“I have faith in you.” I switched my flowers to my other hand and patted his muscled forearm. “I know you’ll find a loophole!”
For a heartbeat, I thought I saw humor in his usually glassy expression.
It made his eyes more like a summer night sky than an endless void, and it cranked his icy good looks from brooding hero to the hottest supernatural I’d ever seen.
Holy cow! What was that?
I was still marveling over the change even though he went back to staring at the fae with his dead eyes. I wasn’t fooled, though, I’d just learned I’d accidentally bagged myself a real looker as a husband!
Now if he’ll just refrain from killing me, I think we can coexist.
“I will give to her as due her station,” Rigel finally said.
Ahhh, there it is. Phrasing it so if I ever displease him as a monarch he can still off me. Plus, he didn’t swear it—which is as bad as a contract. Nice work!
I twisted slightly to look back at Indigo who was standing a few steps behind me to see if she’d seen the change in Rigel too. She just scowled at me, crinkled her cute nose, and raised her eyebrows.
Skye stood next to her, holding her bouquet of flowers at about chest height. I could smell the peppermint sprigs she’d tucked into her flowers from here, and when she sighed, the scent mingled with the candied ginger she’d been chewing on.
Apparently she couldn’t gnaw antacids during weddings. It wasn’t “proper”. She’d resorted to trying other methods of calming her stomach—sniffing peppermint and chewing ginger beforehand. Based on the way her eye was twitching, I doubted they were working.
Past her, filling the massive…ballroom—for lack of a better word—was my Court. Or, rather, all the nobles, and even more common fae.
Dad and Mom were sitting in the front row, and with them—to my great fury—was Lord Linus, lounging next to Dad and looking way more pal-y and at home with him than he had any right to be.
The Paragon sat next to my mom, dabbing his eyes with a tissue as if this was a deeply moving event, and onhisother side was Lord Dion, grinning like a fiend at his best friend.
The Day King was present—he was the only fae monarch who had accepted my invite—he was all smiles, and oblivious to the fae ladies sighing longingly behind him.
I thought I saw Lady Chrysanthe for a moment, but she lookeddifferent; I wasn’t certain if I’d really seen her or if my eyes were just playing tricks on me.
And at the far back of the ballroom—standing with Dusk, Dawn, Azure, and Eventide all playing attendance for them—were my six night mares, four glooms, and seven shades.
When Kevin noticed I was looking, he happily wagged his tail at me.
“Queen Leila?” the fae performing the ceremony asked.
“Yes?” I turned around and smiled angelically.
“All fae traditions have been observed and followed,” the fae said. “Thus, it brings a close to this most blessed of occasions. I pronounce Queen Leila and Lord Rigel mar—”
The enormous window behind the fae official burst, showering us with glass.
Two spiders, both the size of small ponies, crawled in through the broken window.
They parted their enormous fangs as their hairy legs—which had an unnatural number of joints—clicked when they scuttled closer. Their bloated bodies were covered in a hard shell, and each spider had eight eyes that glowed in the light of the ballroom.
I recognized them in an instant—it was the same kind of spider that attacked me on my parents’ farm.
I slipped my prism out of my flowers—as much as people looked down on me for the small artifact, I was finding it was delightfully easy to hide in all sorts of unexpected places. I opened my mouth to shout a warning, but Chase beat me to it.
“Protect the queen!” Chase drew a hand axe from his belt and threw it at the closest spider.
The axe made a whooshing noise as it cut through the air, hitting its target with deadly precision. It sliced through the spider’s head like butter—a testament to Chase’s werewolf strength.
The spider dropped to the floor, its legs twitching as it proceeded to ooze green goo everywhere while it died.
The second spider bowled over the fae official, its many eyes fixed on me.
