Chapter 17

ChapterSeventeen

Thea had gone over a lot with her sisters. Beltane was the festival of light and happiness. There were so many opportunities for a couple to fall in love during this festival, and if she wanted to make sure that Alistair stayed with her for forever, then Beltane was the perfect time for it.

Forever seemed like an awfully long time. They were only eighteen. Planning that time until the end of the world seemed like a bit of a rush. But her sisters knew best, and if they wanted to help her, well, she would not turn away such a gift.

So they ate. They laughed. Her family welcomed him with open arms to prove how amazing they would be to have as in-laws. And though Alistair seemed uncomfortable for the first bit, he loosened up enough for her to see how pleased he was. He liked them.

He liked her.

Thea wasn’t blind. She saw how many glances he stole in her direction and how his cheeks turned bright red whenever she caught him looking. He’d come all this way for her. Probably turning aside everything he knew about her town and her people just to see her.

That had to mean something, didn’t it?

He even helped pick up the table. Alistair loaded his arms with plates so high she was certain he’d drop them, but he gave her a wink and then staggered off in the well’s direction where the elders of Waterdown had gathered to clean the plates. They were all color coordinated so they’d return to the correct home. Although, their plates would simply disappear back to their cottage when the time was right.

“I like him,” Belladonna said, crossing her arms as she stood beside Thea and watched Alistair make his way back to them. “He’s a little too concerned about that suit of his, and I still think it’s ridiculous that he dressed up for a Beltane festival. But he’s trying hard, and I like that.”

“Me too.” Marigold paused and looked over at Alistair as well. “He’s got kindness in his eyes. That’s a good match for our Thea, if I do say so myself.”

Her eldest sister snorted. “A match might be a little more credit than he deserves, but he seems like a nice enough boy. I’ll allow that.”

Thea didn’t like that they were talking as though she wasn’t there. “Excuse me? He’s going to be here any second, and I’d prefer it if you two witches weren’t talking about him as though he wasn’t here at all.”

Her sisters rolled their eyes in tandem before meandering away. But Belladonna tossed over her shoulder, “We’re going to be at the bonfires! You should bring your friend.”

She’d shouted loud enough that Alistair had heard her. And when he walked up to her side, he tucked his hands into his pockets and looked at her through his mop of hair. “Bonfires?”

Explaining all this to him felt as though she had a foreigner in her midst. “Do you not light fires for Beltane?”

“We do.” He nudged his toe in the dirt. “But they’re in the fireplace. We light them all at the same time in the house and let them burn throughout the night. Sometimes we eat good food, but most of the time my father considers the fires enough to honor Ostara. It’s the one time a year we use the fireplaces.”

Balthazar Orbweaver toyed with the gods. Just hearing the story made the hair on Thea’s arms stand straight up. “You’re lucky Ostara hasn’t cursed your family.”

“I wouldn’t be so quick to say she hasn’t.” He chuckled, but the sound had no mirth in it. “Anyway, you said something about bonfires? Is that the right way to do it?”

“Oh yes!” She clasped her hands over her heart. “Ostara loves bonfires. First, of course, we’ll crown the May Queen, and there’s the may pole to dance around! You wouldn’t do that, though. So I suppose I’ll skip this year. And then the bonfires are the last bit of it. Couples will run and leap through the flames so their love burns bright, or you can jump through yourself for good luck.”

She paused in her rambling. Would he want to jump through the flames with her? That seemed rather... forward. She shouldn’t expect that.

He held out his hand for her to take. “We’ll see where the night leads us, shall we?”

That was the best answer she could have hoped for. No pressure. No expectations. Just her and Alistair exploring the world together. As it should be.

She didn’t know how she got so lucky as to meet him when she did or why he’d ever sent her that letter, but she was so pleased that he was here.

Together, they walked away from the town square, and she drew him to a larger open area outside Waterdown. The Beltane festival was always held in the same part of the fields that surrounded the town. There was a small platform, overgrown with grass now, but that was where they always set up the may pole. Already young women were dancing around it and a band playing a jaunty tune with four fiddles and a few drums. The rainbow-colored strips of fabric wrapped around the pole as the sky turned pink with streaks of the setting sun.

