“Did you see that?” someone squealed beside me.
Was their question for me? Sticking my hands in my jeans’ pockets, I turned to find a child peering down below.
A child I knew. Ranka. Sarsay’s son. “The mist moved.”
“Did it?” I asked, trying to still my pounding heart.
He nodded, copper hair juddering around his ears that stuck out from his round face. “I need to tell Mudder.”
He was already racing down. Soon his little body was swallowed by the mist. I turned back to find someone standing so close to me, I jerked and slapped a hand over my heart.
Ace was leaning over the banister. “The mist moved, did it?”
“Don’t sneak up on me.”
“I don’t sneak, just like I don’t flit.” He gave me that cocky grin of his that made indecent thoughts parade through my brain. “I fly soundlessly.” Ace’s gaze slid from my face to my hand, which was still pressed against my heart. “Your hand, Cat.” His tone was quiet, but brusque.
I thrust my hand back down and away from prying eyes.
“Let’s put some distance between you and”—he nodded toward the mist—“that.”
I thought he might offer to fly me back up, but instead, we walked. In silence at first, then, “Did you descend the spirals by foot or did Dawson bring you here?”
“I walked.”
If people had flattened themselves for me, they melted into the tree at the sight of Ace, vanishing through doors if there were any available and unlocked.
“I don’t think people like me much,” I told him.
“You scare them.”
“Me?”
“Your blood could kill them in an instant.”
“Your dust would kill them quicker.”
“Because your dust couldn’t?”
I rubbed my neck, but then remembered the blue threads of magic pulsing in my fingers and quickly lowered my hand.
“Your skin’s back to normal,” he murmured, “but you’re going to have wear gloves from now on. Opaque ones. I’ll tell Veroli.”
“Won’t she ask why?”
“Tell her your hands get cold fast. Which is true.” He grabbed my hand and rubbed heat into it.
We stayed silent for a little while longer. “Did Cruz tell you about my idea?”
“He did.”
“And? Did he find an elder?”
Ace’s Adam’s apple jostled in his throat. “He did.”
“Is it possible?”
“He said no one had ever been able to return to Neverra to test such a theory.”
“So no one knows?”
Ace lowered his gaze to the rising wooden steps and shook his head.
“Did the elder say anything else?”
Dappled sunlight glanced over his bent head and glinted off his cropped hair.
“Ace?”
He looked up. “What?”
“Did the elder say anything about the Cauldron that could be useful?”
A turquoise beetle landed on his shoulder then fluttered off, leaving behind a delicate trail of musk.
“So?”
His gaze was so intense it felt heavy on my skin, like the fur pelt he’d given me during Middle Month.
“What did he say?”
His lids snapped shut over his eyes, then lifted almost instantly. “Nothing. He said nothing.”
“Liar.”
He grinned. “You should talk.”
I blushed. “I lied to protect you.”
He wound an arm around my waist and tucked me against his side. “I know.” His fingers slid beneath the cotton hem of my T-shirt and settled over my skin. He kissed the top of my head.
And even though curious passersby stared, I didn’t care what they thought of my relationship with their prince.
58
The Trim
A day later, while Cruz met with his mother, Gregor, and Linus to discuss the strategic placement of lucionaga on the Night of Mist, Ace flew me to the glades.
“Will it hurt?” I asked him, as I stared into the shiny, inky depths.
“Honestly, I don’t know.”
We stood on a floating shell, enclosed by a circle of volitors that afforded us some privacy. The mist was so low it clung to my hair when I was standing. Like the last time I’d passed through the mist, my skin glimmered strangely, but it was nothing next to the blue threads of magic stirring in my hands.
Ace stroked the water’s surface, and it rippled like the mist rippled when I combed my fingers through it.
“We should...” He tipped his head toward the water, then turned his gaze upward to scan the cloud-heavy sky. “We should hurry.”
Swallowing a gulp of courage, I knelt next to him.
He produced a velvet pouch from his pocket. Then his palm ignited with ribbons of dust that frolicked over his palm before knotting into tiny shears. “Ready when you are.”
I dipped my hand in the glade all the way up to my elbow and waited. It took almost a full minute for my skin to react. Once it broke out into what felt like a gazillion goosebumps, I lifted my arm out and propped it in Ace’s outstretched palm.
I shivered, which made Ace look up. “We don’t have to do this.”
“I know. But I want to.” When he brought the sharp tip of the shears to my small copper scales, I closed my eyes and turned my face away.
Metal clinked against metal as he squeezed the cutters. I gritted my teeth to hold back my hiss.
Excruciating.
That’s what it was.
Like he’d sliced off a piece of skin.
“Cat?” His anxious tone had me opening my eyes. Concern leached off him. “We’re not doing this.”
“We only need a few more.”
He pushed my arm away. “No.”
“If you don’t do it, I’ll do it myself.”
He glared at me, lips pressed tightly together.
“Please, Ace? Think of the edge this will give us.”
He grumbled, but brought the shears back to my arm. He clipped, and I saw stars. He clipped again, and perspiration broke out over my upper lip. Clip. Sweat beaded down my neck. Clip. My eyesight blurred with pain. Clip. My ears buzzed. Clip. Black and white dots scrambled my sight. Clip. Only darkness remained.
