A Strange Hymn
Page 32

I can barely follow my own thoughts, mostly because the idea of two different beings residing in one body is so impossible to me.
But impossible is not a term fairies subscribe to.
I stare down at my scales and claws. Hell, these features should be impossible. People don’t just transmutate the way I did.
The longer I stare at my animalistic features, the more another traitorous thought bubbles its way up. Scales, claws, and wings are sirenic features. Even when I hated them, my siren hadn’t. She’d felt more powerful than ever. And the man who brought these features out in me wasn’t the king who was trying to suck me under with his magic, he was the one who’d pet my skin and mutter nonsense about my latent wings.
I feel my breathing slow.
“What is it?” Des asks, reading my expression.
I look up at him. “What if … what if Karnon hadn’t been trying to punish me that day in his throne room? What if”—I can’t believe I’m about to say this—“he was trying to save me?”
It’s a wild thought.
Des leans forward, kicking his feet off the table to brace his forearms on his thighs. “Explain,” he commands.
“I was about to die that day. I could sense it.”
The whole day is rearranging itself to fit this new possibility.
“Karnon transformed me, and it did nearly kill me—but it also brought you to him.
“What if he knew what he was doing? What if he knew something was wrong with him? What if he deliberately baited you?”
Des’s eyes narrow. “I’m not following.”
I run my hands through my hair. My thoughts are all jumbled up. “I always thought there were two versions of Karnon, but what if there weren’t two versions of him—what if there was a completely separate entity inside of him?”
Okay, saying that out loud sounds way more ludicrous than it did in my head.
Des reels back.
Seconds tick by. He’s not saying anything, and I’m beginning to think that my theory is Grade-A crap.
“You think this is why the spell hasn’t lifted?” he asks. “Something or someone else was living inside Karnon, and it escaped his death?”
When he puts it like that …
I lift a shoulder, feeling like a naïve teenager all over again. I don’t know jack about fae magic and its limits.
Hesitantly, Des nods his head, his brows furrowed. “It’s possible.”
I don’t know whether I’m more relieved or frightened by his agreement. Because on the one hand, I’m happy he doesn’t think I sound crazy, but on the other hand … if what I suggested is true, then there is some malevolent fae creature that can body hop … and it’s still out there.
Still hunting, still killing, still living.
Chapter 20
The next day, the palace is in a flurry of activity. Fairies throughout the royal grounds seem to be cleaning, primping, and packing—all, I assume, in honor of Solstice.
“What the hell is going on?” Temper says when she pokes her head out of her suite, taking in the fairies rushing down the halls. Her hair is a rumpled mess, and she looks like she got very little sleep.
I scrutinize her a bit more. “What were you up to last night … ?”
“You mean after you abandoned me to the wolves?” She shakes her head. “Girl, that was low.”
I roll my eyes. If anyone’s a wolf, it’s Temper. “Did you kill anyone?” I ask.
“No, but I gave that nasty fairy measuring me split ends and dandruff.”
Take it from Temper how to be cruel and unusual. Back in high school she had a whole notebook of crafty little hex ideas.
“Temper, she was just doing her job.”
She huffs out a breath. “She was sticking me like I was a voodoo doll! I wanted to tell her, ‘Bitch, my family invented voodoo dolls.’ Anyway …” She eyes me again. “What’s going on?” Her gaze drifts back to the bustling hallway.
“Solstice,” I explain.
“What about it?” She stifles a yawn.
“It begins today.”
“What?” she squawks.
“We’re leaving in uh …” I reach for my cellphone before I remember that we’re in the freaking Otherworld, where electronics are nonexistent. If I want to rattle off the time, I’m going to have to learn to chart the stars.
Ugh.
“We’re leaving soon.”
“How soon is soon?”
I shrug. “I’m heading off to get changed.”
“Changed? Into what?” Temper is glancing around the room like clothes will just materialize out of thin air.
“A flour sack—an outfit, what do you think?” I edge away. “I got to go. Just get yourself ready and meet me down in the courtyard.”
She lets out a frustrated growl, then closes her door.
I head back to Des’s rooms, feeling oddly nervous about the week ahead. From everything I learned about Solstice, there will be balls and meetings and schmoozing, none of which appeals to me. And then there’s the fact that I’m going to have to rub elbows with fairies who believe humans are nothing more than slave labor.
This is going to be super-duper fun.
When I slip back inside Des’s chambers, there’s a package waiting for me on the bed, my name scrawled across it in looping script.
Hesitating just a hairsbreadth, I flip the lid off. Resting inside the box is a gown unlike anything I’ve seen before. I’m not especially girly, but I have a healthy appreciation for nice clothing, and this is so much more than just nice.
The pale material glows—glows—a soft blue color. The lacy neckline plunges in a deep V. I run my fingers over the material, and it’s both incredibly soft and quite delicate. Nestled next to the dress are two coiled, flowering vines, which also give off the same pale glow as the dress.
Des comes out of the bathroom then, fiddling with his own outfit, which, like mine, is made of the same luminous material.
He’s a far cry from the thuggish king I’m used to seeing, clad in fitted pants, knee high boots, and a shirt that lovingly molds itself to his wide shoulders and trim waist. Topping it all off is his hammered bronze circlet.
Before I laid eyes on him, I would’ve assumed that such attire would make Des look less dangerous, but instead it serves to sharpen the slant of his eyes and the painfully beautiful cut of his jaw and cheekbones.
Here is the monster that all those fairytales warned me of. A man too beautiful to be real, one who rides out on dark nights to snatch up wayward maidens.
“Do you like it?” he asks.
I nod at him dumbly, thinking he’s referring to himself, until I realize he’s gesturing to the package.
I drag my attention back to the dress, noticing the corner of his mouth twitches.
“It’s … breathtaking,” I say, staring down at my own outfit. And I mean it. I rub the luminescent cloth between my fingers. “What is it?”
“Spun moonlight,” Des says, looking pleased by my reaction.
“Spun moonlight?” I repeat. I’m trying to wrap my mind around the fact that in the Otherworld, this is perfectly normal. “And I get to wear this?”
His lips twitch again. “That is the idea, cherub.
He steps in close and strokes away the hair from my face. “I’ve waited years to see you dressed as the queens of my world are dressed,” he says.