CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Autumn

“How long before they move us out, do you think?”

“Uncle wants the entire household back in Athenea by Christmas, and Burrator mothballed. But us? Two weeks, if we’re lucky.”

I felt the inevitable dread rise from my stomach up to my heart. The last time I had been to Athenea had been my grandmother’s funeral, and I had never attended court as a duchess in my own right.

Tomorrow would mark my sixteenth birthday, and I would gain the right to sit on the Athenean council and the Inter. Though my father would continue controlling my finances until I was legally an adult by British law, for all intents and purposes, tomorrow I was to leave childhood behind.

Fallon wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “We’ll look after you. It will be fun. And on the bright side, Father is going to waive the guardian rule for you, so no more humans!” He gently shook me and I managed a smile.

“At least the sun always shines on Athenea,” I allowed, shuffling closer to the small floating fire Fallon had conjured in front of us. Taking his hand, I pulled him across the pebbles so I could rest on him.

We were sitting on a small beach sheltered in a cove just a few minutes’ flight over the hill from my house. It was steep and stony and walled in by hills so severe you could barely climb them, and between them ran a crumbling road that led back toward the town. The most stunning features of all were the lake behind us and the stream that ran across the beach and out to the sea, rough with the strong wind today, white-capped waves grabbing at the lowest edges of the sand.

My parents had insisted I be at home for my birthday, and Edmund, wanting to teach us as much defensive magic as possible, had stolen us both away to the most isolated place he could find—Mansands Cove.

It had been only a handful of days since the incident at Burrator, but already the security had doubled—there were ten Athan with us now, and many more back at my home—and the privacy Fallon and I craved had been halved.

“And your parents? Are they putting up a fuss about leaving here?”

I shrugged. “They’re refusing to go to the Manderley estate. Father hates the grandeur and we take a lot of income by keeping it open for the public . . . they’ll just stay in London. They won’t come to Athenea.”

He pulled my head down onto his shoulder and tangled a hand in my hair, tightly weaving his fingers between the wind-swept knots and curls. “I’ll look after you. Always.”

Part of me knew that he could never fulfill that promise, yet the overwhelming mass—including my heart—absorbed that statement and swelled, content to partake of the lie. I wriggled into the crook of his arm and watched as the strip of orange resting on the sea’s horizon shrank and the sky above us moved from blue to pink to purple.

“Stand up,” he suddenly ordered, doing just that himself. Nestled in the hollow my weight had created in the pebbles, I looked up at him, frowning. He curled his fingers and impatiently motioned for me to join him.

I scrambled up and jostled for balance as stones tumbled away from beneath my feet. He steadied me before allowing one hand to slide all the way up and across my shoulder onto my neck, the span between his fingers so large he could wrap them halfway around. He pulled me toward him and rested his forehead against mine.

“You’re sixteen tomorrow,” he stated. His eyelids drooping, closing, I felt him draw in a breath from the very air I had just exhaled.

“Yes,” I answered in a whisper, sounding uncertain even of that basic fact. But suddenly my arms, hanging limp at my side, found their way around his waist, and the same girl who had straddled him after the party awoke and began to crawl from the corner in which she was chained. She peered out at me from behind the prison bars in my mind, and then looked past me to him. “I’ll be legal,” I added more confidently.

His eyes snapped open. “Don’t,” he growled, pulling me away by the scruff of my neck like a misbehaving kitten.

“Why?” I demanded, digging my nails into his shoulders so he couldn’t keep me at his full arm’s length.

“Not until you’re sure about me.”

“I am sure!”

“Then prove it,” he challenged, letting me go and spreading his arms to expose his front. “I’m all yours.” He cocked his head and allowed me a wry grin.

I spluttered over my words. I only said that to be stubborn! But here he was, a prince of Athenea, the heartthrob of the dimension, offering himself up to me on a plate. And he looked delicious . . . So what is stopping me? What am I afraid of? The depression is better; I’m not afraid of going to Athenea anymore; I can deal with the limelight.

I was aware of how rapidly my chest was rising and falling, a complete contrast to his calm, collected demeanor. “My eyes,” I began hesitantly. “What color are they?”

He was already burning me up with his gaze; he didn’t need to check. He already knew the answer. “Red, Autumn. They’re red.”

Yes, yes, they were blazing, warm and waiting.

Abruptly, he let his arms fall, instead reaching to undo the top button of his shirt, and then another. My eyes turned into saucers and I was aware of Edmund pausing midpace to stare.

Fallon moved to the third button. “Let me get one thing straight, duchess. When I was ten years old, you roped me into a game of kiss chase.” Fourth button. Fifth button. “You declared yourself winner only when you had smooched me in the throne room, in front of my family and the court.” His shirt was hanging open now, and he lifted a leg, took off his shoe and sock, and tossed them aside. He repeated the same with the other foot and continued talking. I vaguely noted the importance of breathing. “Everybody laughed and said what a great couple we would make some day. But I . . .” he waggled his finger at me, before starting on his cuff links and pocketing them, “I have spent every day since wondering what it would be like to kiss you properly. That’s almost eight years, and I am not prepared to wait a single minute longer. Damn the age of consent, and damn him,” he waved a dismissive hand toward Edmund. “Keep me waiting any longer and you’re going to go for an impromptu swim.”

He finished his speech with his shirt framing the beginnings of a washboard stomach, sleeves hanging loose at his wrists, and the gaps between his toes catching the smallest pebbles.

