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“So, you’re saying there’s no going back for me. I’m trapped. For eternity if I am to believe that kind of claptrap.”
“If you care to see it that way, then yes. From the beginning you’ve been tied to me, and with the passing of time, those cords have strengthened. All that’s changed is your awareness of them. I’ve done my best to make it palatable for you, but like it or not, here we are, each bound to the other.”
“I don’t like it.”
He laughed, a bitter sound. “Don’t you see? It goes both ways. If she had you, she had me. And vice versa. We’re stuck with each other, my spirited Gwynn. And you will marry me in three days’ time. Virtually all of Faerie has been invited, which means you made that agreement with each and every one of them and thus so did I. You’ve asked for honesty, for me to explain things. There you are. You don’t have to be happy about marrying me, but you will do it. For your own damn good, if nothing else.”
“I hate it when you treat me like you know better than I do.”
“On some things I do.”
He was, of course, right about that. Not that it sat any better with me.
He stood and started down the steps again. Paused. “If you won’t do it for your own good, consider doing it for mine. That might not be enough, but at least give it some thought.”
“You just want to win.”
“Yes,” he answered without ceasing his descent. “For us all.”
Chapter 19
In Which I Star in the Center Ring of the Three-Ring Circus
‡
Never invite the evil queen to yourwedding.
~Big Book of Fairyland, “PersonalObservations”
We didn’t seemuch of each other over the next couple of days.
Good for regaining perspective, for clearing my head of the fog of sex and seductive emotion. Also lonely. Which only served to both add to my doldrums and also piss me off more. Mostly I was mad at myself, but it was easier to push that onto Rogue and his high-handed ways.
If you won’t do it for your own good, consider doing it for mine.
Like I owed him something. Pompous autocratic control freak.
I really wanted to talk out my concerns and it made me feel crazy that he was the only one I wanted to talk to.
Starling kept me busy with inane activities and meaningless decisions. I didn’t care what color my dress should be, so she badgered me until I told her anything but white. As to where the ceremony would take place, I referred her to Rogue, stopping just short of telling her I didn’t give a shit. None of it mattered a whit to me, except that I had gotten myself well and truly stuck. All the preparations took on such a surreal cast that I found it hard to take any of it seriously. I visited the dragon several times, fantasizing about riding off on her back to some remote location where I might hide and never be found.
Only the prospect of breaking my agreement with all of Faerie—and the specter of Titania’s spidery self draining me dry while I never quite died of it—kept me from running. And maybe a dollop of guilt.
Otherwise, I would have, I told myself. But I was fresh out of loopholes.
On the rare occasions I did see Rogue, he treated me with polite and wary distance. He neither ate with me nor shared our bed. I suspected he mainly kept out of my way. Self-preservation, perhaps, though he seemed dangerously on edge also. I began to feel like one of those maidens in historical romances, forced into a marriage of convenience with the brooding and perhaps deranged gothic hero.
Only it didn’t suit me to play the role of naive virgin.
More and more people began arriving, Starling breathlessly informing me of each and every one. Mostly I didn’t care about that either, except the ones who verified the long-distance seeing as accurate. Fortunately, Lord Rogue didn’t require me to greet them, probably not willing to test my temper that far. I wouldn’t have been able to face any of them, particularly not Marquise and Scourge with Walter as their hapless slave. Starling mentioned that she’d seen them, her tone carefully neutral, and said nothing more when I didn’t comment.
I’d already given her an edited version of what I’d found out and that was all I cared to say on the topic.
I couldn’t discuss what weighed most heavily on my mind, and everything else seemed too frivolous to bear. Everyone tiptoed around me and my foul mood, which suited me well enough.
Everyone, that is, except Puck.
The night before the wedding—to my relief, there seemed to be no fae version of the bachelorette party or, if there was, Athena and Starling knew better than to suggest it—he waltzed into my tower with no announcement, wearing an outfit seemingly constructed of turquoise cabbage roses. “Lady Gwynn,” he sang out, “I have a pig to pick with you.”
