2. Miri
2
Miri
W hile we walked upstairs, Ivy filled me in on everything that had happened since I last saw her, including the meeting with the fairy who had given us the gift, Siobhan, and the subsequent attack by the fairy king. She had told me most of this already via voicemails over the last few weeks. Then, she explained what happened at the wedding. After suspecting Poppy knew where the queen was, Lex had called his uncle to look for her. Dmitri found the queen roaming his property and captured her to bring her to Lex. That was before the king crashed their party and took Ivy’s siblings.
“I don’t know how I did it,” Ivy said, walking down the hallway to the room at the back. “I told him to leave and he did.”
“You claimed the city,” Lex said, reaching the closed door that led into Ivy’s office.
“I don’t think the rules work like that.” Ivy shook her head. “Either way, now that he has our family, we need to create a game plan.”
“And we need to figure out what to do with her.” Lex opened the door to reveal the queen sitting on Ivy’s desk, leaning back on her arms with her legs crossed. Her long blond hair hung around her shoulders, just as beautiful as the last time I saw it, but she’d lost that vibrance that once made me wilt in her presence. Dressed in Ivy’s powder-blue silk evening gown, she looked like a ghost of her former self, her cheeks sunken, her skin a pale, translucent gray.
What had that monster done to her?
Two guards stood sentry on either side of the desk, their hands behind their backs, stern expressions between their brows. I took a step forward, but the one closest to me straightened.
The queen uncrossed her legs and stood, putting a hand on the guard’s shoulder and muttering something in a language I didn’t understand. He backed down, and the queen smiled, moving toward me. She cupped my cheeks and leaned in, pressing our foreheads together, muttering more confusing syllables.
“Right.” I turned to Ivy. “What’s wrong with her?”
“Alberich did something to her after we took off with Poppy at Samhain.” Ivy rubbed her neck, a neurotic habit she’d had as long as I’d known her. “He blew some kind of ruby dust in her face, whatever that is. Now, she speaks in tongues and touches us like we’re her best friends.”
The queen twirled over to Lex, the skirt of her dress spiraling out around her, and brushed a piece behind his ear. He jerked his head away and gave her a look, but she didn’t react to him, just danced over to Carter and grabbed his hands. She lifted them above her head and ducked under them, giving him a dreamy smile.
“Siobhan and her commander, Finn, told us it was a powerful spell,” Carter said. “But this is…”
“Duneh aburgus!” The queen giggled before twirling around again to face me. She stopped and eyed me like I was a naughty child, tsking through her teeth as she walked closer and mumbled. When she touched me, I froze. My gut clenched and my heart ached, the electrifying reaction so sudden and overwhelming, I nearly folded in on myself.
I had experienced something similar to this before with dying plants, but never this intense. The diseased energy latched on to me like a prisoner reaching out from between iron bars, attempting to yank me into the cell with them. Perhaps, if I let it, I could help her. I’d never heard of ruby dust before, but there had to be a reason why Lex and Ivy couldn’t sense this about her and I could.
The queen stared into my eyes, squeezing my wrist tighter until it pinched. There was something there, and if I focused hard enough, if I stared deep enough, I could access it. It felt like her— the way she was the last time I’d seen her.
“Miri!” Ivy grabbed the queen’s fingers to tug them away, but when she connected with the queen, intelligence sparked behind those mesmerizing eyes—there for a heartbeat and gone as soon as my connection broke, but I saw it.
Diana spun away, continuing her song as she pranced over to the guards and coaxed one into holding her hand.
“What was that?” Ivy asked, furrowing her brows.
“I don’t know.” I took a deep breath and shook my head, rubbing the nail imprints on my arm. The rest of my energy seeped out of me, that moment with the queen stealing it away. My head pounded, my eyelids weighed a ton, and my knees almost buckled.
“Did she hurt you?” Carter stepped closer, glancing down at the marks, but they weren’t anything serious.
“No, it’s just…” I hesitated because I didn’t trust myself anymore, not with this. I hadn’t been able to keep the thistles up. I couldn’t keep the king out of my memories. I didn’t know what I was talking about anymore.
“I felt it,” Ivy said. “It was like”—she shook her head as she struggled to put it into words—“her.”
