by Bekah Harris
“It’s been three weeks since our betrothal was announced, Ivy, yet still, you pull away from me.” Ardan’s words were gentle, practiced, but Bear could smell the irritation rolling from his body in strong waves. The prince was not known for his patience with the opposite sex.
Ivy didn’t waver. Never breaking her gaze, she raised her chin and jerked her hand from his. “And I told you I am nobody’s prize.”
“Your Highness, we’ve been walking in these ice gardens day after day, and still, I feel like I don’t know you any better now than I did when we first danced at the Binding Ceremony.”
“Three weeks ago, I was attending high school in the human realm,” Ivy snapped. “Three weeks ago, I was worried about college acceptance letters and final exams. Is three weeks enough time to adjust to everything I’ve lost? Is three weeks enough time to wrap my mind around the fact that my mother made me a changeling? Is it long enough to adjust to the fact that the same mother sold me in marriage without my consent? One day, I might accept the fact that I have to marry a complete stranger. But that day is not today.”
Bear couldn’t help the satisfied smile that spread across his face. He loosened the grip on his dagger and followed, as Ivy began to walk again.
According to Lochlan, the Unseelie King had signed a contract saying that Ardan’s usual scandalous behavior would stop during his courtship with Ivy. What a terrible burden it must have been for him. Bear fought back laughter. Prince Ardan had never managed to be loyal to anyone for longer than a day or two. This courtship must have been torture for him.
“Do you think I enjoy this?” Ardan asked, his voice on the edge of anger. “I don’t know you any more than you know me, but I’m willing to try. Because I know my place, and I know my duty. I could have a dozen girls, Fae or mortal, to warm my bed with the snap of my fingers. Yet I’m here in the frigid Winter Court playing the fool to some spoiled ice princess whose hospitality is as warm as the weather.”
Ivy stopped in mid-stride, her back straight and tense. Slowly, she turned to face Ardan, her green eyes flashing with the same fury Bear had seen only once before. When she’d stabbed a hell hound the night he brought her from the mortal realm. The wind grew stronger, the snow heavier as her eyes swirled like a storm. The full force of her power built inside her and all around her—and it would find a target unless she controlled it. Bear tensed, waiting. Then, taking a deep breath, Ivy smiled up at Ardan just before ripping the necklace from her throat. She took his hand, thrust the jewels into his palm, and closed his fingers over it.
“Then, give your trinkets to your Fae and mortal girls. You might buy their affections, but I am not for sale.”
With that, she turned away from her betrothed and hurried back toward the castle. Bear followed, his steps and his spirits significantly lighter as Prince Ardan stared open mouthed after the girl he mistook for easy prey.
When Bear rounded the corner after Ivy, he found her leaning against the wall of a shallow alcove near the doors. She buried her face in her hands, taking jagged breaths that made Bear want to turn around and stab Ardan. Repeatedly. Instead, he moved closer to his princess, knowing he was too close but unable to resist the magnetic pull of her despair.
Tears, like frozen diamonds, slipped through her fingers and plinked to the stone pavers of the sidewalk.
“Ivy, please don’t cry,” Bear said. “Not over this. Not over him.”
Without warning, she flung herself into his arms, wrapping her arms around his neck. He snaked his arms around her, too, consequences be damned, rubbing her back as she quaked with jagged sobs. He couldn’t say what he really wanted to say: that she shouldn’t marry Ardan. That Ardan was not right for her, that Bear could take her away from all of this. A single suggestion in that direction could cost him his job, his life. And he would never subject her to scandal before her people.
“It’s cold, Your Highness,” Bear whispered. “We’d best go back inside before you’re missed.”
She didn’t let go of him immediately, and Bear squeezed her closer, enjoying the feel of her body against him, the tangle of their arms, the intensity of their pain. Finally, though, she pushed away, and Bear released her.
Avoiding his gaze, she looked down at the sidewalk and wiped the remaining tears from her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “My life as a fairy princess isn’t exactly a fairytale.”