“May pole?” Alistair asked, nodding toward the young women dancing.

“They dance for many reasons.” She still held his hand in hers, and she wondered how long it would take him to realize they were holding each other’s hands. “Most of them dance for fertility, however. Spring is the perfect time for babies to be welcomed, and most of these young women have been struggling.”

It was a bad year for it. She’d overheard her mother talking with the mayor of the town when the other woman had come to visit. Apparently, most of the women in the town were facing some strange fertility crisis, and no one could figure out why. The nearest witch who dealt with mothers and children lived in Wildecliff, and unfortunately, they hadn’t convinced her to come over the river to see to their people.

She was glad she wasn’t looking to have a child any time soon. Thea couldn’t imagine the grief that came with waiting for a baby that never came.

Alistair squeezed her fingers. “And the colored fabric?”

“Ostara and Flora like colors,” she explained. “The goddesses of spring hate anything bland.”

Alistair looked down at his own clothes, and she had to cover her mouth with her free hand. He might be a little overdressed and bland, but that didn’t mean he didn’t look the part. He’d rolled his sleeves up his arms and done everything he could to be involved in the Beltane festival. For that, she thought it was rather lucky to have him here.

A shout echoed from further up the hill. “May Queen! May Queen!”

They were going to announce this year’s May Queen sooner than she thought. Thea grabbed his arm and yanked him toward the hill where they would crown the May Queen. Though she’d never been one herself, she always had some small amount of hope in her chest that this would be her year.

Maybe having Alistair here would be the good luck charm she needed.

A large crowd gathered before the mayor, most of them young women like Thea. Some of them had their beaus with them, and of course, there were plenty of elders who were so excited to see who was crowned this year. Usually, it was someone younger, but rumor had it that the mayor had other plans this year.

She stood at the front of the crowd—her pressed blue suit with gold buttons clearly marking her as the Mayor of Waterdown. She was lovely, with her blonde hair coiffed and twisted at the base of her neck. And though the mayor had been casually thought of as perhaps a little too masculine, Thea had always thought it only enhanced the strange flavor of her beauty.

The mayor was more than the leader of their town. She was the first female mayor Waterdown had ever elected, and Thea thought she’d done a fine job of it thus far.

Hands on her hips, the mayor looked down at the ranks of young women standing around her. “The may queen this year is a young woman who has shown excellent kindness, remarkable standards in magic, and a love for this town that very few others could match. And while I know there are plenty of younger girls who were hoping to be May Queen this year; I have it on good authority from Ostara herself that this year she wishes to have a May Queen of marriageable age. A May Queen who will represent what this time is actually about. Fertility and the coming of spring.”

So the rumors were true then. Ostara wanted someone older this year, although Thea couldn’t guess why.

She hugged Alistair’s arm so tightly that she feared she might cut off his circulation. But what if she was crowned? What would she do? What would she say?

The mayor looked throughout the crowd with her piercing blue eyes, and then her gaze settled upon Thea’s sister.

“Belladonna,” the mayor said, her voice booming throughout the clearing. “Ostara has called upon you to represent her in this time of summoning.”

Belladonna’s eyes nearly bulged out of her head at the announcement. And quite a few others murmured in the crowd. They understood an older May Queen, but one Belladonna’s age? The murmuring died down as her sister walked through them, however.

She had that way about her. Sometimes her sister looked like an otherworldly creature who had stepped out of the forest to guide them into a time of magic and spells. Most times, her sister looked like the true meaning of hag. But today, as the sunset turned blood red, she walked toward the mayor with grace and virtue.

Even those who were angry about their own children not being picked sighed as Belladonna joined the mayor. “I accept this great honor, and my only hope is that I serve Ostara with pride.”

That was it.

Usually, the May Queen gave a long speech, but her sister knew that this moment wasn’t about her. It was about the goddess.

The crowd cheered, and Thea tugged Alistair’s arm away from the crowd. He looked down at her with surprise, a question on his tongue before they had even stepped three feet away.

“Are we not going to watch your sister?” he asked, though he let her tug him through the crowd with no complaints. “I thought the May Queen position was rather important?”