“Her?” Lex raised his eyebrows. “The queen?”
Ivy nodded.
“Fuck, do it again.” Lex nudged me forward, but I stopped. Those few milliseconds were draining enough. I didn’t have the strength. I needed to sleep for about a month and eat for another six before I’d try to take her on. There was no time for that.
“We need to take a second to regroup,” Ivy said. “Think through our options.”
“Burgh a come jurgan!” the queen said, giggling and falling back on the couch, kicking her feet up in the air. Clearly, she found herself hilarious.
“Exactly,” I added. “I’ve missed a lot, and I’d like a bath to freshen up.”
“Me too.” Ivy nodded toward the door to the bathroom.
“Oh.” I cleared my throat and glanced at Lex and Carter before dropping my gaze to the ground. “I meant a-a-alone.” I couldn’t let them see me naked, not anymore. If they did, they’d know what I’d done. If they did, they’d guess at the sickness lurking deep inside me.
“There’s no fucking way that’s happening,” Lex said, stripping off his shirt as he walked toward the bathroom. “It’s time the four of us had a talk—a real one.”
Carter gave me a sympathetic glance before nodding toward the door, suggesting he thought it was time I told them everything. From the sounds of it, they had a lot to tell me, too. Carter followed Lex into the other room, leaving me alone with Ivy, the epitome of American nobility. My heart pounded, echoing in my head, and my throat felt like I’d swallowed an entire ocean.
“Miri,” she said, her footsteps stopping in front of me.
I stared down at the ground, visions of what little memory I had dancing just behind my eyes. I clenched them shut against the burning sobs that almost barreled out of my throat.
Take a deep breath . Inhale…Exhale…
I tried to follow my own directions, willing the bile and shame back down into that dark corner of my soul.
“Miri, my love.” Ivy slowly reached out to grab my fingers, lifting them to her lips, kissing my knuckles with tender touches. “Miri, please let us back in. We love you no matter what’s happened.”
I wanted to believe that. I really did, but I couldn’t. The threat of losing her forever wasn’t nearly as bad as what would happen when she learned the king had been inside my head, twisting and squirming and who knew what else. They weren’t safe around me. Hell, I couldn’t even protect myself. I couldn’t protect this realm. I was useless.
What was I doing there? I should have packed up and returned to London. They didn’t need me. They?—
Ivy’s warm mouth broke my chain of thoughts, pressing against mine with a tenderness I hadn’t felt in so long. My knees shook and my stomach flipped over, and for a second, I let myself believe that I could have her again, that I could be worthy of them again. With that thought, I mentally slapped myself and stepped away, touching my lips as they burned where she’d been.
“Don’t do that,” I hissed.
She winced and cleared her throat. “Okay.”
“Okay.” I shook my head, jutting my chin out as I blinked back my blurry vision. Even hurt, Ivy was incredibly mesmerizing and beautiful. She reminded me of a Goddess come to life, some ancient warrior gifted with wisdom, strength, and compassion. I wanted to fall to her feet and pray for redemption, pray for forgiveness, pray for any empathy she’d grant me.
“If you can’t tell us, I can just—” She reached out, but I moved away.
“No,” I snapped. “Just…give me some space.”
Perhaps I expected her to retreat at my outburst, but she didn’t. Ivy nodded and dropped her arms to her sides, anguish and frustration echoing behind her steel gaze. That made me feel worse. Despite what I’d done to her, despite what had happened to me, I loved her. I never wanted to upset her.
I memorized the slope of her neck as it became her collarbone, now more pronounced and rigid since the last time I’d seen her. We both looked horrid, and I swallowed down the panicked guilt that came with the realization I’d caused this.
The four of us were connected in our own ways. Lex and I softened each other like no one else could. Carter was my best friend and star-crossed lover. But Ivy was my emotional tether. She was the glue that held me together, truly my first love in all the ways that mattered.
If I weren’t me and she weren’t her, I would have proposed we run away together after boarding school and never venture into high society again. She would have been enough for me, if only we had been enough for the world.
“We can bathe together,” I said, moving past her to the bathroom. “But don’t get too close, okay?”
Ivy swallowed and smiled, following me without saying anything else.
