Thorn laughed, a little watery. “That might be awkward.” She knotted her fingers in her skirt, wishing she could hug Rose in truth.
Then Rose opened her arms and pulled Thorn into a gentle embrace. Thorn squeezed her sister tightly, grateful for the connection. “I wish we had more time to get to know each other,” she whispered.
“Only one of them could live,” Rose whispered back, then set Thorn away from her, holding her by the shoulders. “But you and I are writing a new tale.”
“I like that idea.”
“I do, too.”
When Sebastien arrived a few days later, riding up on Kismet, with his cloak flying, Bunny galloping at his side, everything else fell into place. He looked so beautiful, all in cream velvet trimmed in gold, his equally golden locks spilling aroundhis face, green eyes bright with love and welcome as he spotted Thorn coming down the steps of the lodge. Bunny and Nonna raced each other to greet her first and Thorn crouched, laughing, rubbing their ears in turn and accepting the lavish licking of her face, only belatedly remembering she wore makeup now.
Sebastien followed with a grin, bearing a bouquet of tulips, bowing to give them to her. “Not roses,” he said. “I thought no to those, but…” He gestured to the rose jewelry she wore. “Maybe I was wrong?”
“I love tulips,” Thorn replied, clutching them to her breast. “They’re so hopeful. But I’m Rose now, so I have to look like her,” she explained, touching the choker and then the earrings. “Do you—do you mind?” she asked, wondering too late if her looking too much like Rose would pain him.
“I don’t mind at all,” he answered with sincere warmth. “Whatever it takes for us to be together.”
She smiled back, feeling radiant. “I’m so happy. This feels good and right.”
“It is.” He cast an odd glance at the hunting lodge, a shadow in it. “Though I could wish for a better venue for this.”
She turned to look, wondering what he saw that bothered him. “Is something wrong with it? I think it’s a grand place. Like a castle!”
He stroked a hand over her hair, letting it settle and giving her an indulgent smile. “That’s one of the things I love about you, how you embrace the world with such joy. I had a bad week here once. It can be my one story for the day.”
“I look forward to hearing it.” It was so good, so right being with him again.
“You are everything to me,” he murmured, and bent to kiss her.
She gave herself over to the kiss, drowning in the scent and texture of him, the profound and joyous knowledge that he belonged tohernow, forever and always. Her prince, the wish ofher heart granted. “I love you, Sebastien,” she said, when he at last ended the kiss, drawing away gradually, with small, affectionate nibbles of her lips.
“I love you,” he answered. “I loved you before I knew what love was.”
She sighed for the delightful truth of that. “Same.”
“Do you have your ring?”
“Yes.” She fished it out of her pocket where she’d been keeping it with his sapphire embedded in the wax. Some of the wax had gotten on the opal and Sebastien cleaned it off with a cloth, mock-frowning at her.
“As soon as we get to Castle Vega, I’ll have the court jeweler set this stone in the ring for you. Meanwhile, if only to keep it clean…” He slipped the ring on her finger. “Now everyone will know.”
“I’m so glad.” She felt radiant with happiness.
“So am I.” He kissed her. “Let’s replace the bad memories with the good.”
30
Master Zoltan sent Rose a message to attend him barely before she was to depart HASP forever. Everyone believed that she would be traveling to Castle Vega, to marry Sebastien and take up a role as court oneiromancer to King Soren. It was all going according to plan. And yet she hadn’t accounted for the personal impact of having everyone congratulate her on her supposed impending nuptials and bliss with the charismatic Prince Sebastien and on her professional coup. She had to contain a flinch every time, faking smiles so often they began to feel fragile as glass, reminding herself that she was lying to everyone for very good reasons.
Never mind that hiding her own monstrous nature had become a vitally important part of her layers of deception, nor that she hadn’t been the one to weave the initial web of lies. She was complicit now, taking up the tactics of manipulation and evasion to advance her own agenda. She’d even convinced her mother not to tell Thorn about what she’d done as an infant and Rose’s true nature. At least Shoshan had agreed that Thorn had enough to learn without grappling with something like that. Rose still didn’t like the deception, more and more often wondering who she was becoming.
How will I know what good is?Thorn had posed a question for the ages.
It helped steady Rose that Adsila remained steadfastly by her side. Or, more literally, on her shoulder. Surely She Who Eats Bears wouldn’t leave her avatar with someone on the side of evil. Or perhaps the goddess would. Deities notoriously operated on a different moral framework from regular mortals.
Rose had completed all of her classes, except for the final certification from Master Zoltan on her abilities as an oneiromancer. Rose had worried the professor wouldn’t return before Madame Hendricks traveled to Castle Vega for the geas transfer, which could jeopardize the contract terms with Soren. It had taken Rose considerable finagling to arrange to travel separately from the headmistress. She’d finally begged off as needing to be there early for wedding preparations, scuttling the madame’s plans to arrive in grand style with the princess-to-be. But the continued absence of Master Zoltan threatened to compromise all that.
So, along with exhaustively researching everything she could find on her own nature as a creature made of the Dream—which mostly meant finding nothing and experimenting with physically walking the Dream and reconstructing her body upon exit—Rose had been concocting various backup plans, none of which sounded plausible.