She laughed then, a strangled sound that bordered on hysteria, as if she’d just said something extremely funny. The next second, though, once she had composed herself again—raising her chin and wiping her expression blank—she walked swiftly back into the castle.
More concerned about her than he’d ever been, Bear erased his own emotion and followed her inside.
Chapter Three
“This is a nightmare,” Lyric groaned, leaning her head against the cold glass of the window. “You warned me this would not go well, and I ignored you. But what choice did I have?”
Lochlan stood behind Lyric, and, like her, watched as Ivy thrust Prince Ardan’s gift in his hand and hurried away. Her guard sauntered after her, looking amused. Of course he is. Bear was in love with Ivy. And if Lyric knew anything about her long-lost daughter, it was that she returned Barrett’s feelings and resented the fact that she wasn’t free to love him.
And Lyric knew all too well what is was like to burn for someone that could never truly be hers. And yet, in their own way, Lochlan and Lyric had still managed to belong to one another over the years. Still, it was a sad way to live, and Lyric didn’t wish the same lonely fate upon her daughter.
But what could she do?
The Winter Fae were keepers of tradition. It’s what set them apart from the other, ever-changing courts of the Seelie Realm. They would never accept Barrett as Ivy’s choice.
“You did what you had to,” Lochlan said. “That’s all any of us can do, Milady.”
He was, of course, referring to the blood-bound contract she had signed with King Odrhan. A contract she never realized she would regret until she stared into the desolate face of the daughter she loved.
“I want her to be happy here. I want her to love this court and the people she rules. I should have waited to announce their betrothal. I should have postponed it until she was better adjusted. It was all too much too fast.”
Lyric turned away from the window and leaned against the sill. All those years ago, she had planned for the ideal reality she had wanted. Now, she realized just how wrong she had been. When Lyric had exchanged Ivy for Violet so long ago, she had only been thinking of her daughter’s safety and the preservation of the Winter Court. She hadn’t stopped to consider the damage that would be done once it was time for her true heir to return to the Realm. The irony of the entire situation was that Lyric knew exactly how Ivy felt.
“How old were we?” Lyric whispered. “When did you first know you loved me, Lochlan?”
Her guard ignored her question, as he always did. He understood his role, understood that any response would only complicate his duty to her and blur lines that were already a dusty shade of gray. He had always been stronger than she when it came to his emotions, but in the three weeks since he had held her in his arms behind the stairwell and comforted her while she had wept, Lyric had been unable to stop herself from thinking of him, from wanting him—just as much as she had when she first laid eyes on him the day he was appointed by her father as her personal guard.
“I was even younger than Ivy,” she whispered. “And I’ve doomed her to the same fate I have endured the long years since. Tell me what I should do. Ivy isn’t mine alone, after all.”
“Which is something that should never be spoken or even hinted at.”
She dared a glance at him. He was watching her with dark eyes, hooded and hungry. Eyes that communicated what he refused to say with words.
“You have only two choices, Lyric. You can honor the contract you made upon her birth or you can allow her to have her guard. T
here are no other options.”
“And if I were to break the contract, I would pay in blood. It would be an insult King Odrhan would never forgive.”
“Unless it wasn’t you who violated the contract.”
“I’m listening.”
“Prince Ardan is young and impulsive. I doubt it would be difficult to find habits and practices the Winter Court would find offensive. Vices that would make him unworthy in the eyes of your people.”
Lyric turned the possibility over in her mind for a few moments. Even if she could legally break the contract, there was no promise that Ivy would be free to choose her partner. And if Lyric were found at the center of a plot to discredit the Unseelie Prince, Ivy could pay the price for Lyric’s mistake. That was a risk she could never take.
“Do you believe parents can pass their vices on to their children? That somehow, we can unconsciously curse our offspring?”
“No,” Lochlan said. “I believe that is only a superstition from the mortal realm. I believe the heart has a mind of its own, always separate from duty and obligation.”