I woke up on Ace’s bed. Unlike last time, he wasn’t spooning me. This time, he was standing with his arms tied so tightly in front of him, his biceps bulged underneath the sleeves of his tunic.
“That was stupid.”
I sat up, putting pressure on the arm he’d carved up. I hissed as pain radiated all the way down to the bone. A long strip of gauze was wrapped around my forearm. Blood had seeped into the white bandage.
“I tried repairing your skin with fire, but it didn’t do crap!”
I unwrapped it slowly to see the extent of the damage. My skin was pockmarked with nine seeping wounds that resembled popped blisters.
“It’s not so bad.” My arm hurt like hell, but I wouldn’t admit this to Ace. He was sufficiently angry already. “Do we have enough?”
He huffed before answering. “Yes.”
I slotted my fingers around his forearms and pulled to untangle them.
“How exactly are we going to explain your arm, huh?”
“No one will see anything through gloves.” I tugged on him again, and he sat heavily on the bed.
“You passed out,” he said, his voice hoarse.
“I know.”
“From pain. You passed out. For an entire night!”
“I know. But I’m awake now.”
He rubbed the sides of his face. “I’m going to have nightmares about this for a long time.”
“Do I owe you?”
“What?” His hands fell against his thighs like dumbbells.
“I asked you to do something, and you did it. Do I owe you? A gajoï.”
He grunted. “No. It was my choice to help. Fuck. Never ask me to hurt you again.”
I touched the b
ack of his hand. “I won’t.”
“Can we be done hurting each other?”
“We can be done.” I kissed his jaw, felt a nerve jump there. “Thank you. For going along with this.”
He side-eyed me, still very pissed. “Uh-huh.”
I climbed on his lap and locked my arms around his neck, trying not to cringe when my raw skin skimmed his shoulder. He splayed his palms on my waist and held me as I leaned in to kiss him.
The mere contact of his lips made my heart thrash with lust instead of pain. It wasn’t until we broke free to breathe that I felt the sting. So I kissed him again and drowned my pain in pleasure.
59
Red
The following evening, as the sky darkened and filled with lustriums, anticipation rippled through Neverra. People spoke louder. I could hear them through the glass of Ace’s room, where I’d remained holed up. I wasn’t awaited anywhere else. Fireflies spangled the raisin-colored sky as they patrolled. The Hareni would open its gates and release the Unseelies in a matter of minutes.
The Night of Mist was upon us.
After midnight, I would be married.
After midnight, I would fight to rid the faerie isle of its rising silver mist.
The enormity of the task stiffened my body to the point where my bones felt fused together.
Like a starting pistol, the door shut upstairs. Its nerve-crackling sound resonated inside my skull, making my molars grind together. “Catori, it’s Veroli. It’s time, sweetheart.”
I’d hoped it would be Ace, but he’d left to stand by Cruz’s side to greet the Unseelies.
I turned away from the window. Veroli was peering down at me from the glass guardrail. If she was surprised to find me at Ace’s instead of Cruz’s, she didn’t mention it. Over her arm was draped a blood-red gown—my wedding dress.
Brides marry in red, she’d told me the night we met.
She walked over to the staircase along the wall and descended toward the bed, over which she draped the dress. Next to it, she laid out gloves, and on the floor, satin slippers in the same shade as the dress.
I wasn’t sure why, but it appeased me that the dress wasn’t white.
White would’ve felt like a real wedding.
“I’ll go run you a bath.” Tonight, she’d traded her green tunic for a white one. I wondered if it was Neverrian tradition for guests to dress in white, but didn’t ask because my vocal cords felt crafted of hard plastic, unable to produce sound.
Veroli observed me through deeply-lined eyes—surely Cruz’s doing. Unless it was my wedding that caused her the strain. When she vanished inside Ace’s black marble bathroom, I looked out at Neverra and wondered if Ley’s book would allow the Unseelies out of their gilded prison? Would they all leave? Were there enough pages for that to happen? Cruz had a page safely stowed away for Lily.
Cruz hadn’t told me the specifics of tonight’s plan. All I knew was that I had to go through with the ceremony; I had to dip my hand in the Cauldron again.
“The bath is ready.”
On numb legs, I walked toward the bathroom that smelled of musk and patchouli and steam. No longer prudish around Veroli, I pulled Ace’s tunic top off, slipped off my undergarment, and lowered myself into his colossal bath.
Veroli worked soap over my skin, then wet my hair and massaged my scalp with lavender-scented oil, rinsed, and rubbed shampoo through my long tresses. The only part of my body she avoided was my battered arm.
“Ace told me to bring gloves, but he failed to tell me why. What happened to your arm, Catori?”
“Bug bites. They itched, so I scratched my skin raw.”
If she didn’t believe me, she kept quiet. Once I was clean, she wrapped a fluffy warm towel around me and swiped her palms over my hair. Once her fire had dried it, she drew a comb through the black mass to untangle it and kept brushing long after it fell in a silky curtain to my waist. The rhythmic, gentle strokes did little to soothe me, but perhaps they soothed her.
