Loving a Prince Charming (4 page)

The look on Sara’s face was pure approval,
and her voice held not a hint of mockery. “Good for him! An
admirable man. Men like him are part of the reason women will have
equal rights one day.”

Kira took a sip of the cider, needing both a
moment to compose her thoughts as well as a drink to soothe her
parched throat. The movement pulled her sleeve away from her wrist,
exposing skin.

The moment Kira put her glass down, Sara
picked up her arm and twisted it slightly so her inner wrist was
visible. “What an unusual birthmark.”

The intricate bundle of lines on Kira’s skin
was only an inch wide, but it was such a complex design that people
often mistook it for a brand at first. “Yeah, it is unique. I like
it.”

Sara rubbed her thumb over the mark. “Anyone
who knows the old ways would say you were fairy-marked.”

Kira looked up from the mark to see the older
woman staring at her, the blue of her eyes as kindly as ever, but
there was force there as well, and a depth of knowledge Kira was
going to drown in.

“Excuse me, please. Are there any rooms
available?”

That someone had gotten so close without her
noticing embarrassed Kira, though it was an unassuming man with his
equally unassuming wife and son. She pulled her arm from Sara and
leaned back, her father’s warnings zinging through her mind with an
audible snap.

“Of course we have a room. Can’t let this
handsome little man not have a roof over his head.” Sara was back
to being the grandmother of all as she bustled the family in and
got them settled.

Kira took in the inhabitants of the tavern
again, observing them a little more carefully than she had the
first time. They all looked happy and grateful, that was true, but
their happiness was of the same variety as the family that just
came in. It was a gratitude that they had found an oasis in the
midst of their troubles and that they could lay down their worries
for a little while.

Sara returned. “More to drink?”

“No, thank you. Is something going on, some
sort of trouble?”

A spark shot through Sara’s eyes and she
leaned forward, motioning Kira closer in a way that screamed she
had good gossip to share. “They are refugees from the city of
Tolshire.”

King Matthias’s city. Seth’s fiancée’s city.
“I have heard nothing about Tolshire being in any sort of
trouble.”

Sara’s lips thinned. “It’s being kept very
hush-hush. The refugees aren’t supposed to be coming here. The
soldiers are herding them to camps, but the camps are crowded and,
frankly, unlivable, and as a result many of them are escaping and
taking their chances to come here.”

Kira locked her hand around her empty glass,
needing something to hold on to. “Why? What’s happened there?”

“The curse happened.”

The curse. That damned curse that ruled over
every moment of Seth’s life – and, by extension, her own. Kira
shook her head. “The curse hasn’t been fulfilled. There would be
talk of nothing else if it was. No one could keep that secret.”

“No, at least, I haven’t heard that it was.
What I have heard is that the fairy who cast the curse left a
message for the king. To punish the king for being so arrogant
about keeping his daughter safe all these years, when she finally
does succumb to the curse, a dragon will appear in the city to
imprison her forever. So the king has ordered the city evacuated
until her twenty-third birthday is over.”

Damn. Bad. Bad. This was so bad. If Rosamund
did succumb to the curse, Seth wouldn’t let a dragon stop him from
trying to save her. The only problem with that was while Seth was a
decent fighter, he was in no way experienced enough to slay a
dragon.

He still couldn’t beat her dad.

Kira threw money on the table and ran for her
horse.

If he had been asleep, the light taps on the
window would still have woken him. It was a lifelong signal between
Kira and him and the only noise in the world guaranteed to rouse
him.

But he wasn’t asleep. He had been unable to
clear his mind of that damned perfect curve of Kira’s top lip, and
the image of how her eyes had changed and darkened was on a
constant loop. And now he headed towards the window to let in the
cause of all of tonight’s turmoil.

At the sight of her, all his thoughts of how
sunlight lit her hair or how the curve of her neck was more
appealing to him than other ladies’ half-exposed bosoms faded. Her
face was serious in a way she rarely was with him, outside of those
rare moments she thought him in danger.

“What’s wrong?”

