Wildest Dreams (Fantasyland #1)(5)

Yes, I said… the crown!

I was wearing a crown low on my forehead and however it was fashioned it was heavy but comfortable, something soft and maybe furry protecting my skin from the metal.

And it looked like icicles shooting up and slightly out, crusted with glinting diamonds and sprinkled with glimmering aquamarines.

It was freaking phenomenal.

I lifted the heavy skirts up, up and saw a pair of winter white, low-heeled, supple suede boots that kept going to over my knees. Above that, skintight, woven stockings that were also winter white and looked (and felt) like they were made of cashmere. Up I pulled the skirt and I saw winter white satin tap pants dripping with icicle lace at the bottoms, over this were satin garters holding up the stockings but I saw the boned point of the bottom of a satin bustier at my navel and I felt more boning that I couldn’t see against my skin at my ribs.

Freaking great underwear.

“This… is… so… cool!” I whispered as I stared at myself in the mirror.

“Seeoohaahfiiiiiiiin!” I heard the frantic cry, I started, dropped my skirt and looked to the door.

Then I dashed to the bed, snatched up the paper, folded it twice so it was smaller and shoved it into my cle**age.

Then I rushed to the door and had my hand on the skeleton key in the lock when I stopped dead.

“Sjofn, open this door this instant,” a cold, imperious, achingly familiar woman’s voice demanded through the door.

I closed my eyes as warmth spread through me.

“Mom,” I whispered.

Then I opened my eyes, smiled huge and turned the lock. Now I was frantic to get the door opened but when I pulled at it, it didn’t budge. I stared at it and saw three, thick wooden planks, one on top, one on the bottom, one in the middle, all thrown to in iron latches, bolting the door shut.

How weird.

I shoved them all aside and yanked open the door.

Then I froze again, the smile fading from my face as I saw my mother’s body jolt, she blinked then she glared at me.

I stared at her.

Oh God. Oh God. Oh God.

There she was.

My Mom.

Looking at her I thought, Absolutely, definitely, one hundred percent worth a million dollars. Absolutely.

I took her in, all of her and I felt my stomach get warm.

I got my light blue eyes from her and I was looking right into them; looking into them again for the first time in fifteen years.

I felt my eyes fill with tears. Me! Seoafin Wilde about to cry.

Impossible.

But there it was.

I was a freak of nature, where I got my unusual hair, I did not know. My mother and father were both dark and Dad had dark brown eyes. Both of them were tall, lean and straight. I was average height (a little less than that, if I had to admit it, though not short) and curvy.

And now, standing before me in a gown much like mine but a deep red with a glossy, brown fur ruff around her neck, her still dark hair (there were only intermittent shafts of gorgeous silver) pulled up in twists, curls and braids with tiny, gold clips in the shapes of butterflies everywhere, her own crown, gold with diamonds and rubies, a dripping, gold necklace scattered with rubies covering the skin that her scooped neckline exposed and long, gold and ruby earrings hanging from her ears, skimming the fur around her neck was my… freaking… Mom.

“Mom,” I whispered, blinking away the tears and even doing that, I saw her eyes narrow in annoyance over dark, elegant, arched brows that snapped together.

“I’ll countenance none of this nonsense, Sjofn,” she snapped with cold irritation. “We should have left fifteen minutes ago. The Drakkar awaits and all know he is impatient and doesn’t want to be where he’s standing right this very minute in the first place.”

She turned, lifted a hand at four young women who were hanging about, all wearing gowns made of soft wool, nowhere near as grand as Mom and mine and all in dark colors, navy, burgundy, forest green and dark gray (to be precise) and all, weirdly, staring at me intently. I didn’t get a chance to wonder about that because Mom flicked her wrist and then started down a wide, wood paneled hall with more carving and intermittent pieces of glossy, dark furniture.

She kept talking as she floated down the hall, not looking like she was walking but drifting.

But doing it quickly.

I rushed out behind her, the girls rushed behind me.

“It took some doing for your father to talk The Drakkar into this, as you well know. You give him reason, he’ll be gone. We can only hope he already hasn’t mounted his horse and rode away. Then what would we do?”

She turned and disappeared down a flight of steps and I followed.

“I should have known you would try something like this. Your father did know. He warned me. If you anger The Drakkar…” she trailed off, her tone dire, making it to the bottom of the stairs that had a banister the entirety of which was an elaborately carved hunt scene.

I made it to the bottom too to see Mom turn to me on a whirl of heavy skirts, another woman already with her, throwing over her shoulders a long, lustrous cloak made of dark brown pelts of some fur.

“Well!” she snapped. “If you anger The Drakkar, who knows what will happen to the realm?”

“Uh –” I started.

“I’ll have none of it!” she retorted sharply, having closed a frog at her throat, she tore a pair of gloves out of a hovering woman’s hand and whirled again, gliding quickly to the door while pulling them on. “To the sleigh!” she ordered.