It was a small town, poised about a paved road running up a hill. Two- and three-story houses climbed up the slope, cushioned in greenery. Some were whitewashed, some built of pink and yellow stone, most roofed with reddish orange shingles. Here and there streetlamps sparked with magic. Some buildings showed odd cupolas; others had peculiar hieroglyphs scrawled on their walls in flowing script.
A small carriage slid by them, heading up the hill. It had no horse.
Declan led them up the road to a wide blocky building, marked by a tall post with a glowing green lantern atop it.
A dark-haired boy ran out to take Grunt’s reins and bowed deeply. “My lord!”
“Quiet,” Declan told him, pointing at the two boys passed out on Grunt’s back. He tossed a coin to the boy. It looked a lot smaller than the doubloons with which he’d paid her. “Family suite, top floor. And a dinner for four.”
They had two adjoining rooms connected with a door and situated on the end of the second-floor hallway. The rooms were clean and beautiful. For some reason she had expected a smoky medieval tavern, but instead the rooms were almost modern, except for the absence of electric outlets, TVs, or anything else that was meant to plug in. The walls were a gentle peach, the floors golden hardwood. Each bedroom came equipped with a canopied bed and soft dark red chairs. Clusters of elegant glass bellflowers mounted on the walls spilled soothing light.
The innkeeper deposited Jack onto the bed in the right room and withdrew. Declan placed George next to Jack.
Rose went into the bathroom and saw a toilet, a double sink, and a shower with a huge bathtub sunken deep into the floor. A robe hung on the hook, so ordinary she nearly laughed. Suddenly she realized she stank. She stripped and climbed in, wanting nothing more than to wash off three days in the forest. It took her a little while to figure out the contents of the twisted green and blue glass bottles, but in the end, she emerged, clean, smelling like tangerines, and wrapped in a fluffy cream-colored towel.
They didn’t appear to have electricity, but the water pressure was excellent and the water was hot. She’d have to ask Declan about it.
She tiptoed past the sleeping children into the second room and gasped when Declan pounced on her, sweeping her off her feet. His lips touched hers, and she melted. She missed him so much, she almost cried.
His voice was a husky growl knitted with need. “I missed you.”
She put her fingers on his lips. “Quiet, the kids . . .”
He glanced at the door and roared at the top of his lungs, “Kids?”
She gasped, expecting Jack or George to fly through the door. Declan reached over, swung the door open, and showed her the boys asleep in their room.
“Soundproof sigil,” he said, shutting the door. “We can hear them, but they can’t hear us. You can scream all you want.”
“So I’m completely at your mercy?” Rose laughed.
He carried her to the bed. “You will be . . .”
MUCH later, warm and ridiculously happy, she lay on her side, her head on his arm, his body pressed against her. “So this is your idea of slow and sensuous?”
“Pretty much,” he said. “Explain the thirty days to me.”
“It’s your chance to change your mind,” she told him. “I’m scared you’ll fall out of love with me. I’m scared your family will hate me, and then you’ll marry me anyway to rescue me, but you’ll become a pariah and blame me for the rest of your life for being disowned.”
His chest shook, and she realized he was trying to hold in laughter. She stared at him, indignant. “I want to give you a choice, you idiot. I don’t want to make you feel like you have to do it.”
He broke into laughter. She groaned and curled into a ball.
“I’ve made my choice,” he said. “In fact, I’ve done everything in my power to get you right here into my bed, and I had to work very hard for it. I gave you no reason to believe that I’ll abandon you. Or murder the children and leave them on the side of the road. Really, that was priceless. I was a bit put out.”
She glared at him. “A bit put out” apparently meant three days of the silent treatment.
He pulled her close. “I’m not doing this to rescue you. I’m doing this for entirely selfish reasons—I love you, and I don’t want to be without you.”
“I love you, too,” she told him.
“Let’s get married now,” he offered. “We’ll go down to the magistrate in the morning . . .”
“Thirty days,” she said firmly. “After your parents meet me.”
“You’re an impossible woman,” he said mournfully.
“You wouldn’t love me if I wasn’t,” she said.
“True.”
She kissed him. He wrapped his arms around her, and she smiled. Tomorrow would bring new troubles, but for now she was perfectly and completely happy.
THE castle was enormous. It spread atop a hill like a crouching dragon: at the front, heavily fortified entrance, like a mouth, followed by the stretch of the wall—the beast’s neck. Next a round tall tower stabbed the sky—the dragon’s leg, followed by a cluster of fortified buildings surrounded by a high wall with a spiked parapet curling on the edge of a cliff, like a massive ridged tail around hindquarters. The brown stone, darkened with age, intensified the illusion. Rose gaped at it.
“It only looks severe,” Declan informed her. “Inside, it’s very open. The Duchess of the Southern Provinces has a fondness for natural light and gauzy curtains. It will be quick, I promise. We go in, I report to the Duke, and then we depart for Camarine Keep. We’ll be home by tomorrow night.”
Rose shrugged, trying to get rid of the tension sitting between her shoulder blades. Her horse, a smaller version of Declan’s Grunt, immediately reacted by dancing in place. He had bought it for her in that first town. The kids each got a mount of their own. George rode like a natural, with almost Declan-like elegance, while Jack mostly clung to the horse, clawing at it at every bump, until both he and his horse dashed about in blind panic.
The trip across Adrianglia had taken almost a week. Both she and the kids had ended up with raw thighs after the first day of riding, and after that, they’d taken it slow and easy. It was an odd place, clean and beautiful in some areas, stark in others. Ruins dotted the countryside here and there, scars of old wars. She had tried to prepare herself for the possibility that she might dislike the Weird, but it grew on her, with its patches of forest and horseless carriages, and children playing with magic on the sides of the roads.
She had been completely blindsided by Declan’s status. She had known he was a Marshal, but she’d never quite realized what it entailed. People bowed. When he passed through a town, a report was brought, usually by a commander of the local militia. Every stop was a working stop. The first time someone called her “my lady,” it zoomed right over her head. She had tried her best not to embarrass him. Unfortunately, she knew this would last only until she came into contact with other nobles.
Now she had to face the Duke of the Southern Provinces. He was the man to whom Declan answered. The man she desperately needed to impress, even more so than Declan’s parents. She still wore her jeans and a T-shirt. Her hair was still a short mess. She was still unrefined. She was Rose. And Declan was determined to drag her into the castle.
They rode up the road. This was so not going to end well.
They passed under the portcullis. Declan merely nodded at the guards, dressed in gray and blue. Everybody bowed. He jumped off Grunt and helped her down off her mount. The kids dismounted, and Declan started toward the doors.
“I was thinking, we might just stay here,” Rose said. “We can wait for you.”
“ ‘Dear Declan, where is your bride?’ ‘Oh, I left her outside, Your Grace.’ ” Declan shook his head. “I don’t think so.”