* * *
I felt Ivy’s eyes on me while I stripped, her blistering stare even more intense for how long I’d ached to have it on me again. Carter leaned over the enormous Jacuzzi tub, swirling his fingers in the water while it filled, and Lex had already gotten in, leaning back against a corner with his head relaxed and his eyes closed. I ignored Ivy’s scrutiny and pushed my trousers down to my ankles, stepping out of them before yanking my blouse over my head. I was just about to climb into the tub when I caught her gaze and paused.
She ran the length of me, and I immediately covered the scars on my thighs with my hands, the ones I’d picked at until they bled, the ones I’d done to myself. But that was a psychological door I didn’t want to open tonight. They didn’t need to know, not yet.
“I’m happy we’re home,” Carter said, holding out a hand to help me step into the water. I refused it, grabbing onto the porcelain sides to ease myself in. The steamy pool soothed my tired muscles, and when I finally relaxed against the sloped wall farthest away from the others, some of the tension from the last few months slipped away.
“It’s not safe for me to be here,” I said. “I should go back to England as soon as we figure out how to break this curse.” I wanted to stay. I’d always want to stay. But I was dangerous to them, and I might always be. I had ruined Ivy’s reputation and my own with it. What more damage could I do?
“Hmm.” Lex didn’t bother to pick his head up, just grunted a sardonic noise that said he didn’t believe me.
“I’m serious,” I snapped as Ivy sank into the water next to me, unraveling her long, shiny hair so it hung in thick waves down her back.
“I’m sure you think so.” Lex raised an eyebrow, his gaze scrutinizing every inch of me.
“Don’t gaslight me,” I said, more bite in my tone than I’d meant. Sure, Lex had reason to be upset. I’d broken his heart and cut him off, something I’d sworn I’d never do. We were married, after all. I’d made an oath to the three of them. It was written right there on my hand.
Until the end.
The end hadn’t come yet.
“I’m not gaslighting anyone,” Lex said, finally deigning to look at me. “I don’t need to. You know what happens when we’re apart.” He shook his head, his features softening for the first time since I’d been home, like he’d finally decided to take pity on me. “You know we can’t break the curse.”
My chest caved in on itself. Yes, Siobhan had told them that when they met up with her and her lovers. They’d talked about the Fianna, about Siobhan admitting she couldn’t take it back, even if she wanted to.
“There are some other things you should know, things we didn’t get a chance to explain.” Ivy talked about her connection to the king’s mind and Lex training Poppy to go back in time. In the end, none of it worked. The king still took Ivy’s siblings and Poppy had done God knew what with my cousin and Lizzie.
“I don’t know what we’ll do now,” Ivy said. “I don’t think he’ll hurt anyone we love, not until he has the queen.” She rubbed at her temples and laughed. “I can feel him squirming around in here, but it’s like…a nightmare I can’t forget.”
I blinked back tears and swallowed, wondering what this could mean for my secret. “So you’re connected to his mind?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. He’s always been able to get inside my head, planting nightmares, scaring the hell out of me. It’s more like I’m inside his now.”
It was all so complicated and strange, but perhaps she’d be able to figure out what he’d done to me. What would she do when she found out? Worry because she wasn’t there to protect me? Go off after the king like an imbecile, hell-bent on avenging my virtue? I gave a small laugh and sighed.
“Miri,” Ivy said, pushing through the water so she stopped right in front of me. “We can’t help you if you don’t let us in.”
I wanted to tell them, I did, but perhaps I still felt ashamed that I could be so fragile, so vulnerable to attack. Perhaps there was a small part of me that had been grateful he’d come after me instead of them, and what did that say about me? I was a wretched beast, truly.
“I’m your wife, and I love you more than anything else in this world. If I can help you, I will.” She kissed the tip of my nose in a move so tender, I almost started crying again. Ivy wrapped her arms around me and pulled me into her lap, tucking my head into her neck. “Talk to us, my love. Tell us what you’re going through.”
“The king…he did something to me…” I sputtered, agony spearing my chest. “I don’t know.”
She leaned back and put her hand under my chin, forcing me to look her in the eyes. “Then show us.”
