Quirking his brow, Grae reached out and touched the bending air. His mouth dropped open as his fingertips disappeared.
I snickered and looped my arm through his; the contact making my cheeks burn as I tried to hide it with bravado. “Come on,” I said, tugging him through the glamoured air. “Vellia will delight you with her magic once we’re inside.”
Stepping through the seam, cool air rushed over my skin and the cabin appeared. What was once an empty forest was now a sprawling acreage, complete with gardens and stables. Two golden carriages parked in front of the house, the horses already unhitched and grazing in the grassy gardens beyond our home. I dropped my hold on Grae’s arm, flustered at that buzzing contact between us, and clenched my hands by my sides.
I really needed to stop touching him.
Grae’s eyebrows shot up. “This is the cabin?”
Vellia built the three-story house from giant redwood trunks. Garlands of wooden beads hung from the rose-colored shutters, vivid summer flowers filled the window boxes, and a bright blue door greeted us. A faery clearly designed the home.
“Do you like it?”
“All these years running in the woods together, I’d imagined you were returning to a one-bedroom hovel,” Grae jeered. “I should’ve known better.” Shaking his head, he followed me up the steps to the front door.
“Did you want us to live in a dilapidated shack?” I teased.
“No, no—of course not. It’s just . . . this,” he said, gesturing at the house.
“Dying wishes make for powerful magic.” Before he could reply to that—and before my fingers could reach the handle—the door opened.
Vellia stood in a sage green dress that made her pale gray eyes seem to glow. A matching scarf wrapped around her silver hair, fluttering as she dropped into a low curtsy. “Welcome, Your Highness.”
“Thank you for receiving me,” Grae said in a princely tone that sounded so different from the easy one that had just flowed between us.
Vellia took another step backward, opening the door with a flourish to grant him entry. She gave me a wink. This day was a victory for Vellia. Upon my mother’s deathbed, Vellia granted her dying wish: protect my daughter until her wedding day. The power of that wish had filled Vellia with immense amounts of magic. I always wondered if my mother would have changed her wish if she had known I was about to arrive a moment later. The elderly faery seemed to think so, and so Vellia had protected Briar and me both with a ferocity that would make any mother Wolf proud.
The cabin ceiling rose high above us as we spilled into the grand entryway. A towering gray stone fireplace bisected the room. Boughs of evergreen covered rough beams of wood, and an antler chandelier flickered with hundreds of magically lit candles. A circle of guards stood beside the fireplace. They all had the same thick black Damrienn hair, angular faces, and light golden-brown skin. Wearing thin plates of silver armor, their hands rested on the hilts of their swords as they laughed, listening to a joke from the elegant woman in the center of their circle.
Briar.
She wore a dusty rose dress, covered in delicate lace that billowed around her willowy frame. She probably had Vellia conjure it for her this morning. Her red hair was braided back at the temples with wispy white flowers circling her head like a crown. She flashed the soldiers a broad smile, drawing attention with ease—born to be in the center of any circle.
Spotting Grae over her shoulder, she sauntered over. Her hair swished in rhythm with her hips. She dropped into a bow and murmured, “Your Highness.”
“Your Highness,” Grae said in return, inclining his head to her.
I blanched, realizing I hadn’t addressed him by his title. Maybe I would’ve remembered to bow if I hadn’t run smack into him.
“I trust the journey from Highwick was not too harrowing?” Briar already spoke with the grace of a queen holding court.
“Not at all.” Grae played along with her courtly act. “It’s an easy day’s journey, and the countryside is lovely.”
Briar demurred, lifting her lashes to look up at him. She barely had to incline her neck, the top of her head reaching his eyes. She would look perfect standing beside him. My lips thinned as I hid my frown. It was such a waste. Briar knew she would never love him—had said as much to me in secret moments. But love had nothing to do with royal marriages. Love was for humans. If Briar had been born a boy, she could’ve avoided all this peacocking and laid claim to Olmdere herself. Sometimes I wished I could’ve been born a boy for all the ease and permission it would’ve granted me. Sometimes I wished I didn’t have to play a role in order to be valued. But this was how Wolf bloodlines stayed strong and how the four kingdoms maintained their peace. Ruling a pack meant sacrifice, and we all had a part to play.
They held each other’s gazes for a moment longer before Briar said, “I can show you all to your rooms. You’ll probably want to wash up before dinner.”
A strand of black hair fell around Grae’s face as he nodded, and I had the terrible urge to brush it behind his ear. I balled my hands into fists until my fingernails cut into my palms.
“Thank you.” Yet he didn’t look at her; instead Grae’s eyes found mine, and he gave me a half-smile.
Briar led them up the winding steps to the upper balcony. I watched them disappear around the corner, only to realize Vellia was still standing beside me. Her eyes crinkled with knowing mischief.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “What?”
“Nothing.” Vellia shrugged, drumming her fingers on her cheek. “This day has been a long time coming for us all.” The clink of the knights’ armor rang down the hall. Vellia looked me up and down. “What do you want to wear for dinner? A periwinkle blue to match your sister’s rose?”
Wear? What did she mean? Then I frowned at my crumpled brown dress, touching the fresh tear from the thicket. It was perfect for the village, plain and unremarkable. I huffed, as if what I wore now mattered. I could traipse through Allesdale in a ballgown and, if Briar were by my side, no one would notice me.
“I’d rather dress like the knights,” I said. “A tunic and leathers, nothing too fancy—”
“Nothing too fancy?” Vellia tutted, rolling her eyes. “You are dining with the crown prince of Damrienn tonight.”
“And I am a royal of Olmdere.”
“Then act like it,” she snapped.
“I’m not meant to be noticed.” I scowled. “The guards don’t even know who I am.”
We would keep the secret of my parentage until the King of Damrienn decided otherwise. In his letters, he had promised once Briar married Grae he’d reveal the truth . . . until then, I was to remain a secret. Their wedding fulfilled a contract forged before our birth, and the future of Olmdere hinged upon it. Our position was too precarious to argue, and this could put that all in jeopardy.
That’s what I was telling myself, at least.
“It’s Briar who must dress like a queen,” I said.