She didn’t answer right away, instead pacing
the long length of his room. Seth knew that the worse the news she
had to tell, the more Kira needed to collect herself before she
began to speak, and considering she’d circled the room three times
and still had not looked up from the carpet, this was going to be
very bad.

Kira pulled herself up, her body going
soldier straight and battle-ready. Another bad sign. “I heard some
very disturbing news in town. A part of me doesn’t want to tell
you, but…”

She started pacing again. And while her
actions worried him, it didn’t stop a slow flame of contentment
from burrowing itself in his chest. Her distress was because this
had something to do with him. Her anger and frustration at the
situation was because he was involved.

Kira was her most fascinating in battle mode,
and the more she paced the more that part of her came to the fore.
Her stride lengthened and firmed, her steps near gliding over the
carpet, the walk of someone who was ready to battle in any
direction at a moment’s notice. Her posture shifted so her sword
was within reach and ready to draw without any obstacles to slow
the action. Her face became unreadable. Not angry, but blank, with
no emotions an enemy could use to detect her next movement.

She walked toward him again, and he wanted to
gather her up in his arms and swing her around. Her face would lose
the blankness and her mouth would form an
O
of shocked
surprise, a development he’d take advantage of by placing his mouth
on hers. Her lips would be warm and soft, and when they parted he
would slide his tongue inside and battle with hers.

Seth gasped, the image so strong he could
almost believe her taste was on his tongue. “Kira!” he shouted, as
much to shock himself as it was to shock her.

It worked. She stopped, her face losing the
blankness. Replacing it first was surprise, followed by
determination and worry, before finally plunging into a deep-seated
misery. She drew in a deep breath. “Sorry. I think for the first
time, I really don’t know what to do.”

Kira was bossy and always knew what to do,
even when she didn’t – she made a decision and went for it. This
indecision did not suit her, and he didn’t want to see it on her
again. “You do what we’ve always done. We tell each other and
figure it out together.”

The misery was still etched too deep into her
beautiful face, but a genuine smile formed on her lips and her eyes
shifted from a dark and stormy green to a brighter, more verdant
shade. “Yeah, that’s what we do. Whatever’s before us, we figure it
out together.”

Seth rose, using the same gentle movements he
would to calm a bucking filly. He reached out and took her hands in
his, entwining their fingers and rubbing his thumb over the
birthmark on the inside of her wrist, a move he always used when
her emotions were riding high. “What’s happening?”

She cleared her throat and blanked her face.
This time was on purpose, the way a soldier would when giving a
disturbing report to a superior officer, devoid of any personal
hurt or worry. “Tolshire has been evacuated by order of King
Matthias. There has been another layer added to the curse. The
fairy who cursed Rosamund said that when the curse is fulfilled, a
dragon will appear to attack anyone coming to save her. The
residents of Tolshire are being herded to refugee camps and
instructed to not return to the city until after Rosamund’s
twenty-third birthday.”

The air around him became weighted, making
breathing impossible. His lungs could not bring in enough air no
matter how hard his chest worked.

Warm fingers squeezed his own ice-cold ones.
“Seth,” her beloved voice whispered, and only the warmth the
bone-deep contentment her presence always provided kept the ice
from sinking into marrow and muscle and straight into the heart of
him.

Stay in the castle
.

Damn his father. What game was he playing?
“My father knows,” he said, and Kira’s eyes widened as the same
realization hit her.

“Why would he not tell you?”

Seth shook his head. “My father doesn’t tell
me most things. We have to try Taren and see what he knows.”

They snuck out the window and made their way
to the little house Kira lived in with her father. They opened the
door to find Taren still awake, reading a book beside the fire. The
Captain of the Guard looked up as they entered but said nothing,
his gaze expectant and weary.

A second chair was pulled in front of the
fire, separated from Taren by a small table. On the table were two
cups of half-finished tea. Seth glanced around but no other
visitors announced themselves. Taren volunteered nothing, so Seth
spoke first. “Tolshire is being evacuated. The curse has been
expanded. Why was I not told?”

