Chapter 31

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

"I thought I'd find you here," a soft honeyed voice observed.

Sitting on the settee in the late-afternoon sunlight slanting in from the glass dome of the atrium, it wasn't exactly like I was hiding. I didn't look at the fae king, preferring the view of the wight swirling around like trapped smoke within the cloch. With a small movement, I reassured myself that my foraging bag, and the little cat inside, was tucked out of direct sight between my thigh and the armrest.

Ossian sat on the far end of the damask settee, but it wasn't an exceptionally large piece of furniture so there was a serious risk of our hands touching. They didn't.

"Am I so predictable?" I asked in a hollow voice.

I hadn't been able to stay in my room long after my tears had dried. It was too closed-off from everything else, too alienating, and while I hadn't wanted to be discovered, I hadn't wanted to stay cooped up either. That had ruled out the rose courtyard, too, so I'd come here where at least the sky seemed a little closer.

And before his unwelcome arrival, I had been exploring my newfound bond with my magic, testing its limits. We were no longer witch and oak tree, but something in between. I felt at peace with it, though I was no longer na?ve to think I had reached my limit. Violet had shown me another aspect of my magic that had not yet come to pass, but, for now, I was content with what I had achieved. What I had become.

Even if I hadn't liked how I'd gotten there.

"You're mortal, Meadow," the fae king answered, still in that soft, lulling tone, "which means you are obsessed with one thing every moment of your waking existence. Your freedom. Your freedom to live your life as you wish it. And that cloch represents it."

I didn't comment, and I ignored the golden haze swirling around my listless thoughts.

"Have you touched it yet?"

I shook my head.

"Wouldn't you like to know, Meadow, to truly know if you have finally freed yourself of your grandmother's curse?"

"I do know," I said firmly, finally deigning to gift him the focus of my attention. With a glare.

From the flash of coolness in his jewel-bright eyes, he didn't share my conviction. My assessment was an opinion, not a fact, and while the rational Meadow could agree with him if she really wanted to—I had been cursed, so maybe my conclusion was biased with hope—I shoved that aspect of my personality into a broom closet and locked the door shut.

"I'll have to verify for myself if you don't touch the cloch, love. Remember, it is not just your life on the line if this summons fails, but my own."

Sighing impatiently, I stood, stormed over to the cloch, and seized it between both hands.

The wight swirled from gray to pink to the brightest white. "Happy?" I snipped.

Ossian stood and replied with the utmost sincerity, "I am. It saddens me you aren't."

"I'm peachy!" I shouted at him. "Aside from the fact I don't have all my memories back, I'm as dandy as a dandelion in June! No one is more elated that my core is free—that I've bonded to my magic—than me. If I had a confetti canon, this entire place would be covered in bits of colored paper right now. But what I'm livid about is how that came to be! How dare you use an illusion like that on me? And roping my friends in like that—"

"They volunteered, actually."

"Shut up , Ossian! Shut. Up." I stalked towards him, eyes glowing green.

He hastily backed up a pace or two, the backs of his legs hitting the edge the settee and his backside soon after.

"People about to marry each other and invade a fae court to reclaim a birthright don't go tricking each other like that. Manipulating each other for results." I seized the front of his shirt, and the fae king cried out in surprise. I'd left my leather cuff guards back in my room, and the iron around my wrist glowed hot in proximity to his skin. "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't cram this ruby engagement ring down your throat and kick you out of Redbud for good. And don't you dare tell me it's because we're fated mates. Not good enough."

"Would an undevoted fae do something like this?" he snarled, clamping down on the wrist that held his shirt. Flesh sizzled and sputtered as the iron cuff burned his palm, but Ossian only gritted his teeth.

"What's that supposed t—"

The fae king rocked back, hauling me forward and wrangling me onto his lap. His hand left the smoking iron and clamped down on the large sapphire at his throat, his other knotting into my hair at the base of my neck.

The audacity! If he thought he could just kiss his way out of this—

"Let me show you why, Meadow," he whispered, jerking my mouth down to meet his.

