The Blood Spell (Ravenspire, #4)(105)
Blue slipped Mama’s dancing slippers on and spun once. A laugh bubbled up, even though she felt like crying.
It was beautiful. Magical. It was a dress fit for a princess. And for a little while, Blue was going to pretend to be a princess instead of a girl full of poison and dark purpose.
“Now for a carriage.” Grand-mère aimed her wand at the pumpkin and the pile of twigs. The pumpkin shuddered and then began expanding, doubling in size and then again and again until it was a full-size carriage. The twigs bent themselves into wheels and spokes, steps and harnesses, a coachman’s seat and a carriage tongue. Grand-mère borrowed starlight again and bathed the pumpkin coach in it until it sparkled like a silver-white jewel.
“The mice!” she said.
Lucian plopped the mice down in front of the carriage, where they immediately started scampering away.
“Not so fast.” Grand-mère aimed the wand, and the mice lifted off the ground, hanging suspended in midair. Soon, their tiny bodies rippled and then expanded. In an instant, they were two gorgeous white horses standing patiently in the carriage’s traces, waiting to be hooked to the coach they would pull. “Lucian, be a good boy and get those horses laced in.”
Lucian scrambled to obey, his eyes wide with wonder.
Grand-mère turned in a full circle, hunting for one more thing. “A coachman. Something careful and loyal.”
Her eyes landed on Pepperell, and Blue held up her hand. “Don’t change him, Grand-mère. I want to remember him just as he is.”
Grand-mère’s scowl could’ve dropped the wraith on the spot. “You’ll have many more memories with him. You’re going to use that brain of yours to survive. You promised.”
“I promised I’d try,” Blue said gently.
The older woman sniffed. “Clearly, I have more faith in your abilities than you do. I’m never wrong, my child.”
Blue bent to pet Pepperell’s fluffy head, and then yelped in surprise as he shuddered and spun into the air, coming back down in front of her, a tall, pudgy man with bushy gray eyebrows lowered over one glowing golden eye. A handsome coachman’s uniform in red and gold and shiny black boots completed the look.
“Pepperell?” Blue asked, cautiously reaching out to touch his shoulder.
“Meow,” he said.
“He still sounds like a cat.” Blue looked at Grand-mère.
“Because he is a cat, my dear. But he’ll look the part, the carriage will do the work to guide the horses, and I trust that Pepperell would protect you with his life if necessary.”
“It won’t be necessary,” Blue whispered to Pepperell as his bushy gray beard twitched.
“Lucian, I need you to go into the city with Grand-mère and collect as many street kids as you can. Don’t try to go to all nine quarters. Send runners. Get everyone into the shop. Grand-mère has a key.” Blue turned to her grandmother. “There are ingredients for a powerful protection spell—”
“I know how to keep someone out of a building,” Grand-mère said, her voice thick with tears, though she didn’t let them fall. Gathering Blue close for one last hug, she said, “The enchantments will last about four hours, so you have until the midnight bell before everything turns back to the way it was. Remember, I’m proud of you, and I love you. Now go dance with a prince and kill yourself a wraith.”
FORTY-THREE
THE NUMB CORNER of Kellan’s heart had spread until he felt half-empty.
He’d stood for his valet, for his hairdresser, for his tailor, and for his mother. Every detail was perfectly in place, from his close-trimmed curls to his white dancing coat with its polished gold buttons and royal purple sash, to the tips of his shiny black boots.
He looked like the perfect prince. And tonight, he’d play the part of one by following the law of the land, regardless of the destruction it would wreak on his own heart. Tonight, he’d choose one of the head families’ daughters for his betrothed, and all dreams of kissing Blue or telling her he loved her would have to die.
Nessa walked into his suite, her purple dress flowing in a pretty bell-shaped skirt, her tight curls brushed into an updo and secured with jewels so that she looked at least fifteen instead of twelve.
You look handsome. She smiled at him.
“Please. No one will even look twice at me once you walk into the room, little bird.”
She rolled her eyes, though she looked shyly pleased. Who are you going to choose?
He sank a little further into the numbness and was spared from explaining once more his reasons for choosing Emmaline Perrin when their mother swept in, resplendent in a diamond-sprinkled purple dress with a headscarf of delicately woven gold. “It’s time.”
Kellan pressed one hand to his fluttering stomach and let the sudden punch of dread settle once more into his bones, where it had lived for the past two days since he’d seen Blue.
She wasn’t coming tonight. She’d made that clear. And it was better that way. Better that he not see her, not dance with her, when he had a declaration to make for another girl. Because surely there was no way he could dance with Blue and not have the entire kingdom know that she was the girl who held his heart.
“Are you ready?” the queen asked him, her expression the same relentless expectation of perfect gamesmanship he’d seen since he was old enough to understand the precarious political situation he would have to navigate before his nineteenth birthday. He wished his friend Javan had responded to his invitation for the ball. Of all of his friends, the studious, duty-obsessed prince of Akram would’ve understood Kellan’s dilemma best.