“Oh, it is. But we’ll see her speech again. They’ve got to cover her in flowers and get her into a white dress first.” Thea had other plans than waiting for her sister to get ready. She’d already smelled the ash in the air and the way the wind had blown smoke toward them.

The bonfires were lit. This was her favorite part of the Beltane festival. She loved watching people leap through the flames in the hopes that their wishes would come true. So many couples would hold hands and leap as though nothing was stopping them from getting to the other side. They did not fear the flames. They did not fear the heat. For no matter what stood in their way, they would always be together.

They clambered up a larger hill and then stood at the top. Far below them were the fires. This year, Waterdown had decided they would have three large bonfires and that each of them would be for different people. Two for singular leapers and one for couples.

“This is a good view,” she breathed and then sat down on the ground.

Alistair hesitated, and she wondered if he worried the mud would sully his pants. But then he sat down beside her with a heavy thud.

She tried not to look at him, even though her eyes kept seeking his. With the moon coming out on the horizon and darkness falling around them, it felt as though they were the only two people in the world. And maybe they were.

For the long moments of silence, it was just them and the moon. The warm light of the fires played across her skirts and burnished her fingers with outlines of gold. She could see every freckle on his face and how they dusted the backs of his hands. How his long legs stretched so much farther than her own, and it seemed even the grass clung to him.

She watched as her friend Clodagh walked through the crowd with her fingers intertwined with another young woman’s. That must be the young woman she’d talked about, and then they were leaping through the fires together.

Her heart squeezed in her chest. Maybe someday she’d have someone to leap through the fires with. Just not yet.

Alistair reached for her hand and twined their fingers together until they’d almost made a kind of knot between them. “You’re suddenly quiet.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“I’m unused to you being quiet.”

Thea wasn’t sure if that was a compliment. She supposed she talked quite a bit, but hopefully, that wasn’t overwhelming for him. Or too much. Or... Or....

His fingers squeezed hers. “Do you know why I wrote you that letter?”

“Which one?” She looked down at their hands together, and she found that she quite liked what she saw. “You’ve written me many.”

Alistair chuckled. “The first one.”

“Ah. I’ve never really thought about it.” That was a lie. Thea had thought about it a lot.

She’d first explained it away as guilt. His family had been so cruel, and she supposed that was why he’d wanted to apologize. And then she’d written him back, and maybe he had to keep writing to her, or else he’d be considered rude.

He cleared his throat and turned her hand over in his. Alistair traced the outlines on her palms, the life line, the love line, and even her fortune line before he continued. “When I saw you in that clearing, I thought you were the most lovely girl I’d ever seen in my life. Not just because of your hair or how your eyes remind me of hot chocolate on a winter’s day. Not because of your clothes or how you stood up to my father, either. I thought you were beautiful because of the love in your eyes when you looked at Browning. A creature most people would have hated immediately.”

“He’s easy to love,” she corrected.

“Oh, I know. I’ve met him many times now.” Alistair laughed, then lifted her hand to his lips.

He pressed a kiss to her knuckles and then turned to face her. He moved his legs so that they were on either side of her body. Trapped, surrounded by him, she had never felt so at home.

Those deep green eyes stared into hers, and he whispered, “I’d very much like to kiss you, Thea.”

She’d never been kissed before in her life. Never even thought about it. But as her gaze drifted down to his mouth, she realized she’d like to kiss him as well. So she nodded.

Alistair leaned forward, and his hand cupped the back of her neck. He drew her close and kissed her lips as though she were made of glass. Delicate. Soft. She hadn’t thought his mouth would be so soft.

His mouth moved against hers. Once, twice, three times. Gentle, chaste kisses, but they made her feel something bloom inside herself.

He drew back ever so slowly, his cheeks bright red and a genuine grin on his face. “There,” he whispered. “Does that make up for not jumping through the bonfires with you?”

The words were so preposterous that a laugh escaped her, unbidden. She pressed a hand to her mouth as though she could hold his kisses there for good, then she nodded.

And when he turned back to watch the bonfires, he wrapped an arm around her shoulder. She leaned into his warmth and thought she would never forget this night. Never.