“But you believe duty always comes first?” Lyric whispered. “What about love? What about truth?”
Lochlan released a heavy breath, so out of character for her strong guard. His eyes softened along with his voice. “If you were anyone else, love and truth would always win out. But you are Winter’s Queen, Milady. And you don’t have the luxury of either.”
The truth of his words rippled through her, and she turned her back on him, facing the window. Watching as Prince Ardan stared after Barrett and Ivy, his eyes flashing with the fury of rejection. Ivy had rejected his gift. Had rejected him. Over the years, Lyric had dealt countless insults to Dristan. But her husband had never looked at her the way Ardan looked at Ivy…
Ivy was playing a dangerous game—a game she didn’t understand. And if she didn’t learn the rules, it could even be deadly, not only for her but for the entire Winter Court. Fighting back icy tears that crystallized in the corners of her eyes, Lyric straightened her spine and hurried toward the door. She would have to act as Winter Queen now, rather than a mother concerned for her only daughter, and it was a separation of duties she resented with her whole heart. But she had made terrible decisions for Ivy’s sake from the very beginning of her life. She wouldn’t fail her now.
Chapter Four
Jules McKinnon raced up the stairs of McKinnon Hall, the Kingston Academy girls’ dormitory named in honor of her grandfather, hardly able to contain her excitement. She’d endured the entire holiday break with absolutely nothing from Ivy.
No texts, no scandalous pictures, no phone calls, zilch.
She could only assume that Ivy didn’t have any cell service in the depths of the New Hampshire wilderness or was too busy hooking up with Sir Gawain to give Jules the steamy deets. Maybe both. She hoped both. If anyone deserved a good time, it was Ivy.
Jules stopped at the door and knocked, practically throwing herself against it, and waited.
Nothing.
She checked her phone. It was 4:30. Ivy’s flight was supposed to have been in at two. She shrugged. Maybe Ivy was down the hall in the shower or something, freshening up after her flight. Jules hustled down the hall and peeked inside the communal bathroom.
Nothing. Totally empty.
Jules ran back to Ivy’s room, taking hold of the knob and wiggling it. To her surprise, the door squeaked open on rusty hinges to reveal the dark room. Ivy was one of the few students whose family actually had enough money and clout to secure a private room. But sometimes, Jules worried that Ivy spent too much time alone.
Jules flipped on the light, taking in the tidy desk, open laptop, and perfectly made bed. Then, she zeroed-in on the suitcase settled in the middle of the mattress, exactly where it had been when Jules had left her three weeks ago.
“What the hell?”
She approached the bed, unzipping the suitcase. Everything was neatly folded with no indication that clothes had been hastily crammed inside in any sort of half-hearted last-minute trip-home packing…
Jules turned around. The top drawer was still open halfway, just as it had been when she had rummaged around for Ivy’s tragically non-existent bikini.
It’s like she had just disappeared without taking her suitcase. Jules rushed to the closet, sliding open the doors. Her messenger bag was the only thing missing from the hook inside.
“Reel it in, psycho,” she said to herself. “You’re totally losing it. There is a rational explanation for this.”
Maybe Ivy got hungry and went to the dining hall. Jules took one last look at the room, the frames in the corner of the desk catching her eye. She hustled across the room. The pictures were missing. Ivy had taken the pictures, leaving behind only empty frames. A second scan of the desk revealed an empty gap in the row of books that neatly lined the wall.
Her favorite was missing. The Poe collection.
So everything was just as Jules had last seen it, other than a messenger bag filled with a few pictures and a book? That made no sense.
A strange feeling swam through her, causing her arms and legs to feel like Jell-O. Her heart sprinted forward like an Olympiad who’d just downed a triple shot of espresso. Fighting against it, Jules rolled her eyes, telling herself she was crazy. Turning on her heel, she hustled out of the room, closing the door behind her as she raced toward the dining hall.
