“It did?” I wasn’t exactly sure what comment she meant.
“You told me you had problems getting past statues. Remember?”
“No.” I must have been talking about the sphinxes. They’d certainly been a pain to deal with.
Another conversation with the Skallan interloper turned the princess’s eye to the utility of the humble spinning wheel; armed with that knowledge, she manipulated the lion into setting a better trap for her foes. All this had occurred while they were working at cross-purposes. What might they accomplish if their goals were the same? Who could stand against them?
The princess lifted the coffin lid and kissed her captive’s lips, wondering even as she did if what lay between them would be strong enough to break the curse. Unsure what shewas feeling for this woman who had thwarted her, fought with her, and flirted with her.
And as she pulled back from the kiss, she heard the other woman’s breath catch and saw her eyelashes flutter.
She had kissed the sleeping girl, and the sleeping girl had awoken.
Chapter Thirty-One
Hairbreadth Escapes
“So,” Angelique said, gazing at me expectantly, “would you consider a partnership?”
“What kind of partnership did you have in mind?”
The corners of her lips twitched into a small, coy smile. “We can work that out over time. But you seem to have infected me with your foreign notions. I don’t think I’d mind if you were awake the next time we kissed.”
“I’m…not sure.” I hadn’t come up with any reasonable escape plans. Unwisely, I’d gotten caught up in her story instead.
“Whyever not?” She came nearer, closing the distance between us. “You must see the benefits.”
I shrank back, but I had nowhere to go short of throwing myself out the window. Around us, the few monstrous creations left in their cages gibbered and shrieked.
“For one thing,” I said, “I think you might be, you know…evil.”
She stopped midstride.
Then she chuckled. “Well, if the glass slipper fits, I’m happy to wear it.”
I blinked, surprised. “You are?”
“I’ve murdered most of my family. I understand that’s a lot to take in.” She moved in so close that our knees were almost touching. “But you must see I had my reasons. You know what it’s like here. All of us restricted to our little wing. Kept out of the light so we don’t get any ideas.”
“Locked in a tower.” My throat was suddenly dry, and the words came out as a whisper.
“I’m hardly the first person to kill for a crown. They weren’t going to give it to me any other way.” She put her hands on the sill, one to either side of my hips, and leaned forward. “I’d be shocked if any rulers haven’t left a few corpses behind them. I’d wager your stepmother has, to keep hold of her throne. Why does she deserve it any more than I do?” Her face was a scant inch from my own. “Or more than you do? Come to Castle Tailliz with me. It surely can’t withstand the both of us.”
The castle still stood, then. I hadn’t been trapped in the glass coffin as long as I’d feared.
Angelique lowered her lashes. “I know you feel something for me. My kiss wouldn’t have woken you otherwise.”
Was that true? I hardly knew anymore.
She was right about my stepmother. I was well aware of what she’d done to crush any threats to her rule. I remembered watching a prince tumble from my tower window, falling so far and so fast into the rosebushes. It was unlikely he’d survived very long, wandering blind in the wilderness. My stepmother had kept her life at the cost of his. Although the blame couldn’t be shouldered by her alone—I’d played my own role init.
I didn’t like to tell that part of the story.
I’d be lying if I said no trace of me was tempted by Angelique’s offer. Two sorceresses united, with a kingdom to calltheir own. We would have enough power to stand against anyone who might oppose us—the nobles, the lion, perhaps even my stepmother if she objected to her plans being disrupted.
And who was to say she would care? I had been sent to wed the ruler of Tailliz, and here was a would-be ruler of Tailliz, waiting on my answer. One who had kissed me and perhaps truly meant it, which was more than Gervase had ever done. If whatever I felt for Sam could never come to anything outside the realm of dreams and stories, if my ultimate choice was either a queen with a ruthless streak or a king who loved someone else, then the queen with a ruthless streak might at least view me as a valuable ally instead of a curse. Not to mention that I couldn’t deny a certain justice to her cause. Forever set aside in favor of her brothers. Her mother’s life ruined. Both of them trapped in a kingdom where women were locked away and ignored. In her place, I might have fought back just as fiercely. There were far worse reasons to overthrow a government, even if the only brother who’d ever listened to her was condemned along with the rest.
There was, however, one important subject her tale had not addressed.
