’s voice broke through the panic. “The doctors here are the best in the world.”
No, Belle pled for her to stop, but couldn’t grab hold of her voice.
“You were bleeding too much. They thought they were going to lose you.”
She was drowning. Dying. There was no way this was happening.
“The only way to save the baby was to do an emergency surgery.”
No. She clamped her jaw as her eyes lit on fire. She was only twenty-two weeks. No baby would survive that. No baby in the world would be strong enough to—
The child on her lap shrieked. Then it flailed its hands in the air and laughed.
Belle couldn’t even tilt her head to look at him now. Now, this baby—whoever he was—was the cruelest thing she could imagine. Now, the little cherub symbolized the life she could have had but lost in a fit of unthinkable violence. Now, this little doe-eyed, brown-haired darling was—
“He’s yours,” she heard Snow whisper, wrapping the fleshy hand back around Belle’s finger. “A little bigger and sooner than expected, but yours.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
RAPUNZEL
Rapunzel swiped at her eyes as Belle gazed at the infant. She was scanning him all over, tears running down her cheeks, as if he wasn’t actually real—as if he’d just materialized out of nowhere, which, to her, he sort of had.
After all, Belle hadn’t been awake for the surgery. She hadn’t witnessed the terror on her friends’ faces as they barged—one by one—into the hospital, demanding to know what happened and how she was doing and when they’d be able to see her. She hadn’t watched Gray, that fearless, untethered wanderer, crumble into helpless mush in the waiting room. Nor had she seen Rapunzel, the woman who secured her heart behind ten layers of iron and a coat of mascara, holding onto Ethan as if his arms were a life vest and she was struggling not to drown.
In truth, Rapunzel had never been so scared in her entire life. Not when Grethel discovered her plan to run away from her tower. Not when she landed in a back alley of a strange land called Carpale. Not when Ethan left her for the second time. Never. And it was eye-opening.
If Belle had died—or if the baby she’d never even met had died—Rapunzel would be just as healthy, famous, and beautiful. She’d still be envied and hated and worshipped by women all over the globe. On the outside, not a single thing would change. Yet over a period of seven hours, she’d felt as if everything that mattered was dangling on a thread that could sever at any moment. And if it did, nothing would make sense again. Nothing could be happy again.
Now that Belle was awake, all Rapunzel wanted to do was jump on top of her and fling her arms around her and tell her that she was the sister she’d never had. She wanted to apologize for always covering up her emotions with sarcasm, and tell her their friendship had changed her life in so many wonderful ways.
But for all of these reasons, the best thing she could do right now was sit by her friend’s side and let her process what Snow had just told her: That her baby, who wasn’t supposed to come for another five months, was sitting in her arms; that the precious newborn stages had completely slipped through her fingers; and that the curse—in some massive, mental brain twister sort of way—had actually saved him.
So when Ethan knelt down behind her chair and wrapped his two strong arms around her neck … and nuzzled the soft bristles of his chin against her cheek … she couldn’t care less about giving in. She dove in, finally, despite everyone’s knowing eyes, and held on tight. She didn’t want to wait until he was lying in a hospital bed before she could show him how much she cared.
Unfortunately, this precious moment flittered away the moment Ruby Welles came crashing through the door—a guard protesting behind her—snapping a newspaper through the air.
“Tyranny!” she bellowed, sneezing and coughing all over the place. “Rapscalliontry! A wolf in sheep’s clothing in the first degree!”
The baby began to wail as Ruby zigzagged forward. Her balance was off, her hair was all frizzles, and her blouse hung wrinkled outside of her skirt. She looked more like a homeless bag lady than anyone of note.
Rapunzel had a red hot flashback to the opening of the Phoenix. Was it this woman’s goal to ruin every decent milestone in Belle’s life? To run in ranting about Parliament and Angus Kane and a declaration of war against magic, when Belle should have been focused on coming to terms with her bundle of joy?
As usual, the rest of the assembly stood in dumfounded silence, gaping at the fairy like she was the star of a carnival freak show. Once again, it was going to be Rapunzel vs. Ruby. The heretic vs. the fundamentalist. Round five hundred.
But as Ruby advanced toward the bed and Rapunzel unclenched her hands from Ethan’s arms, a dark blur beat her to it.
“Not a good idea,” Gray said, planting himself in Ruby’s path.
“Get out of my way,” she snapped.
The corner of his lips rose to meet the corner of his right eye. It was the first time Rapunzel had seen that trademark smirk in hours. She’d feared that, in coming to care for Belle, he’d lost it.
“No thanks,” he replied with a shrug, as if declining a tray of hors d’oeuvres.
Ruby’s face suctioned in on itself. She sneezed into her sleeve and then smothered it against her bright red nose.
“If you don’t get out of my way, I’m going to turn you into … into something extremely unpleasant.”
Gray shrugged and crossed his arms. “You mean more unpleasant than an emotionally castrated vagrant who brings darkness to everyone he meets? That is how you put it, right?”
“I told you to stay away,” the fairy shot back. “And look what happened!”
Gray flinched but stood his ground. Rapunzel had no idea what was going on, but … well, it was quite riveting.
“You’re the one who scared her into going back to that psychopath.” Gray shook his head. “I don’t know how, or what you said. I j
ust know you’ve been hounding her for weeks. You may have a hold on her for some reason, but you don’t scare me.”
Ruby let out a pop of air. “Now there’s a newsflash.”
“You’re the one who should be ashamed, not me.”
She smashed her lips together but looked away.
“So go ahead,” he continued. “Whip out your little expanding thimble and turn me into a salamander.”
Even Rapunzel felt something icy creep up her spine at this. Not that she hadn’t dared Ruby many times in the past—but that was because she’d thought magic had no place in today’s world, that it was just exaggerated folklore perpetuated by a waning genetic condition. But something had made Belle’s fetus age a year in just a few weeks. Something had made the blood flowing through Donner’s veins turn toxic. Now was not the time to dare a pissed-off pureblood.
But Gray kept at it, despite Belle’s pleas for him to stop. With the exception of the baby’s howls, no one else made a sound. Even Dr. Frolick was captivated.
“Who cares if you get arrested? Or lose your powers? You could turn me into an ant, step on me, and then get them right back. And what jail could hold the all-powerful Ruby Welles if she really wanted to get out? All you’d lose is the world’s adoration!”
“Gray!”
“Oh.” Gray bopped his forehead sarcastically. “That’s it, isn’t it? You can’t take any real stand because it would tarnish that fairy love guru image you’ve got going on. So you just boss and guilt people into acting how you want them to instead. So when it comes down to it, you’re about as scary as that infant over there. Actually, less. You might as well have no powers at all.”
Ruby glared through him and snapped her fingers in the air. “Bingo,” she said.
Gray, already winding up for his next jab, floundered. “What?”
Ruby’s gave her sleeve another dose of snot. Then she slapped her newspaper into his arms.
“This isn’t just a common cold I’ve been battling. And if you’d just gotten out of my way and shut up for five damn minutes, you’d know that. My powers are gone. Angus has taken Donner’s throne. Carter’s passed the Riverfell crown to his brother. And Parliament is threatening to send troops to Tantalise if Snow doesn’t step down. In all honesty, Belle’s romantic preferences are the last thing on my mind right now. And I’m no longer sure she has anything to do with Marestam’s downfall—or Donner’s curse—at all.”