0: Before We Begin

(Three months ago)

Candles covered the bistro tables, the café lights were dim, and the fireplace cast a warm glow over the space as the sunset burned against the freshly cleaned windows. Everyone except for Kate and Cress was upstairs being suspiciously quiet. Kate was sure Cress was trying to be romantic, and it would have worked if it wasn’t so painfully obvious that he was only doing it to make up for how he’d totally ruined her book release day yesterday by compelling her to shove her face full of cake in front of a room of reporters. Unfortunately for the fae Prince, Kate wasn’t ready to forgive him quite yet. Also, it was sort of nice having him try so hard like this. He got frustrated easily when she didn’t buy into his over-the-top romantic gestures, and that was probably the best part of it all—his face muscles tightening, his lips thinning, his smile transforming into a weird, stretched line. Kate caught a glimpse of that face when she didn’t accept the bouquet of flowers he’d ripped out of the neighbour’s garden after the interview, or the heaping stack of handwritten letters he’d brought her on a literal silver platter two hours later, or the way he’d pushed her aside so he could open the door for her with a dramatic swing, nearly tearing the door off its hinges.

It was glorious.

But tonight, he was smiling, his turquoise eyes aglow. Tonight, he didn’t seem to have any doubts that whatever trick he had up his sleeve was going to work to win her back.

“What is it this time, Cress?” Kate asked, folding her arms and waiting for his shenanigans to begin.

Cress yanked her arms free, and he held her hands. He cleared his throat loud enough to echo through the café. Then he dropped to a knee.

Kate sighed. “Unreal,” she murmured. “Cress, I hate to break it to you, but in this realm, guys do that when they’re going to propose. Humans don’t grovel at each other’s feet to beg for forgiveness.” She glanced toward the staircase, hoping none of the others were nearby to witness this nonsense.

Cress cleared his throat, again. He squeezed his eyes shut like he was nervous, and Kate drew back in surprise. Cress wasn’t one to get nervous. It made him look curiously sincere. “I know I fell fast and hard, and I turned to a complete fool for you, Katherine,” he said, and an unexpected patter rose in Kate’s chest, “but fairies fall in love fast. It’s how we are. And it certainly doesn’t mean my feelings for you aren’t real. I want you to be mine forever. I want to take care of you for Grandma Lewis—”

“Wait… is this an actual proposal?!” Kate asked.

“—and if you say no, I will hunt you to the ends of the human realm until I change your mind. I will appear in your dreams and nightmares, and I will put an enchantment on every instrument in this entire land so that each song you hear for the rest of your human life will make you think of me.” Cress stood and gazed into her eyes. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a wooden ring with tiny branches wrapping a dark blue gemstone. “Marry me, Human. Immediately.”

Laughter tumbled from Kate’s mouth. She was unsure if it was nerves or amusement. “I don’t even know what to say,” she admitted through giggles. Marrying Cress had never crossed her mind; mostly because they hadn’t been dating for that long, but also because some days she still woke up wondering if it was all a dream that four fae assassins had once shown up to kill her and ended up running her café instead.

“Say yes.” There was a poorly concealed demand in his tone. “Say yes, Katherine.”

Kate looked him up and down as her chuckles ceased. She’d always imagined that if she got proposed to one day, it would be through a sweet question on a jumbotron at a hockey game while eating nachos, or at least the question would pop at a fancy restaurant. There wasn’t even food here. Not a single snack.

Even after all the years that had existed in the universe, men still failed to understand that the way to win a woman’s heart was to provide her with endless snacks. A hungry woman was the beginning of all life’s problems.

Kate sighed.

“Well, I guess I can’t argue with all those threats,” she said. She stole one last moment to herself, thinking about having this lethal, turquoise-eyed assassin by her side for the rest of her life.

Could she do better?

Probably.

Did she want to?

A fresh smirk found her face when she realized that no, she would never want someone else. Anyone with eyes could see that Cress was crazy, but he was hers. And the truth was; she was so flattered, she could have cried and kissed him right there.