Taren put his book down beside the teacup
nearest him. “His Majesty did not want you to know.”

“Not a good enough reason from you,” Seth
said, anger propelling him forward until he towered over the older
man. “You’ve always told me things the king wished to keep from me
when it’s the right thing for me to know. Why is this time
different?”

Taren sighed and turned to look into the
fire. For the first time, it struck Seth how old the man looked.
Deep lines grooved themselves into every inch of skin and his face
had an ashy undertone that the firelight couldn’t quite hide. The
man was a warrior of unparalleled caliber even now, but his best
days were far, far behind him.

The firelight highlighted an internal battle
going on behind the man’s eyes. Seth turned to Kira, but for once
her eyes were not on him. Instead she too was looking at her
father, her own confusion at the man’s odd behavior reflected in
her face.

“This damned curse,” Taren murmured, a small
speck of sound that Seth wasn’t sure was meant for his audience.
“Pride brought it about, and pride has kept it alive.”

“Taren?” Seth asked, taking the seat across
from the man.

The man’s gaze shifted to him then. He
nodded, coming to terms with something inside of himself. “I’ll
tell you all I know. I don’t know everything, but at least you’ll
be a little less in the dark.”

Kira came over and sat on the arm of Seth’s
chair, waiting for what her father had to say.

Without preamble, Taren began. “The curse
began because King Matthias insulted a ruler of the magical
kingdom, The Elf King, who sent an emissary to tell Matthias he and
Queen Esmerelda would have a daughter and he wanted to wed her to
one of his warriors. King Matthias would have none of that. He told
the emissary his daughter was a princess and would never be so low
as to marry a warrior. He dismissed the man without any
courtesy.”

“That was what started all of this?” Seth had
never known. What a ridiculous reason to destroy a child’s life.
“The Elf King is a low being.”

“No argument,” agreed Taren. “But while I
doubt the Elf King is the type to react well to any rejection, the
fact that Matthias did it so publicly and with so much derision was
what assured the fairy ruler would strike back. Matthias and your
father had always had an understanding that their children would be
married, and with the news that Matthias’s child was a girl, they
turned around and announced to both kingdoms the news of the
engagement.”

“Did the Elf King have any part of Queen
Esmerelda’s death?” Kira asked as she rubbed her palm over her
thigh, a gesture she often displayed when she was upset. Seth
reached out and enfolded her hand in his.

“We don’t know. We don’t think so. He seems
the type that if he was indeed instrumental, he would announce it
rather than keeping silent.” Taren picked up his cup and drained
whatever liquid was left. “Still, Esmerelda’s death was an ill omen
and, looking back, the start of it all. Because Rosamund was the
firstborn and because they had to make the engagement official,
neither king would not delay the introduction ceremony, but we all
felt it was a mistake. We – I – begged them to wait. I didn’t know
if the Elf King would ever forget, but I wanted to at least give
him a chance to. They would not. They said they had a plan.”

“The fairies,” Seth supplied.

Taren nodded. “The fairies. Esmerelda was
from a blessed kingdom, one with great ties to magic. It was the
reason the Elf King sought their daughter in the first place. The
fairies would be there to bless the child. Our kings hoped that the
presence of Esmerelda’s magical kin would dissuade the Elf King
from pursuing any vendetta.”

“Instead it probably spurred the Elf King on,
because he could not allow himself to appear weak in front of
beings he dealt with in his own lands,” Seth finished.

“That was what I thought too, and told King
Thomas as well. He wouldn’t listen. The Elf King waited until after
the blessing ceremony was finished. That was done with only the
family in the privacy of the castle. He chose to strike during the
public portion of the ceremony.”

Now this part Seth had heard before, about
the giant raven which had flown down and made the grim
pronouncement that the child was cursed and would stick her finger
with the spindle of a spinning wheel, falling into an eternal
slumber, with only true love’s kiss able to break the spell. From
all accounts chaos ensued, with the guards trying to kill the bird
and people scattering from the evil magic. Matthias squirrelled
Rosamund away after that, and no one saw her again.