I nearly hit the marble floor with my knees in gratitude. In that moment, I knew that the queen had finally kept her end of the deal. For the first time since I was a child, I wasexcited. I wished Ivy was there with me. It was everything we’d ever dreamed of.
And there, in the middle of it all, was Bram.
He was seated in a magnificent golden throne on a dais, overseeing the whole party. His black doublet hung half-open, embroidered with stars that matched the ceiling. His crown was made of twisted silver, like the branches of a tree, that matched the single earring trailing down to his shoulder. He had one leg crossed over his knee, and his head was resting in his hand like he was bored. I remember thinking,Howcould anyone be bored of this?
The crowd parted as the guards brought me to him.
He smiled in that way only Bram can smile, the kind that lights up his whole face, and he said, “Please don’t be afraid. You are very welcome here.”
I should have told him I wanted to go home, that would have been the responsible thing to do, but I wanted to stay. I danced at the revel until my feet bled, leaving the marble floor slippery. I’d stick out my hand, and my cup was filled. When I grew tired of dancing, I collapsed at the banquet table and a plate appeared in front of me, piled with candied fruits and sweets I couldn’t begin todescribe. It was better than anything I’d ever let myself hope for. I didn’t think of home once.
Bram had a room prepared for me in the castle, decorated in my favorite colors. His staff brought me a trousseau of dresses in the court fashion and braided flowers into my hair.
It was a few weeks before the melancholy struck. It began with dreams of my sister. The longer I was in the Otherworld, the hazier my life back in London felt, like it was something that happened to someone else. I should have recognized Bram, I should have mourned my family, but every time the memories felt within reach, they’d float away again, just past my grasp.
As we spent more time together, Bram noticed my vague, unplaceable sadness. At first it was during simple afternoon activities. We rode horses around the palace grounds and picked fruit from the orchards.
Bram had only one rule. After that first night, I was never again allowed to attend his court revels. He insisted they weren’t safe for me. But I craved the joy of dancing, and I was lonely. Bram would disappear, sometimes for days at a time, and I thought he was below, merrymaking without me.
“I want you to be happy here. This place can be your home if you let it,” he said as he wiped tears from my cheek. Every day, cakes showed up in my room that tasted exactly of Mr. Froburg’s birthday cake recipe. The same sterling silver brush set from my room back home appeared on my vanity. He brought me paints and charcoals and pastels. I painted well into the night as music drifted up from the revels below. At dawn, Bram would climb into bed beside me and stroke my hair as I cried.
He didn’t love the way I imagined love would be. He held me likehe wanted to consume me. At the time, I thought that made it even better.
I wasn’t surprised when he asked me to marry him. He slipped a moonstone ring on my third finger one night under the strange double moons of the Otherworld and asked me to be his bride. I threw myself into his arms and kissed him so hard my lips were bruised the next morning. He pulled back, smiling. “You forgot to say yes.”
We held banquets and went on picnics, and he even had a chair brought into the throne room for me so I could sit at his side while he did his official work. One day, while we were having lunch in the gardens, he placed a crown of daisies atop my head and told me I was the queen of the Otherworld. I just looked at him, bowled over by his beauty. “Don’t we need something more official?”
“I’m the king—what could be more official than that?”
But it wasn’t enough for me. I grew ruinously sad and unbearably clingy in the lead-up to our wedding ceremony. I’d curl myself around him in bed and beg him not to leave me. I could feel him growing bored with me, and I didn’t know how to fix it. I ordered the court ateliers to make me more interesting dresses, I painted him pictures, planted a rose garden, but nothing held his attention. He’d leave, every night, to revel without me.
The morning of our wedding, Eloree, who was perhaps my only true friend in the Otherworld, dressed me in a gown constructed of dozens of layers of tissue-thin spider’s silk. It fell in ruffles and waves, as if I was emerging from seafoam. The veil I wore covered my face, which I was grateful for. Struck by an unshakable feeling of loneliness, I cried all through the long walk down the aisle.
All of Bram’s court was in attendance, as well as representativesfrom the surrounding Seelie territories. The palace dripped in flowers and swelled with music. I walked down the aisle alone, clutching a bouquet of roses that smelled of freshly fallen rain. I wished my sister was holding my train, but I forgot my hollow sadness as soon as Bram turned and smiled at me.
We exchanged our vows, and he placed on my head a heavy golden crown that he said had once belonged to his mother. Did I know his mother? I felt I must have, but the thought flitted away as soon as it came.
I slipped a ring on his finger, and he kissed me, hard, just like the day I’d promised to marry him. When he pulled back, he smiled and said something strange. “I’ll be right back.”
He sprinted down the petal-carpeted aisle and out the door.
“Bram?” I screamed after him, hiking up my skirts and trying to run. But suddenly I blinked awake and was back in my room.
I rose from my bed, still in my wedding gown, and opened the door. It wasn’t locked, and no guard waited for me in the hallway. On bare feet I crept across the cold stone floors, back into the main hall of the castle, where my wedding feast was raging without me.
Bram was in the corner, back from wherever he’d run off to, with a foul look on his face. I’d never seen him look so angry. He was deep in conversation with my least favorite of his advisers, the man with the cruel mouth and curtain of black hair that reached the floor.
“It’s exactly the same.” Bram was ranting, the rings on each of his ringers clicked as he waved his hands in emphasis. “She’s one of her subjects. She’s been crowned twice. I don’t see what the problem is.”
The adviser considered. “It must be on English soil, then.”
Bram cursed and threw back the rest of whatever was in hisgoblet. He jumped as he finally noticed me at his elbow.
“What are you doing up?” There was a cruel tilt to his voice I didn’t like at all.
“It’s our wedding feast,” I replied, confused.
Bram stuck out his arm, and his glass was filled once more. He drank that as well. “Sure, fine.”
