The moment the sun kissed the horizon, I leaped from the tower and soared down to her.
Lilia sat in the courtyard waiting, while Victor and Genevieve had mercifully gone inside.
“You came back.” I embraced her before she could even respond, folding my arms around her much smaller body. She pressed her cheek against my chest and released a gentle sigh. The warmth of her skin, the feel of her in my arms, the scent of her hair filling my nose—I savored it all.
I pulled back enough to glance down into her beautiful, earnest eyes and bent to kiss her. Not gently, I devoured her with the desperation of a gargoyle convinced he’d never see his mate again.
When we broke apart, both gasping for breath, she placed her gentle hands on my chest and gazed up at me.
“Did you hear what I told Genevieve and Victor? I found something in my grand-mère books.”
“Part of it,” I said. “But I was far too distracted by the sight of you.” I nuzzled her neck.
She softened at my touch, but then straightened. “Hadrien, this is important. It’s old magic, plant-based. I think we should try it to see if it can help you, the same way we worked together at the wards. Your magic and mine, together.”
Together.
“Anything,” I agreed. For the first time in three years, something light fluttered inside me rather than the usual dread.
Hope.
Lilia quickly summarized what she’d put together using a spell she’d found in the old manuscript. She grew animated, the way she always did when she discussed plants in her garden, as if they were her beloved children—just one of the many things I’d missed when she was gone.
She glanced at the vial on the table. “The longer it brews beneath the moon, the better, to help it reach its highest potency.”
I gave her a grim look and shook my head. “One thing we don’t have is time.”
She let out a soft gasp. “The poppy?”
My mouth hardened into a tight line. “I don’t think it will last another night.”
She glanced up at the moon with horror etched on her face. The moon shone bright, but wouldn’t be full for another two nights, another two nights which would be too late.
“It’s good enough.” She forced an optimistic smile. She referred to the manuscript and read, then directed, “Take my hands.” We stood across from each other in the courtyard, my hands enclosed around hers. She read through the manuscript in old French, chanting about the moon, calling the goddesses, the spirits, and as she did, it reminded me of how we’d worked together at the wards with our energy entwining. I sensed it again now, but it felt different this time. Deeper. I felt something move through me I couldn’t name—warm, like thefirst breath after a long stone watch—and then it settled, the way roots settle in soil, finding the dark places in me and threading through them.
And the way we held hands with our magic flowing between us, I sensed something more. Like we were making a vow, a marriage vow. One in which to promise you’d love and protect your mate. One in which I sensed was happening now, at least on my part.
Silently, I promised,I will love and protect you to the end of my days, Lilia.
When she finished reciting her spell, she said, “Drink, Hadrien,” and released one hand to give me the vial.
I poured it into my mouth, almost spitting it out when the bitter taste rolled over my tongue. Forcing it down with a quick swallow, I faced her. “Now what?”
She tipped her head as she glanced once more at the moon. “We wait.” With her free hand, she placed it on her chest. “And we hope.”
For a few minutes, we sat at the table in the courtyard, each caught up in our thoughts.
In the stillness that followed, Lilia’s gaze drifted toward my parents’ tree in the courtyard. She studied it, her brow furrowing as she concentrated. She rose without a word and crossed to it, then crouched at its base where a few leaves had fallen onto the moss, and picked one up. She rubbed it in between her thumb and forefinger. “Hadrien, this tree in one of my grand-mère’s books. L’arbre miroir. It has a unique kind of magic. I need to study it more.”
Lilia turned it between her fingers, holding it up to the moonlight. She studied it in the way she studied everything in her garden—with the attention of someone who understood that plants had something important to say if you were quiet enoughto listen. She tucked the leaf into her satchel and came back to me.
Then I heard it. Movement outside Valgarde. Shouts.
Men, Victor, Genevieve. I rushed through the castle and out the front door. Three soldiers stood there, armed with spears. And stepping between their ranks, wrapped in dark fur that swept the cobblestones as she walked—the queen.
She was not tall, but she carried herself as though the space around her answered to her, each step unhurried. Pale eyes, the color of winter ice, already scanning Valgarde’s walls with the expression of someone taking inventory of what they intend to claim. Her hair was dark, pulled back severely from a face that was more striking than beautiful—sharp features, a mouth set in a faint curve that suggested amusement at something only she knew. No warmth in any of it. The cold that came off her had nothing to do with the night air.
I hadn’t seen her in three years. She looked exactly as I remembered, except more certain of herself. That was the only thing that had grown.
