Page 42 of Wickedly Ever After
Ida took her seat at the table, the northern end, and watched the salamander feeding the flames with a few flakes of birch and cedar, coaxing the fire like a nervous animal from the hearth.
“Can I get you anything, Your Goodness?” the salamander asked, flame flickering around their mouth and nose. “A hot drink? A pastry?”
Ida’s stomach rolled. “Tea,” she decided. “Hot herb tea with a lavender tea cake, and this morning’s copy of theKingdom Wall. No, theSorcerer’s Star.”
The salamander, to their credit, didn’t ask why she’d asked for the city’s most infamous rag. In a quick puff of brimstone and smoke, they vanished.
For all their heat, salamanders were the calmest of the elementals, the least emotional. Perhaps that was why the Wicked Witch of the West was represented by them. If so, what did a sylph say about her? Was she flighty, prone to temper, to changing her mind, to adapting to each situation as mutably as the wind? She wouldn’t have said so a day ago, but thinking over things now…
A sudden guttering announced the salamander’s return. They set the tea and cake at her elbow and the paper in front of her.
Ida split the ribbon with her finger and unrolled the paper on the table. She skimmed the article. The only good news: the true nature of the dragons remained a secret. The tabloid made mention of a snafu. At least they hadn’t gone further. The paper had a reputation of jumping to conclusions faster than a pair of seven-league boots. She’d half expected to see the headline:
Top Cardinal Witches Botch Princess Abduction! Happily-Ever-After Is Dead! World Ending Soon! See your Doomsday Horoscope on page seven!
The terrifying thing was that for once in its long history of wildly inaccurate reporting, the Star actually might have stumbled on the truth. If Happily-Ever-After had gone wrong, the world really might end.
It would be like shattering a magic mirror, although this would bring far more than seven years of bad luck. More like seven centuries. Happily-Ever-After was potent stuff. If it escaped from the confines of the spell, her vivomancy would spread through the land unregulated. Crops would ripen at the wrong time. Children would be born, but there would be nothing to feed them. Whole families might go to war over love matches that should never have happened. And what about Hector’s side of things? She shuddered. That didn’t bear thinking about.
A sudden gust of wind, and a slender sylph in blue opened the door and held it open. “Your Wickedness.”
Hector stepped into the room. He looked even more tired than he had that morning and also soaked. She noted the deep, black circles under his eyes, the stringy, greasy cast to his long salt-and-pepper hair, and the way his mouth tightened when he saw her. If he weren’t such a complete asshole, she’d almost have thought he looked as scared as she felt.
“Anything I can get for Your Wickedness? A drink? Something to eat?” the sylph asked.
“Just tea,” Hector said in a heavy, gravelly voice. “Nothing to eat. Later, perhaps.” He carried his staff, the first time she’d seen him take it into a meeting, like he expected trouble. He sat in the chair nearest the fire, lowering himself like every muscle hurt.
“We need to talk,” Ida said in frosty tones.
“We do,” he replied. “But not here.”
“No. We’re going to do this right now, before you blame this whole thing on me. If you so much as insinuate that I picked the wrong princess, I’m going to tell the Council that you sent me a candor curse. What’s more, I’m going to theStarwith it. Is that clear?”
He folded his hands on the table in front of him. “That’s supposed to scare me?”
“It should. Agatha would love to take your place.”
“And curse you so she can take leadership of the Council. I suggest you remember that. The last person who crossed her ended up a rather hairy creature confined to a drafty castle with only a bunch of furniture to take care of him.”
“That’s supposed to scare me?”
His stare would have turned a Medusa to stone. “It should. Forever is a long time to have fleas. And while we’re on the subject of threats, if you even mention that candor curse, I’ll havesomething to say about laughing charms and just how little regard you have for the magic you’ve been entrusted to protect.”
“You think I haven’t spent every waking minute of my eternity protecting and preserving Happily-Ever-After? You’ve no idea of how hard I work. All you ever have to do is manage the monsters.” She huffed. “You’ve got all this time on your hands to come up with diabolical plots—like picking a dragon to act the fool and burn up the stadium.”
“I did not—”
“And setting your gnome to seduce mine because you knew it would humiliate him and hurt me.”
Hector’s face flamed. “I never—”
“You did it to get back at me for my laughing spell. Burned your balls, did it?”
He sat back in his chair, arms over his chest. “Oh, for the love of magic! I wouldn’t be so petty. That’s more your thing—putting love potions in the ink so poor Tinbit would fall in love with someone he’d never met! Don’t think I don’t know one of your schemes when I see it—”
Her cheeks grew hot. “I did nothing of the sort! I’m a good witch—I don’t go around trying to break people’s hearts!”
He leaned forward, fist balled as he set his elbow on the table. “That’s rich, you talking of hearts when you’ve never had one.”