“You’re blackmailing me!” I accused, pursing my lips and trying mybest to not blush.

“It’s what my father would call diplomacy.”

I sprang forward, hands resting on each of his cheeks, and pressed my mouth to his. His eyelids shut, and he relaxed into my grip; I could feel his smirk against my lips. After a few seconds, I pulled back.

“I’m not really a negotiator,” I murmured apologetically to his contented expression, as the gradual realization that I had just experienced my first true kiss descended. “Did I do it right?”

Slowly, he opened his eyes and his smile softened. “Not quite.” Before I could become any more mortified, he tilted my chin up with a single finger, and I needed no more than that simple touch to feel the warm rush of magic and happiness in my veins, and the tingle of rising goose bumps along my arms. He kissed me much more gently than I had him, but began to part my lips with his tongue. My eyes flew open and wide but I complied, following his lead.

Eventually he pulled away, tugging on my lower lip with his teeth. The flesh slipped away and was released with a pop, and I could feel the warmth of the graze marks along the delicate skin on the inside of my lip.

“How was that for a six-hour-early introduction to womanhood?” he asked, smirking and glancing at his watch.

“My grandmother would approve greatly of me taking lessons from a prince,” I said, grinning myself and finding a home for my arms tucked in the folds of his shirt, palms flat to his back. “And Jo will stop badgering me to get together with you.”

He kissed my forehead. “I’m more than happy to tutor you in kissing, and more, when you’re ready.” Resting his chin on the top of my head, he wrapped me up in his arms, and I tucked my head into my favorite spot on his shoulder. “And we’ll invite Jo to court as soon as she breaks for the holidays, so you have an old friend in Athenea.”

He stroked the lace sleeves of my shirt, threading his fingers through the gaps. I was shivering; it was cold now the fire had gone out, and neither of us had dressed for a November wind.

“And my sister will be a friend to you. She’s a little younger, but she was always in awe of you . . .”

He carried on talking, whether about his sister or others I didn’t know, because I had ceased listening. An unease was creeping up from my feet, slowly but surely toward my heart.

My grandmother . . .

My hands fell away from his back and I stepped back.

What is stopping me?

“But you’re keeping it from me.”

“Autumn?”

“You know why my grandmother was murdered. Everybody knows, except me.”

He seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, and placed his hands on my upper arms, looking me straight in the eye.

“You already know this, and in truth, it’s why my family are here. I lied to you about coming here to escape the press.”

I held my breath expectantly. Am I about to discover the truth? The real truth? I reached up and placed my palms on his chest, warm and scarred, and could feel his rapid heartbeat, slowing. There were so many things to endear him: his looks, his sincerity and humor, the way he wanted me, and the way he made me light up . . . his honesty . . .

“I was ordered to come here because the Extermino attacked. We came to keep you safe.”

I shook my head. “But that’s suicide, you’re royalty, why would—”

“It’s to do with your grandmother. But I can’t tell you why she was murdered, not yet.”

I jumped back. “Why?!”

“I just can’t.”

Even I was shocked as my palms slammed back down onto his chest and sent him stumbling back a few paces. Two red handprints remained, one laced over his scars, turning them purple.

“Sthlancleen!” I cursed, and his mouth fell open in horror as the most rotten word I knew hit him. “I thought relationships were supposed to be based on honesty!” He was only five or so feet away but I was screaming at the top of my lungs, and Edmund came racing down the beach toward us.

The prince didn’t even seem to hear past my curse. “Don’t you dare debase yourself with that word! It’s for your own good we have orders not to tell you.”

Edmund was stalking toward us, and before I knew it, his thick arms had wrapped themselves around me from behind and his mouth was at my ear.

“Wash your mouth out, young lady, and start acting like a royal girlfriend,” he growled, intimidating enough to make my heart go cold without ever raising his voice beyond the subtle warning of a snarl. “I suggest you go home and think about what you have just said, and accused His Highness of, and come back to us when you’re ready to accept your situation.”

He tossed me aside and I scrambled for balance as my feet caught in the banks of pebbles. As I turned, my stance dropped and I hissed, knowing that my magic was flaring in the anger, making me primal. I started to swear again, but Edmund cut me off.

“Go home,” he ordered, and with one last muttered curse I stamped away and took off into the air, several Athan following me.

“No. Leave her to seethe. She needs to get over this gripe of hers,” I heard Edmund say and shrieked in displeasure so loudly there was no way they wouldn’t hear me.

The cold air around me and the physical exertion of flying did nothing to ease my temper, and when I landed outside my house and had to endure the long security checks imposed on us, I tapped my foot impatiently, being as thoroughly uncooperative as possible. When they finally let me through, I vaulted the gate and opened the door with a blast of magic. It swung back and dented the wall inside.

Storming up the stairs, I caught a glimpse of Alya hurrying toward the living room.

Good, let her explain to my parents.

I threw myself facedown onto my bed and screamed into the pillow, utterly unable to contain the temper that I had been famed for as a child. That I had managed not to set anyone on fire was the only sign that I was five hours from a milestone birthday.

Stupid orders. Stupid Athenea. They had no right to withhold information about my own grandmother!

It had to be about me being a seer. I was a glass ornament, as Fallon had put it. Had she known something about all of this? She must have done. She knew everything . . . perhaps how, in time, I would too.

Nobody came to disturb me, and so I stewed in my anger until midnight.

It was hollowly that I sang “Happy Birthday” to myself.