Suddenly, I had grown so very tired of carrying this weight alone. I didn’t relish the thought of anyone else in my mind, not after whatever Alberich had done to me, but if it was Ivy, if it was them, perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad. I nodded and closed my eyes, intertwining my fingers with hers, giving her permission. When I felt her presence knocking at the mental barrier between us, I submitted to her dominance, allowing her feminine strength to infiltrate every secret part of me. Lex’s icy aura joined next, quickly followed by Carter’s warmth and empathy. Once we were all connected, she found it quickly, wasting no time before going to the most guarded area of my memory. It played like a movie, the events going backward and forward before reorganizing into the correct sequence.
I’d had dinner with Reginald, then gone to bed, where I’d had an intense sexual dream about Carter. He took me rougher than usual, but gentle enough that it was realistic. When I woke up the next morning, there had been blood on the sheets, but I assumed it was my period. A person knew when they’d been penetrated, the soreness almost unmistakable. But I believed I’d been alone all night, so what other conclusion could I draw?
In the weeks after the photo leak, my body tried to remind me that something else had happened, some violation I needed to reconcile. Combined with the distance from my spouses, I had no other way to cope. Scratching the insides of my thighs became the avenue to deal with the loss of both my memory and my dearest companions, a self-soothing mechanism that made the emotional pain physical and therefore bearable.
We watched as I dragged the razor along the inside of my leg, hissing against the pearl of blood as it trailed down the inside, relaxing into the sharp bite of release that came with it. No one else knew this about me, no one except them.
“Are we having fun yet, Little Thistle?” The king’s antagonizing voice cut through it all, vanishing my self harm in a misty fog. “Bring me the child. Bring me my wife. Then, I’ll give you what you seek.”
Startled, Ivy retreated, pulling out of my mind so quickly, the absence stung. When I opened my eyes, she stared at me with shock and fury rising behind hers, the normal steel color now a molten fiery metal. It wasn’t directed at me; she’d reacted exactly as I predicted. The king had done something to me, and she wanted his heart on a silver platter.
Tears streamed down Carter’s face and he wiped them away, swallowing whatever he truly wanted to say. Sympathy radiated off him in thick, debilitating waves, and it was that more than anything that made me realize why I’d stayed away. I didn’t want them to see how feeble I was, how disgusting and vile. I didn’t want them to feel sorry for me.
Me and my stupid pride.
In the end, it was Lex who spoke first. “Why did you think you couldn’t come to us with this?”
“I’m the weakest,” I muttered, sounding small and shattered. “He can mess with me because it’s easier. You and Ivy have each other, and Carter’s luck protects him.” When Lex still looked unconvinced, I steeled my jaw and kept going. “Don’t you see? He can get to you through me.”
“You’re not weak, and you’re not putting anyone at risk,” Carter said, his tone more gentle than I deserved.
“He’s inside my head, even now,” I tried to counter.
“He’s inside mine, too.” Ivy cupped my jaw so she could rest her forehead on mine. “Miri, I am so sorry this happened to you. I promise, we’ll figure out the truth.”
“I don’t need your pity, Ivy.” I tried to break free, to get some space.
She wouldn’t let me, holding on to me tighter. “I don’t pity you.” She kissed me, a soft, tender peck that reminded me of why I’d loved her to begin with. “You’ve been so strong. I wish you’d told me sooner. I wish I could’ve carried this pain with you.”
“I can’t sleep,” I admitted. “I can’t eat. I can’t stop to think about it because when I do, I never want to move again. It’s me he wants. I’m the reason all of this happened. Who knows what he can make me do, what he can make me forget? I could hurt you and not even know it.” I was exasperated by the end, pouring my heart out to the people who had loved me the most.
“So self-sacrificing, aren’t we, Princess?” Lex let out a disbelieving laugh, burning my cheeks and making me feel small and silly. “Ivy has been having nightmares for years, the king and the queen and Siobhan and who the fuck knows who else getting inside her head. Carter has to drink himself to sleep every night without you, and me—” He cut off, his voice having risen to the point where it echoed off the walls. Lex paused to collect himself before calmly saying, “I’ve been holding it all together by my fucking fingernails. Siobhan said it was the four of us in this… four, Miri.”
“I’m here now.” I matched his ire with my own, the months of stress finally catching up to me as I glared right back at him. Ivy had always been the one to go head to head with Lex, and normally, I didn’t see the point in fighting with him. Now, perhaps I was looking for someone to be mad at, someone to take the blame for what I’d lived through, what I had allowed to happen.
