Page 70 of When Wishes Bleed

I could imagine being here in early summer with fireflies lighting the paths down into the hewn earth, cricket song on the gentle breeze, the sky streaked with gold to match the gilded columns.

“This is amazing,” Mira remarked, awestruck by the beauty of such a simple place. “We need one of these in Thirteen.”

I nodded emphatically. “Completely agree.”

“It could be done. The House of Earth could make one.”

I smiled, hoping one day this small dream might come true.

The sky faded to a dark sapphire and diamond stars began to show themselves, the largest boldly sparkling overhead. Seating wasn’t assigned in this place, but we took up a corner of the last row. Tauren sat in the center middle of the bottom row with his parents and brother. He stood and turned to the left and right, peering out over the crowd. When his eyes hooked on Rose, he waved for her to come forward and sit next to him.

My fingernail tips bit into my palm.

Mira made a choked sound. “I thought he was looking for you.”

“He can’t.”

“Why?” she asked, mouth still agape.

“Because I can’t marry him, and he has to choose a wife – soon.”

Brecan nodded. “Glad the two of you finally came to your senses before things went too far. Assuming they didn’t.”

I felt like clawing him. “They did not.”

“Good,” he said, extending his long legs and leaning back on his palms.

Sometimes, I loved Brecan’s friendship. Sometimes, I didn’t. This was one of the latter times.

“She’s wearing a love potion,” I whispered.

Mira slapped my arm. “I knew it!”

I shushed her when the people in front of us turned around to gawk.

“I knew it was something,” she said quieter.

Brecan sat forward, elbows on his knees. “Where’d she get it?”

“She says she was at the Equinox and bought it in Thirteen.”

“Maybe it’ll help Tauren make up his mind.” It was the cruelest thing Brecan had ever said to me. Not the words he uttered, but the fact he said them at all, knowing how I felt.

Mira leaned closer. “What if she’s bad for him? Bad for the Kingdom, I mean.”

“Right,” he said sarcastically. “Then shame on him for allowing this disgusting pageant in the first place.”

I couldn’t say I disagreed with his logic, but I understood all too well about being bound by customs in which you didn’t want to partake. I agreed to hand-fast when I stepped back inside my sector, knowing full well there wasn’t a single witch to whom I wanted to bind myself.

A gentleman stepped onto the stage and the murmuring of our small crowd ceased. He teased us with the story they were about to unveil; a tale of love which caused strife, and strife which caused death, and death which caused woe.

The actors were skilled. They projected their voices and emotion into the night, and the enraptured crowd soaked up every syllable, every feeling. The story was of a girl, a pauper, who wanted nothing more than to be loved. She met a prince who gave her his heart, but his parents wouldn’t allow them to wed. They wed in secret, bribing a priest to join them despite his parents’ wishes, but the priest had already been bribed by the King and Queen to poison the girl. He disposed of her in a lake, and two days later, the grief-stricken Prince waded into the dark water, never to be seen again.

A shiver scuttled up my spine when Tauren turned to look at me over his shoulder.

Rose followed his gaze to me. One side of her upper lip rose in disgust, but hatred was what shone so brightly in her pretty blue eyes. Realizing her hold on him was failing, she reapplied the love potion, and with it, regained the Prince’s attention. I hoped she’d bought gallons of it. She would need every ounce.

Knox sat on the other side of Rose. Rose’s escorts had squeezed into the second row, sitting directly behind her.

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