Marigold does not care.
All she sees is Lottie Burke. All she feels is absolute, unyielding desire.
For Lottie’s kiss, she would forsake all else. For her love, she would undo legacies.
They pause for breath at a dead end. Sweat and humid air caress their skin. They are each braced against a hedge wall for balance and steadiness, but they cannot hold themselves back from each other.
“So many times, you have left me aching with want, Mari. I have thought of you every night since we met,” Lottie says breathlessly.
Marigold bites her lip as it trembles. “You have defied all that I know. I am starved for you.” She moves to stand an inch away from her face, caging Lottie in her arms against the hedge.
“I am going to close my eyes, and when I do, I want you to kiss me. I want to see if the curse will have mercy on me if I am not the one to act first.”
“I will try. But you must tell me if it hurts you the very second it starts. Do you promise?”
“I promise.”
The tension between them is tangible, able to be held and licked and savored. Lottie closes her eyes and parts her lips slightly. Marigold grips Lottie’s hands as if they are the only things that might keep her tethered to this world. She pulls Lottie close, takes her face in her hands, and kisses her. It feels likethey are weightless, frozen in time. They move like they are underwater again, back in the moon pool. Lottie’s tongue dips into Marigold’s mouth for the first time as their hands roam over each other’s bodies. Their fingers thread through each other’s hair. Their passion drags them both to the ground where she straddles Lottie. Her kiss moves from Lottie’s lips to her neck, to the swell of her breasts. Lottie’s hands push upward underneath Marigold’s dress until she reaches her hips. They are completely lost in each other, until Lottie’s body goes completely rigid beneath her. Startled, Marigold climbs off her and moves to her side.
With her back arched, Lottie gasps for air, her hands clawing at her throat as if trying to break free from a merciless grip. “Cannot… breathe…” she says between gasps.
Marigold searches her pockets for a vial of honey, any honey—lavender, tupelo, black sage, whatever she grabs first. She holds Lottie still by her chin and pours it into Lottie’s mouth. This is exactly why she wanted to wait until they returned to Innisfree. What if this honey isn’t enough?
“Why didn’t you tell me to stop?” she asks, panicking.
Lottie swallows the honey, and her heart rate begins to calm. A few intense minutes tick by, and her lips start to move. Her words punctuate her labored breathing. “I… did not… want… to stop.” Her trembling hand finds Marigold’s. “I… still… want… you.”
Her heart swells so much that it could consume her, could rid her of all logic, but she fights against it. Her selfish heart is putting Lottie in danger. “You impossible girl, you cannot—”
Thunder cracks and booms above them. The air sours with the scent of dark magic. Shadowy swirling clouds consume the sky above like those that she summoned a moment ago against George. And then it’s the attack-not-storm all over again. It’s the summer of sixteen years ago. Marigold sees everything all at once, clearer than on the day it happened.
Her grandmother fought Versa in the center of the isle. Hermother’s hand was skinned clean, bleeding all over her body. She was soaked to the bone in her mother’s blood as Mr. Benny picked her up, held her tiny body to his chest and whispered desperate prayers for her to live.
“Mama!” her mother screamed to Althea.
“Go, Raina! Now!”
Then they were in a carriage—she was sitting next to little August. They huddled into each other, crying silently, as if they knew that they were supposed to be hiding. August’s mother was putting pressure on her mother’s hand. Mr. Benny was driving. The carriage was moving so fast. It was bumpy. Her mother’s blood kept splattering on the walls. It got in her eyes and it burned.
“You’re going to be all right,” Mr. Benny kept calling from the driver’s seat. “You’re going to be all right.”
He was crying. They were all crying.
Because they weren’t going to be all right.
August’s mother had a jar of honey. She was fumbling with it, trying to get it to open, but her mother pushed it away.
“It’s too late,” her mother said. Marigold knew then that her mother was going to die. She pulled herself out of August’s little arms, stood up and wobbled on her short legs in the bumpy carriage. Her mother closed her eyes, surrendering to the loss of blood. August’s mother cried over her and cursed the world. Marigold found the jar of honey, fought against the blood on the lid that made it slippery, and got it open. She scooped it out with her fist, slathered it onto her mother’s wounds, and breathed.
Eyes closed, she pictured their last happy day. Bumblebees and sweet pies. Her grandmother’s silly stories. Mud potions with August. Her mother, beautiful and whole, sipping tea in the garden. The world was beautiful. Her grandmother was not fighting. Her mother was not dying. And she was just a child who wanted everything to be good again.
And when she opened her eyes, it was good. Her mother’s bones were no longer exposed. Her breathing had steadied. Shewas asleep, but she was not dead. She was not even dying. And it was good.
How did she perform such a feat at six years old without ever performing the ritual to access her full power? What could have given her such strength, and why was the same storm happening again now?
Suddenly, Marigold is back in the present. A ring of fire surrounds her and Lottie, trapping them in each other’s arms.
“What’s happening?” Lottie says breathlessly as she presses herself into Marigold’s body. Another impossibly loud crack of thunder. The flames start to rise and lick the hem of their dresses. Marigold wraps one arm tightly around Lottie’s waist and helps her stand, while she reaches her other hand up toward the sky. She instinctively curls her fingers into a fist, bringing the clouds closer. Lottie whimpers as the storm closes in on them, but then the rain comes. The clouds cry over them, soaking their gowns and putting out the mysterious flames.
