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Most of my life I’d lived on the road. When I was six years old, Krystal—my junkie, bloodwhore mother—had dragged me away from my aunt Heather and the Veil House and Grieve, and everything that was familiar. Even then, I knew nothing would ever be the same.
I sniffed my vanilla body wash. The scent was warm and inviting, and it comforted me gently as I lathered up. It reminded me of the visits home. Aunt Heather always had plenty of vanilla and lavender bath wash waiting for me. Every year or so, Krystal would put me on a bus and send me, alone, back to New Forest for a week. And when it was time for me to go back to life on the road, Heather would cry as she returned me to the bus. If she’d tried to keep me, Krystal would have taken me away forever.
In my early teens, I’d fallen in love with Grieve. At seventeen, he’d asked me to stay with him. And I . . . I’d walked away.
Grieve and I sprawled under the cedar, lolling around on one of my rare visits back to the Veil House. My mother let me return once a year for a couple of weeks, and I took full advantage of it. I missed living here, missed being off the streets. My mother had snatched me away when I was six from all I’d ever known—my aunt Heather, cousin Rhiannon . . . the Veil House . . . and Grieve and Chatter. I’d been on the run ever since, learning to steal, to bluff my way through potentially dangerous situations. At seventeen, I felt old—older than any teenager has any right to be.
Before my mother ran away with me, Grieve had helped me bond with Ulean and sent her with me as a protector.
I’d tried to forget. Even at six, I knew that if I held on to the past, I’d never be able to face the present. But Grieve . . . I couldn’t forget him. My child’s memories of his kindness, of his otherworldly nature, remained safely tucked in my heart. With each year, as I visited, he grew out of being a child’s crush and I realized I was falling in love with the Fae Prince.
When I was fifteen, he began to kiss my hand. To walk with me in the ravine. To talk to me like an adult. At sixteen, I handed him my heart, made the first move and kissed him on the lips as we ran through the glades, laughing and dancing in the sunlight.
Grieve never pushed, never made a step over the line. But with that first kiss, his lips crushing mine, a longing so deep it nearly tore me apart rose up and I broke down weeping, wanting only to stay with him. To be with him. To love him. To never leave his side.
And now . . . at seventeen, I was home again. I whispered to him gently, tickled his ear, and opened my heart and body to him.
“You cannot leave me,” he said, toying with my fingers, kissing their tips slowly. “I love you. I’ve been waiting for you to remember.”
I stared at him, afraid to say those three words for fear of what they’d bind me to. But I couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to be a princess in his realm. What would it be like to be with my love forever?
“Remember . . . what am I supposed to remember?”
He swept his gaze to my face, his lashes long and lazy. “Oh, my sweet. If you have to ask . . . never mind. It’s no matter. But stay with me? I must protect you. Take you away from the life you lead. You long to be here; I can feel it. The Golden Wood is your home. Your cousin and aunt are here. You belong by my side.” Stretching out on his back, he folded his arms behind his head as the sunlight broke through the clouds and splashed across his face.
He was gorgeous, my prince. With eyes so blue they mirrored the morning sky, and hair as silky as spun platinum. His skin was a deep olive and he barely looked human. But his energy was that of summer apples and warm hay, of long nights under the stars with the scent of roses heavy on the breeze. I caught my breath, wondering again at the connection that I felt with this man. This Fae Prince. For it ran like a river beneath the surface, wide and vast and deep, rolling thunder as it moved along and took me with it.
I leaned down, slowly, brushing my lips to his. “You are the most incredible man I’ve ever met.”
He slid his arms out from beneath his head and ran his hands lightly up my shoulders. “Cicely . . .” His voice was hoarse. “Cicely, you are like wild honey wine. I can’t get enough of you. You were adorable when you were a child, but now . . . now you are grown and you are my passion and dream. I wish you could remember . . .”
“What is it, my love?” I sprawled in his arms and he rolled me over, looming above me.
“I cannot tell you . . . I cannot interfere. But one day, you will know the truth of our bond, and you will be mine forever.” A shadow brushed across his face and he whispered, “Or perhaps you will forsake me.”
“Never! I will never let you go. I love you, Grieve.” I sprang up, blurting out the words that I’d wanted to say for the past three years, but I’d been too young. Too afraid. Even now, I knew it was too early—that I couldn’t back up my feelings. My mother still controlled my life and I was at her beck and call.
But to Grieve, they were the magic key. He pulled me to him, his gaze searching my face. “You love me . . . how much do you love me? Enough to stay? Enough to marry me now?”
My breath caught in my throat. Marry him? The promise loomed lovely and brilliant and my heart skipped a beat. And yet . . . the image of my mother sprang up in my mind.
Krystal, strung out on heroin. On crack. On whatever she could get her hands on. Krystal, her dark eyes wide with fear, with the desire to forget who she was. It was me who kept us alive, ever since I was little. I’d learned how to survive. I’d kept myself off the dope and out of the bars. I’d learned how to pick pockets, to steal, to beg if need be. Together with Ulean, my Wind Elemental, I managed to keep us one step away from the cops and the pimps and the gangs.
If I left my mother . . . she’d die. She wasn’t prepared for the life into which she’d slid. I was the only thing standing between her and death.
I slowly turned to Grieve, torn. Wanting to say yes. Wanting to stay and live my own life. Wanting to come in from the cold. But . . . my mother was my mother. And she’d never come back to New Forest. She’d let me go, and then die cold and alone in some alley. How many times had she said, “Without you, I’d be dead. Cicely, never leave me. I can’t do it on my own. I need you.”
“I . . . I can’t. Not yet.”
He stared at me, a flash of pain shooting through his eyes. “Cicely . . . I need you. I need you to be with me. We complete one another. You are my soul mate. My only love.”
I stood, slowly. “My mother . . . she needs me.”
“You would choose your mother—she who has done nothing for you, who’s made your life a living hell? You would choose her over me?” He jumped up, cheeks flushing, voice bitter. “Are you toying with me? I wait for every summer, just to see you return home. The past few years, you’ve led me to hope for the future.”
His love was overwhelming, and even though it felt so right, I was afraid of how dark his eyes had clouded. “Grieve, I’m still young.”
“You are magic-born, not yummanii. You are older than your age. Cicely, I’ve waited all my life for you. I’ve waited a lifetime and more for you to find your way back to me, and now that you have, you turn me away?”
