“I couldn’t tell you I loved you before. How could I when I knew what I’d done would make Happily-Ever-After impossible to restore? I killed the rose, Ida. When I destroyed my own immortality, I destroyed that magic. If they had demanded you restore it, I’d be nowhere to be found. It was the least I could do for you, to make things right. But now you’ve sacrificed your immortality for me, I dare to hope. Ida, if you could find it in your heart to stay by my side, to be my constant companion, there’s nothing I want more. ”
“Oh, Hector.” She buried her face in his chest while he held her.
He pressed his nose into her hair, breathing in the warm scent of her. “Come with me. We can protect each other. I don’t want you to go anywhere else. I want you with me until the day you die, and when that happens, I won’t be far behind. I don’t want to be alive if it means I don’t have you.”
“Oh, you, you stupid, stupid—you amazingly foolish man. How do you do this to me? I think I know what you want, and then you go and”—she thumped his chest with a gentle fist—“you ruin everything, you blow my plans up in a word, you turn over everything I do.” She gazed up at him, purple eyes filled with tears, but she was smiling. “And I don’t even care.”
“Say you love me. Do you? Please say you do. Please say you’ll come back with me. I have a little gingerbread house in the foothills of the Dread Mountains. It’s old and the foundation might be a bit cracked in places, and the style is hopelessly out-of-date, but I think I still have the batter recipe. We can fix it up together.”
“How did you know I love gingerbread houses?” She laughed, tears running down her cheeks.
“Is that a yes or no?”
She shoved him sideways. “That’s a yes. For now. Until you make me mad and I leave in a fury.”
He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. “Well, sincethat’sunavoidable, perhaps I can make you laugh enough to stay.”
She cupped her hand around his cheek. “And I hope I make you annoyed enough that you’ll never get tired of me.”
“I think you can count on that,” he said.
“So, I do annoy you.” She huffed, eyes sparkling.
He pulled her close. “So much that I don’t think I’d ever have a happy day if you weren’t there to do it.”
“You infuriating man,” she said as he helped her up. “You could have told me all of this instead of just sacrificing yourself and telling me you wanted to resign. I’d have understood.”
“At first, I was afraid I was being selfish. That I’d let my desires rule my decisions. Or worse, that I didn’t care if they did. And I had hoped that possibly…”
“…the Council might listen to us if we both explained.”
“Yes.” He brushed a strand of hair from her forehead. “I think your optimism rubbed off on me.”
“And your pessimism on me.” She gazed sadly at the red rose, glowing brightly in the afternoon sunshine. “They didn’t.”
“No, but I hold out hope that the world is ready to rule itself regardless of what the Council thinks,” he said, breathing in the scent of those ancient flowers—wild, intoxicating—so like the flowers of his Skeleton Rose that he could almost believe they’d never been different species at all, more like variations on a theme. “Amber said that the dragons had outgrown their need for me. Perhaps the people will prove just as capable of handling their own affairs without us.”
“In time, maybe. But right now—no. I can see a manhunt happening as soon as the king and queen find out there will never be a Happily-Ever-After again.”
“Probably.” He curled his fingers around his staff. It felt so final, the end of Happily-Ever-After. Odd. He’d always thought he’d pass on the seeds from the black rose to an apprentice, much as they’d been given to him. He’d thought about it often, but every time he considered it, something held him back. Perhaps there was a destiny to it after all. He’d seen it come into being. Now he’d be here at the end of it.
But not alone.
He reached for her hand, and she took it.
Together they walked toward the garden wall where the root of the enormous rose grew, thick as a tree trunk and guarded by thorns as long as Hector’s hand. She bent over and picked a small bloom, twirling it between her fingers. “This is where it was planted, Hector, so long ago. My mentor brought me out, gave this seed to me and said, ‘I’ve been needing to hand this over to you for some time. It’s going to be your responsibility in the future. You might as well be in charge of it now.’”
He smiled. “I received almost the same speech.” He reached into the pocket of his robe and pulled out the crumpled, wilted bloom he’d taken from the Skeleton Rose. He kissed it gently. “I had rather hoped that we could have made this a bigger event. I’m not one for spectacle, as you well know, but I think theSorcerer’s Starwould have liked front row seats.” He set the tip of his staff on the ground beside the rose and let the power flow through him. A sudden stinking smell of death, decay, and rancid meat filled the air to mingle horribly with the roses.
Ida watched the plant wilt with a firm, resolute look on her face. “I don’t suppose there’s any point in explaining to anyone else, but I think I’ll send a note to the prince and his husband to explain things. Maybe they’ll listen.”
“I was thinking of doing the same for Alistair and Amber. I plan to suggest he send an envoy to Archie and Caedan, just to feel out the possibility of formal diplomatic relations.”
“And if that doesn’t work out?”
“Then they’ll know where to find me when the fighting starts.” He glanced up at the rose bush, now curling and blackening in the sunset. He reached out and plucked a fading blossom and handed it to Ida. “A keepsake. Hold onto it like holding onto hope.”
She pressed her forehead against his shoulder. “Like holding onto you.” She tucked the red rose in her hair. “My horrible, horrible Hector.”
“My dear detested Ida.” He kissed her.
A gust of wind picked up the drying petals and showered them with crimson.
The End