She lifted Cress’s hand to study the ring, and she smiled, but she didn’t take it. “I love you, too, Cress. Some days I’m not even sure how it happened. But this totally doesn’t excuse what you did at my book release with that red velvet cake.”

There it was—Cress’s lips thinning ever so slightly, his eyes narrowing and looking like they were going to pop from his head. It was all Kate could have hoped for. “I just asked you to be my betrothed. Say. Yes. Katherine,” he articulated.

Kate looked off, pretending to think about it. When she brought her attention back, a streak of fear crossed his face.

“Katherine…” Cress was begging now. “I’ll never force you to eat cake again,” he promised. He took a hold of her cheeks and declared, “I will hunt down your enemies. Any male who hurts you will have his eyes gouged out with a human toothpick—”

Kate felt her smile twist into something horrified as she tried not to imagine that.

“—I shall guard you with the fierceness of a thousand wild forest beasts,” he announced. “I shall…”

Kate sighed as he rambled on for another few minutes. Finally, once she deemed he’d suffered enough, she peeled his hands off her face, took the ring, and slid it onto her finger. Sure enough, Cress’s undying oaths went quiet. He stared at her hand. At the ring. Up at her face. He could have been enchanted by the way he looked at her in this moment, and Kate’s heart did an unexpected flip.

“We,” Cress whispered, moving in while staring at her lips, “shall have—” he tilted her chin up so their mouths were almost touching “—seventeen childlings.”

Heat filled Kate’s stomach, and she tore back. “What?”

“Fine. Sixteen,” he said. “But I won’t negotiate for less than that. My powerful bloodline must be carried on.” He smiled, but not quite in the way that assured her he was joking, more in the way like he was imagining seventeen pointy-eared children running through the café. “And I got you a betrothal present. It sounds like he just arrived,” he added.

Kate looked down at her stomach, having a fully awake nightmare.

“Come in!” She was only half conscious of Cress calling to someone. The bell rattled and Kate tore her gaze away from her ‘betrothed’ to see Connor wandering in, timid and twisting his police cap in his hands. He stopped before Kate. Then he dropped to his knees at her feet.

“Just so we’re clear, this is what grovelling looks like,” Cress whispered to Kate with a satisfied smile.

“I’m sorry, Kate!” Connor said. He didn’t look her in the eyes. “I should have never gone near you. I see that now! I’ll never reach or look or…” He paused to think.

“Breathe,” Cress reminded him.

“…or breathe in your direction again. I’ve brought shame to the great name of the police department, and I don’t deserve to be a cop after how I’ve behaved! Please forgive me?” Connor pleaded.

Kate turned to Cress. “Seriously? You made him do this?”

Cress’s smile turned sheepish. “It was worth a simple and harmless scare tactic, don’t you think?”

For a split second, Kate almost laughed. But she bit it back and pulled Connor to his feet instead. She cleared her throat and cast Connor Backs a serious look. She’d been waiting a long time for this moment. Frankly, it wasn’t that terrible of an engagement gift. “I forgive you, Connor. Go be a good cop. Your coworkers are the best cops on the planet, and you should be, too,” she said.

Connor nodded, bowed, and rushed back out of the café as quickly as he’d come in.

“You didn’t enslave him or something, did you?” Kate asked. “You promised you were done enslaving people.” The temptation to remind Cress once again that he’d made her stuff her face with red velvet cake in front of cameras was nearly impossible to resist, but by the grace of God, she managed.

“Of course not!” Cress waved a hand through the air. “I just told you; it was a simple scare tactic. I merely growled a little. Broke a few non-valuable things. Ripped a cookie from his mangey paws and flung it at the window and all that.”

It was a mild comfort, though Kate desperately hoped Cress hadn’t caused the scene he’d just described at the police station. She folded her arms. “Well, at least you didn’t gouge his eyes out with a human toothpick,” she said sarcastically.

Four seconds of comfortable silence went by as they stared out the café windows where Connor had left. Cress wrapped an arm around Kate’s shoulders and hugged her to him as they watched the spring breeze dry the streets outside. Then he muttered, “Yet.”