“Instead of taking from you, the Cauldron will give tonight.” She speared two ruby barrettes on either side of my face to keep my hair back.
I frowned.
“When you become engaged, the Cauldron takes from you, wends your essence with all of the essences of Neverra to bond you, not only with your fiancé, but also with the marsh, the moss, the trees, the water, with all of Neverra’s creatures.” She dabbed glittery cream over my cheekbones, then lined my eyes with kohl, swiped mascara over my lashes, and applied a coat of see-through gloss to my lips. “On wedding nights, the Cauldron slides your essence back into your veins, as well as the essence of your husband, and that of Neverra. For months, you will be more powerful, stronger, healthier, more fertile, and more beautiful.” She smiled, a small, gentle smile. “Although I’m not sure how you could be any more beautiful.”
More powerful. Those were the only two words that stayed with me as she led me back into the bedroom and eased the gown over my head.
My nerves sizzled like high-voltage power lines, and spots of blackness flecked my vision. I blinked to dispel them.
Veroli laced the gossamer redness until it compressed my chest and hugged my waist so closely I had to gasp for breath. Air shot down my throat, burning as it snuck into my squashed lungs. I pulled the gloves on and then the slippers.
A knock rasped on the door, then a voice. “Mom, I’m here.”
Dawson had arrived.
In spite of the gloves, my fingers felt cold and numb. All of me felt cold and numb. Veroli draped a cape made of white mink over my shoulders and hooked it around my neck with a diamond-encrusted brooch. She dipped all ten of her fingertips inside a pouch filled with gold powder, then positioned her fingers over my eyebrows and pressed gently.
I frowned.
“The mark of a bride,” she explained.
As I turned to leave, I caught sight of my reflection in Ace’s window. Even though my skin scintillated as wildly as the brooch nestled in the hollow of my collarbone, and my flame-colored dress blazed bright, my eyes were as dark and murky as Lake Michigan on a moonless night.
“I’ll come pick you up after I drop Catori off,” Dawson told his mother.
“Veroli—” My voice cracked, so I started again. “Veroli, don’t come. Please.”
She stared into my face a long moment without speaking. “And leave my children alone on the most important night of their life?”
I grabbed her hands. “Please. Stay up here.”
“No.” She squeezed my trembling fingers once, then let them go.
Let me go.
60
First Encounter
During the entire ride down, Dawson’s eyes needled me. As we flew lower, it was no longer only his eyes watching me. Thousands of sets gleamed in the night.
Votive candles lined the spirals of the calimbors, while currant-colored paper lanterns hovered and dipped over the crowd below.
Everyone in Neverra had come it seemed. Even though caligosupra stood on the misty ground, they didn’t mix with the caligosubi. It was their clothes and jewels that set the castes apart. Where the courtiers had worn their usual multi-hued finery, the people living below the mist had traded their green uniforms for white tunics.
Again, I wondered if it was a tradition. But if it was, why weren’t the caligosupra in white, too?
Concentrating on outfits made me momentarily forget the attention hobbling me. Unfortunately, the moment passed, and I was back to gnawing on the inside of my cheek.
Dawson’s face uncrinkled once he landed on the floor of fog that blanketed the ground like fresh snow. Linus advanced toward the runa and extended his palm to help me out. Even though I didn’t want to touch him, or the ground for that matter, I placed my hand atop his and descended as graciously as possible from the runa. Tendrils of mist wrapped around my ankles like dewy spider webs, snaking up the folds of my dress.
“You look dazzling, my dear,” he said, as Dawson took flight again.
“Catori, child of ours,” whispered a voice that sent a chill down my spine. As though the mist had risen, cold threads now enveloped my cheeks.
I blinked as I realized it wasn’t the mist that had skated over my cheeks, but hands…fingers made of glimmering smoke. My heart pitched as I stared into a face that was more skull than face.
A wispy, dark skull.
I gulped.
Living over a cemetery had not prepared me for this.
61
The Night Of Mist
The Unseelie slid its misty hand down my neck. Its insubstantial limb separated from its body, then reattached.
I clamped my fingers over Linus’s hand, who chuckled from my death grip. “You’re intimidating our bride, Rafi.”
The Unseelie—Rafi—turned his—or was it a her?—head toward Linus and scowled. For a skull made of smoke, it possessed an extensive palette of expressions.
“Shall we?” Linus asked me.
As though I had a choice in my destination.
As though I could say no.
As though I could go home instead.
He led me toward an arched trellis covered in thin green vines dripping with white blossoms. Candlelight flickered between the petals and leaves like shards of fallen stars. A single soprano voice as clear as the violet night trickled over the silent crowd—mesmerizing, hypnotic.
As the Unseelie’s wispy arm wound and unwound around my gloved forearm, I tried not to flinch. My dust shifted, as wild and jumpy as I was. The ghost’s empty black orbs turned toward the hunter tattoo wreathing my neck.
As my feet carried me nearer to the end of the floral tunnel, I inhaled the dark scent of twilight. A dais as translucent as an ice floe rose before me. It couldn’t have been made of ice, or it would’ve melted from the heat of the faeries standing upon it.
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