Hope soars through Reyna. She looks back to Khortland, who looks just as shocked as Reyna feels. She didn’t think Aerin wouldactuallycare to try to solve this seemingly impossible problem she and Khortland have. The fact that the Princess, self-proclaimed strongest Fae in Novhelm, would even look into it gives Reyna hope she lost long ago.
“Until then,” Aerin continues speaking, closing the small space between them while reaching behind her neck and unclasping the locket, “this will have to do.” Aerin holds out the small piece of jewelry.
Reyna reaches for it, but just as her fingers graze the chain Aerin pulls it back.
“Remember what accepting this locket means, Human.” Malice’s foreboding voice comes from across the room.
“What the hell is he talking about, Reyna?” Khortland demands.
Reyna doesn’t look at him. Instead, she looks to Malice, who meets her gaze with his firm blue eyes. His words ring in her head:If you accept the locket then you accept all of her.
If Reyna takes this locket, she becomes indebted to the Princess of Valtara forever. If she takes the locket, she’s also one step closer to being something other than a powerless Human. And she’d give anything for that. Even her loyalty.
Looking at Aerin, Reyna meets those molten gold eyes.
“I know what it means,” Reyna responds firmly, holding out her hand.
Aerin smiles as she drops the locket into Reyna’s waiting hand. Reyna quickly fastens it around her neck, rubbing the engraved rose on the outside of the golden heart between her fingers.
“Good,” Aerin says, smirking now, “Because you’re going to need it in Valtara.”
The breath rushes out of Reyna. At the same time, the magic of the locket hits her.
“Reyna! Reyna!”The frantic sound of Khortland’s voice is far away through her ringing ears. Reyna blinks her eyes open—bleary, bright—she shuts them again.
Isn’t it nighttime? Why is it so bright?
“Reyna!” This time Khortland’s voice is full volume, more than full volume, like a blowhorn in her ear. Reyna flinches and groans at the sound, rolling away from it.
“Talk quietly, she’s adjusting.” Emrys speaks, his soft timber feels a thousand times better than Khortland’s panic.
“Rey, please, open your eyes, show me you are okay,” Khortland begs, softer this time. The fear in his voice coaxes Reyna to open them again. She brings her hand up to block the light.
“It’s so bright,” she complains.
When her eyes focus, they focus first on her hand. On the way her fingers are longer, and her palm is leaner. The small ring she wears glistens in a way she’s never seen before. Reyna sits up abruptly, almost head-butting Khortland who barely moves away in time. She takes in the room and sees details she’s never seen before. The grain in the wood around the hearth, the small fibers of the blanket, the dust moats, the small crack in the floorboards.
Then, she looks at Khortland.
Never has she looked at Khortland and thought it was a mistake, until now. Because she knows for the rest of her shortlife, she will mourn every second she is not able to see him likethis.
He is the most beautiful creature she’s ever seen. His white-blonde hair is rumpled, like he’s been running his hand through it, and his dark eyes… Before she’d just called them dark, but now, they are like coffee, not quite black, warmer on the outside and darker towards the middle, with small streaks of gold throughout. His face is set with worry until Reyna lifts an arm. She almost misses his cheek when she goes to touch him, her arm longer than she’s used to. When she does take his cheek in her palm, she gasps at how muchmoreshe feels—like every single millimeter of her skin is sending touch signals to her brain.
“You are so beautiful,” Reyna says, running her thumb over the bow of his pink lips. His face is crafted by an artist, by the Gods, it has to be. His forehead is partially hidden by hair that hangs down around his brow bones. Those dark brows pull together in concern over his narrow brown eyes. Cheek bones and jaw lines run just under his skin, creating a wholly masculine form. Reyna finds herself wishing she could paint, if only to capture this forever. Dark stubble is barely starting to spread over his jaw, but Reyna can see his cool skin through it, can see smile lines around his perfect mouth and barely there wrinkles around his eyes and on his forehead. Things she could never perceive before. Things that make himmore, so much more.
The worry on her lover’s face melts into awe moments before he kisses her. This too feels like a mistake. The feeling of his mouth on hers is like stars exploding. The blood-bond between them hums to life in a way Reyna has never felt, pulsing with happiness between the ribs on her left side.
Khortland’s tongue pushes into her mouth. Reyna opens for him eagerly, feeling herself moving her new body clumsily, or asclumsily as a Fae can, to straddle his lap. She notices how she fits him better in this form. She can look down on him in the kiss. His hair feels like a thousand strands of silk under her fingers, while she grinds down on his hardening cock beneath her.
Reyna catches the small sound of need he makes, hardly more than an exhale, something she never would have heard before. Louder, clapping comes from another place in the room.
Pulling away, Reyna looks towards the sound to find Aerin is the source. Unfortunately for Reyna, the improvement in attractiveness doesn’t extend exclusively to Khortland. Aerin is equally changed. Reyna looks to the others in the room—first Emrys, and then Malice. Each looks different. The same, justmore. It’s as if her Human eyes dulled them down, but now they are in sharp focus.
Then Reyna realizes she must look different as well. She abandons Khortland with a boner in the middle of the floor, scrambling to the bathroom. The mirror is small and dingy, but it shows Reyna enough.
She is taller, by at least four inches. Her limbs longer. Her body is altogether leaner. Where she used to have stores of fat, she now has slender muscle. Where there had once been tissue between the bones in her cheeks, collar bones, ribs, it now seems like there is only skin. Her face is still her face, but less Human. The roundness in her cheeks is gone, but her freckles remain, as do her large brown eyes and her slightly crooked nose. She still has the scar on her wrist from falling out of a tree when she was a child. Her clothes are laughably both too small in some places and too big in others.
Her hair is also the same, though shinier, but maybe that is due to the change in her vision. Reyna leans closer to the mirror and pulls back her curtain of hair to reveal ears with pointed tips. She smiles, and when she does, she realizes her canineshave pointed as well. She runs her tongue over them and is shocked at how sharp they are.