The golden haze thundered into me. It wasn't soothing or lulling or assuaging as it normally was. The haze hit like a flash flood, dragging me away from myself and down into its warm depths. And at the bottom of that golden ocean shone the sapphire like a beacon. Its light swirled, like something was trapped inside it just like the cloch, and I felt a tug on my heartstrings. At the hollow piece that remained. Almost frantic, I strained after the blue cloch, reaching—

Then the memories came. Not mine. Ossian's.

Our first meeting in the woods when he'd asked if I was lost.

Enjoying a blueberry scone over cups of hot tea at the local café.

Our first embrace, how he'd wanted nothing more than to hold me and smell the faint honeysuckle notes of my shampoo forever.

Watching my eyes drink in the sight of him as he stood in my bedroom doorway, unfastening the stays of his shirt.

The devastation he'd felt seeing me weep over the latest volley of venom flung by the Hawthornes in response to our growing affection for each other.

The jubilation he'd felt when I'd agreed to move into his castle with him.

Screaming his rage at the stars upon discovering what Grandmother had done to me.

The desperation he felt with each passing day, knowing there was no way for him to truly help me.

The heart-clenching fear that I would die in the summoning and leave him alone to wander the mortal realm until it finally poisoned him enough to claim his life.

It was a torrent of passion and all-consuming possession and indomitable will, conquering everything in its path, including me. The golden ocean buffeted me away from the blue cloch at its depths, funneling me towards the surface.

When he broke the kiss with a shuddering breath, there were silent tears tracking down his cheeks. Just like mine. His chest was heaving, his hands gripping me like I was a bird about to fly away. At his throat, the light of the large sapphire dimmed. I withdrew my hands, poised previously on his shoulders to shove him away, so I could pull my sleeves down past my iron cuffs. Then I slid my fingers up the strong column of his neck.

"Ossian," I whispered, wiping his tears away with my thumbs. I hadn't known any of that. Ossian, while amorous, wasn't exactly the vulnerable type. "I didn't know you felt all that."

He leaned forward, resting his forehead against mine. "I didn't know how to otherwise tell you. You are mine, Meadow Ní Violet. What I showed you… that's what you mean to me."

"You need to work on your communication skills then," I told him, only half teasing. "You can't rely on showing me memories whenever we have an argument."

Ossian released a watery one-note chuckle.

"And you do know that was you basically using the reason we're fated mates, right?"

"Yes, but I didn't tell you that, per your demand." With his hand still on the back of my neck, he pulled me forward for one of his bruising kisses, but I slipped a hand between us, melding over his lips.

"I need you to promise me you'll never cast an illusion like that again."

He nodded slowly, showing me he'd heard me. "I prom—"

"I want a fae bargain, Ossian. Something binding."

His coppery eyebrows arched up into his mop of curls. "Meadow," he began.

"I need to know I can trust you never to use such a tactic against me again. From your memories, I know you did it for the right reasons, but that's not good enough." I shuddered. "I can't go through that again. They're so strong, Ossian. I didn't know what was real and what was fake, and that was terrifying."

The fae king considered me a moment. I could almost see the thoughts whizzing around in his head like sparrows after the evening flies as he examined every angle of my request. For a moment, I was afraid he would refuse. Then what would I say? This was something I would not budge on.

"I can vow to never to use them again on you alone, Meadow," he finally answered. "It is part of who I am, the birthright of the high fae of the Court of Beasts. I must make use of every tool available to me if I am to reclaim my court."

"Fair enough."

"Then I, Ossian," he said, his voice deepening another octave, "promise to never use another illusion on Meadow Hawthorne again."

"I accept." I leaned in for the kiss and the resulting whoosh of air against our faces. Our bargain sealed, he rose with me still straddling his lap, letting me slide down his body until my feet touched the ground.

"Now that we are all settled"—he pressed my left hand against his heart, his fingers toying with the ruby engagement ring—"it's time to get ready."

"Ready?"

He nodded, a grin like that of a lean winter wolf spying a deer all alone in the woods spreading across his chiseled lips. "You're bonded to your magic now, just like a fae. There's no more reason to wait. You're summoning the portal today, love. We're finally leaving this mortal realm behind."