Arris was surprised she was walking. Though this was mainly because the animalium potion she had brewed to transform them into stags hadn’t fully worn off and her legs ended in hooves. In her hair, Arris glimpsed the nubs of antlers.
“You are feral,” said Arris. “As if fighting a herd wasn’t enough, then we had to go after a wolf?”
“He snarled at us.”
“He’s a wolf!”
“Admit it, you’re surprised that you enjoyed yourself.”
“I’m surprised I’m alive, Yvlle.”
“Well, at least you still had time for flower picking,” said his sister, eyeing the bouquet Arris clutched in his right hand. “Don’t you think the attention should be on the bride?”
“For the thousandth time, thesearefor her!” said Arris, careful not to shake the tender blooms. “She’ll need a wedding bouquet and I wanted it to be special.”
It had taken him the better part of the night to find, select and cull the flowers to make Demelza’s bouquet. He wanted something that looked like a promise… like hope. Fragile and fierce and precious.
Near the north-facing boulders of the Ulva Wyld’s tangled wilderness, Arris found fire lichen, with its delicate blooms so like the flickering light of a candle. By the shoreline, he’d found rare shrinking crab roses. Their blooms were a vivid scarlet, but almost always hidden, for the vines were shy and scuttled away from noise in the manner of a crab. As a stag, the shrinking crab roses had paid him no attention. Near dawn, he’d even found a bush of slender, pearlescent cat’s whiskers, fine as silver and oddly twitchy. He’d bit off the stems as best as he could, laying them tenderly atop a boulder until his limbs transformed and he could gather them in one hand.
Usually, Yvlle scoffed at Arris’s experiments and hobbies but when she looked at the gathered flowers, she almost smiled. Tenderness flashed in her eyes.
“You deserve happiness, brother,” she said, not looking at him. “I’m glad you have found it.”
When Arris entered his chamber, he was expecting only two things: a warm bath and a hot breakfast. There were only a few hours before the wedding festivities started and though Arris was eager to start a life with Demelza, he wanted to honor the time that had come before this moment. He expected silence. Solitude.
But when he entered his room, he found it transformed. The wall immediately beside his door had vanished, transformed into a strange window through which he could see straight into an unfamiliar study. A red-haired man was leaning forward in a scruffy armchair, speaking earnestly. When Arris took another step, his heart skipped.
“Demelza.”
She was listening intently to the other man, her eyes downcast. She looked withdrawn. Her red hair hung in a limp braid over her shoulder and Arris wanted nothing more than to go to her and make her smile.
“Demelza!” he called again, but neither she nor the man could hear him.
Arris’s floors glowed. There was an unmistakable warning within them. As if the Castle was cautioning him to stay still. To watch.
Arris could only see the man’s profile, but there was only one person this could be. The wizard Prava. Demelza’s father.There was a strange likeness between father and daughter. Their eyes were both green, but while Demelza’s were the tender green of early spring, Prava’s had the look of mold. Poison. Where Demelza’s hair was the color of a combed sunset, Prava’s hair looked like blood and rust. When Prava spoke, his sharp teeth grazed his bottom lip. And yet for all the wizard’s obvious monstrosity, when he spoke to his daughter, Arris heard only affection. And it was this which sparked wariness in his heart.
“—never want you to feel trapped, Demelza,” said Prava.
Arris watched Demelza touch her necklace. Her eyes shone as she defended him and briefly, Arris felt buoyant. Safe. There was the proof of her love for him, shining and fluttering against her throat. But then Prava explained that the necklace meant nothing…
It was little more than a gesture.
“If he loves fiercely enough, it can make any man a monster.”
Arris wanted to shout at them. He wanted to say that it was not true… that it could never be true… but would that be a lie? He stared at the bouquet in his hands. Yvlle had sprinkled a few drops of tonic to keep them fresh and vibrant. But already they drooped.
“There is, however, a way out,” said Prava.
Arris watched as Demelza’s eyes widened. In that moment, he felt as though his heart was a string pulled taut. From the moment they met, he’d known that she had not come to this tournament for love, but freedom. It was all that Arris wanted too. The freedom to live, to want, todream without the brevity of his life haunting every waking moment of his days. It was what had drawn them together and, now, it would tear them apart. Arris knew it in the same moments that Prava said:
“Cut out his heart… and you shall be free.”
Arris heard theplink!sound of a clattering object. He watched Demelza’s face go blank as she stared at something on the ground. Then she bent, briefly vanishing from view. When she straightened and was once more in the frame of the window, he saw that she was holding a glass knife. How clear the blade was. How curious that his own ending might be so transparent. So full of truth. For so long, he had questioned the intentions of possible brides, but Demelza could not lie. And she wore the truth of her love around her neck. He had imagined it was an ornament. But to her, it was a shackle. She loved him. She wanted freedom. The decision she would make was clear.
It seemed that Rathe Castle was in no mood to grant him a reprieve. Perhaps it thought that hastening the inevitable was its own mercy. Demelza’s wing and his own were on opposite sides of the castle, but the castle could pinch away distances in the span of a blink and that is exactly what it did.
The wall shimmered. One moment, Arris was staring at Prava’s study. The next, he was face-to-face with Demelza. There was no boundary between them. From where he stood, he could smell the fog roses and billow violets that filled her chamber.
