Hunted(84)

“But when they reached the castle gates and Ivan looked at the horse with the golden mane, with Yelena on its back and a beautiful golden bridle draped with silk over its neck, he realized he didn’t want to part with it, because freedom would make him happy. He begged the wolf to help him again, and the wolf turned itself into the spitting image of the horse with the golden mane. The king was so filled with happiness to have the horse with the golden mane that he told Ivan to go into his menagerie and take the Firebird. He warned the prince, however, not to take the solid-gold cage that housed the Firebird. But when the prince went into the menagerie and saw the Firebird, he saw the cage as well, and he thought that if he could take the cage too, he would have wealth, love, and freedom, and he would finally be happy.

“But as soon as the young prince touched the cage, its golden door opened and the Firebird sprang free. Ivan leaped to capture it, but he was able to catch only a single feather from its tail before it was gone, vanished forever into the north.

“When the wolf escaped and rejoined the young prince, he found him sitting at a crossroads with his head in his hands. The wolf asked him how he could be so unhappy, when he had the love of the most beautiful woman in the world, and the freedom of the swiftest horse in the world, and a golden cage worth enough to buy him any luxuries he could wish for.”

Yeva thought of her home, her sisters, her friends Galina and Solmir—she even thought of the Beast’s castle, and the books there she hadn’t had time to read, and how beautiful the river would have been to walk along in spring. If only I could break the Beast’s spell, she thought bitterly, then I could be happy.

“The prince confessed,” Yeva went on, “that the last king had been right, that the dream was what he’d longed for, and he’d never be happy until he found the Firebird and everything he’d ever wanted. None of the things he’d found along the way would ever make him happy.”

Her voice petered out, for there the story should have brought the prince home triumphant, to marry Yelena and inherit his father’s kingdom and use the golden cage to establish a stable full of mounts sired by the horse with the golden mane, which would be so prized that they’d bring his kingdom a century of prosperity. But there the fairy tale ended, and Yeva lifted her face to find the Beast still watching her. The force of his stare had eased, though, and now that she’d fallen silent, he was starting to stir where he lay against the stone and rumble with discontent deep in his throat.

“How does this story end?” the Beast growled.

Yeva swallowed hard, clutching the old feather in her hand. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “The wolf and the young prince were cursed to stay together for the rest of their endless lives so that neither could ever be truly content. And only if the Firebird, the one thing the young prince had always wanted more than anything in this world, came back to him on its own, would his curse be broken.”

The Beast’s claws flexed, and as Yeva watched his face, the gray brows drew in a fraction and he dropped his gaze in confusion. “How do you know this story?”

Yeva’s breath caught. “Because it’s my story too,” she whispered. “Because I thought I wouldn’t be happy until I left town to live in the wood, and then I thought I wouldn’t be happy until I could hunt every day, and then I thought I wouldn’t be happy until I avenged my father’s death. Because I spent a year in an old castle with the young prince and the gray wolf and I thought I couldn’t be happy until I killed them both, and when I did, I wept harder than I ever have in my life. Because I thought I couldn’t be happy until I went home, and then I thought I couldn’t be happy until I came back.”

The Beast’s features flickered, and Yeva’s heart began to pound, because there in the red, senseless, animal depths, she thought she saw the faintest glimmer of gold. Greatly daring, she crept forward, her every sense on alert for the slightest sign the Beast’s animal nature might take over and cause him to strike.

“Because I thought the reason I’d always felt so restless was because I was meant for magic,” Yeva said softly. “That if I could fix the story, that if I rescued the young prince and the gray wolf and I found the Firebird and I held in my hands everything I’d ever wanted, I would live happily ever after.”

“How does your story end?” asked the Beast, his voice easing back toward the velvet bass Yeva had come to know so well.

Yeva gazed back at him, all her answers gone. A thousand fairy tales flashed through her memory, full of quests and dreams and wishes and rewards. But the path ahead of her was blank, as empty as the leather binding of the book of stories she’d brought with her.

“I don’t know,” she whispered. “I think maybe it doesn’t end.” She inched forward again and lifted a hand, but the Beast didn’t pull away, and he didn’t snap at her. Her fingers crept into the soft fur at his chest, and his warmth banished the numbness of the cold. She felt the beating of his heart beneath her hand, and below that, the pulse of the magic binding man and wolf that sang as strongly as ever. Her eyes filled. “I’m so sorry.”

The Beast’s chest rose and fell under her hand in a sigh. “For what?”

“I was so close,” Yeva replied. “The Firebird was here. I almost had it, but I was . . . slow. I could have saved you, and I failed.” She lurched forward until she could lean against him, burying her face in his shoulder and feeling his warmth spread through her, chasing away the bone-deep chill the Firebird’s cave had left her with. He smelled as he always did, and the familiar scent of wind and spice swelled inside her and she knew she had the answer to the Beast’s question. She knew how her story ended.