She barely even noticed the new landscaping that lined the flower beds as she sped across campus, bracing herself on the doorframe after she finally reached her destination. She couldn’t remember the last time anything had prompted her to move that quickly. She rushed inside, absently handing Rhoda her meal card on her way to the food stations. A small scattering of students filled their trays with a variety of delectable selections, but Ivy wasn’t there. Jules went to check in the dining room, but there was no trace of Ivy at the tables, either.
Fear raked its razor claws against her back, as she searched in vain for her bestie. Where the hell was she?
Her heart rising to her throat, Jules darted back the way she had come, hurrying across the deserted campus. Maybe Ivy’s flight had been cancelled or delayed. But why would her suitcase be back? Nothing made sense.
Again, she climbed the stairs to Ivy’s room and went inside. Turning on the light, she sat down at Ivy’s desk and booted up her laptop. Her password for everything was Nan’s birthday, so Jules flew effortlessly through the security screen. Clicking on her email icon, she stared at the bright screen, which illuminated at least a dozen e-mails, all of them from Nan. All of them titled some variation of “How are you?” or “What’s going on?” The first one, however, the one with the most recent date, was titled, “You’re scaring me.”
Jules clicked it and read.
Ivy,
Where are you? This is my seventh email of the holiday break. In the first one, I invited you to come visit for Christmas. When I didn’t hear from you, I called your father. He hadn’t heard from you, either. So I called the Headmaster, who had no indication that you were anywhere but there on campus, where you were supposed to be. You aren’t answering your cell phone. You don’t return my calls, and you are clearly ignoring my emails. Please, Ivy. I’m really worried about you. If this is about the conversation from family day, the one about your mother, you can tell me. We can talk about this. If I don’t hear from you in the next hour, I am calling the authorities and driving to Kingston.
Love,
Nan
So Nan hadn’t heard from her, either. Ivy had mentioned they’d had a tense conversation about her psycho mother the last time they’d spoken. Was she avoiding Nan because she was pissed? That didn’t sound like Ivy. Still, if a student was leaving campus, the headmaster’s office had to be notified by a parent. Why would the headmaster think she spent the holiday on campus when Ivy had told Jules she was going to meet Bear’s parents?
Had Ivy lied to her? Had Ivy lied to Nan? She didn’t understand. And N
an was going to call the police?
Jules sat back in the chair, her heart rising so high in her throat, she thought she might choke on it.
Barrett Forbes.
Ivy had left with Barrett Forbes. Had she even asked her father if she could go? Did she sneak off with him? If so, was she coming back?
What did Jules really know about him? What did anyone really know about him?
Jules thought back to his charm, his accent, his impossible good looks. She thought back the that day in the mall bathroom. The day she thought she had caught them making out. But Ivy had never opened up about it. She had seemed shaken and preoccupied afterward. Scared.
“Oh, my God,” Jules whispered.
What if Ivy had been trying to tell Jules something, only she had been too busy flapping her jaws to notice? Flashes of the tense conversations between Bear and Ivy flooded her memory. The frequent occasions Jules got the feeling she had interrupted an argument.
What if Ivy had been in some kind of suspense novel fatal-attraction style relationship she couldn’t get out of? What if Bear had taken her somewhere, and he wouldn’t let her come back?
What if? What if? What if?
Panic seared through Jules’ veins, but just as she was about to pick up her phone to call Nan and then, maybe, the police, there was a light peck at the open door.
Jules whirled in the chair, her stomach wild with butterflies. But it wasn’t Ivy. Instead, a tall guy with the darkest hair and eyes she’d ever seen filled the doorframe. His skin was a freaky green-tinted olive that didn’t look natural. Or human, for that matter. Jules gripped the handles of the desk chair and perched on the edge of the seat, ready to run.
“You’re on the right track, but you’re not being creative enough,” he said.
“Who the hell are you, and what are you doing here?” Jules demanded.