Charming went on angrily, “Mypointis I don’t get my human form back unless I convince a man to eat from the Tree of Transformation and then kiss a princess! It should’ve worked. I don’t know what I did wrong.”
Imelda stepped forward, and Charming flinched.
“I’m not a princess. I’m aqueen.”
Then she gathered the horse cloak, flinging it over her shoulder as if it were an ornate shawl.
“Let’s go.”
Ambrose’s eyebrows shot up his forehead. He couldn’t stop the smile spreading slowly across his face. He fell into step beside her.
“If the lady insists.”
As they headed for the hills, Charming called out to them, “If there’s no hard feelings, would you mind taking a survey? Was it the honey badger form that you found most alluring? I was thinking about trying to turn myself into a fox for the next passersby. Or should I just skip all this and pretend I’m the cursed prince of this palatial dump and hope it all works out?”
Ambrose and Imelda ignored him.
“Hellooo? Could I at least get freed from theshoe?”
***
Charming, as it turned out, might have been a terrible badger…but he was right about the road. It emerged suddenly from the line of trees, stretching out like an unbroken line of gold. Its sudden emergence caught Ambrose by surprise because all this time, he hadn’t taken his eyes off Imelda.
The light clung to her differently now.
It wasn’t just her eyes that now reminded him of a lioness. It was all of her. The tangled mane of her hair, the wild and regal grace of her walk. He couldn’t stop looking at her. Part of him wanted to smack himself. He’d had a year and a day to know her…to look at her…and he’d wasted every second of it.
The other part of him was grateful he’d never bothered.
Imelda was becoming more dangerously fascinating by the minute, and something inside him flinched at the realization.
His eyes fell to the forest floor. With every step, he saw a flash of her bare feet, and shame coiled in his gut.
She’d spent her life under someone else’s thumb, and he’d had the nerve to command her.
She was no one’s to command.
Ambrose knew he was many things. Too serious, too stoic, too proud.
But he always knew when he was wrong.
“Imelda, I—”
“I’m sorry,” she cut in, breathlessly. “Though it absolutely pains me to say it, you were right about the beaver—”
“Badger.”
“Whatever.” Imelda sighed. “I should’ve listened.”
“And I shouldn’t have ordered you about like that. I’m sorry.”
Imelda regarded him silently with her golden eyes.
Finally, a small smile broke across her face.
“Don’t feel too sorry. You made a pitiful badger.”
Ambrose raised an eyebrow. “At least I didn’t kiss one.”