“You’re here now.” He repeated the words like they meant nothing. In his mind, what was the point of showing up after the battle had already been lost? The damage was done, and we might never be the same. “I needed you three months ago. We needed you three months ago.”
“Lex,” Carter cut in, “c’mon. Take it easy.”
“Easy?” Lex made an incredulous laughing noise just as Ivy grabbed my hand in solidarity. “She’d be lucky to get easy from me.”
“Don’t be a dick,” Ivy said, but that just caused him to direct his wrath to her. “I can’t imagine going through these last few months alone.”
“She was alone by her own volition.” Lex cleared his throat to try to stay calm, but a thick wall of ice grew behind his eyes.
“I was protecting you,” I said, my voice carrying now, steaming-hot tears sliding down my face.
“And who was protecting you, Miri?” Lex slammed his hand down on the water, dousing us with a sobering splash. All this time, I’d thought he was mad at me because I’d broken his heart, broken Ivy’s. But that was only a small part of it. He was most upset that I’d put myself in danger, and it widened the chasm in my heart. He’d been afraid of what could happen to me while I was gone, and lo and behold, his worst fears had come true. Now, all that energy came out as visceral anger.
My cheeks burned as I stared at him. God, he could be so cruel when he wanted to, but I understood him better than anyone ever had. Lex lashed out when he got scared. That had been the reason he treated Ivy the way he had his whole life. I suspected it had to do with losing his brother at such a young age. Bleeding hell, it might have gone back even further than that. When it came to something he really cared about, Lex would rather destroy it himself than see someone else take it from him.
“You broke his spell before, Princess,” Lex said, moving toward me with an intimidating glare in his hazel eyes. “Why don’t you try harder? Or maybe we can throw you in front of the king like we did last time. Perhaps you can be useful and grow a wall of thistles around the fucking world.”
“Stop it.” Carter moved at the same time Ivy did. He had one hand on Lex’s shoulder while Ivy pushed him back.
“What did you do to your legs, huh?” Lex went on, his scowl hardening, his lips twisted with anger. “You think no one saw the way you sliced yourself up like a Christmas ham?”
“Lex!” Ivy let go of me to give him a hard shove in the chest, but I’d already had enough.
Magic licked at my fingertips, every plant in a fifty-mile radius responding to Lex’s threat. Ivy had been nursing a tender pothos in her bedroom, and now, I willed it closer to me. Vines crept over the walls like thick green spiderwebs, twisting as they came closer, wrapping around Lex’s wrists and neck.
“Stop it,” he said, yanking at them, but I didn’t. I coiled them tighter, wrapping them around his waist and legs, confining him until he’d stop threatening me. Rage boiled my blood and tears blurred my vision, the anguish of Lex’s words mixing with the fact I had so little control over my own life. “Miri, what are you doing, stop it.” He writhed, trying to get away. “Stop it. Tell me the truth! What happened to you?”
“ I don’t know!” My scream echoed off the walls, sending a shock wave through the room, exploding in every direction. Water flew up around us like a tsunami, hanging in the air, weightless, like gravity had ceased to exist. Time stopped. The world stopped. And for one brief moment, I heard the king’s voice again, barely a faint whisper…“ There’s a good girl. Come for me.”
The tenderness in his voice sliced me in two, and the pain brought me back to reality. I crashed into Carter as my knees gave way. The water slammed into the tub with a loud swoosh, time restarting like a punch to the gut.
We flew to either side of the bath, my back slamming into the porcelain so hard, it radiated pain down my legs and up my neck to my skull. My hands trembled from the magnitude of the magic I’d just put out, and it rolled around in my gut like acid. I had terrified them…fuck, I’d terrified myself. Where had that come from?
“There’s a good girl. Come for me.”
Oh, God… No, no, no, don’t think about that. Put that away. File that in the darkest part of your heart.
Closing my eyes, I did. I swallowed it and forced myself to forget the moans I’d made while Alberich whispered in my ear, his voice deep and soothing, coaxing me to relax while he took what he wanted.
None of us said anything for a long moment, just staring at each other as we independently debated what had happened and what to do next.
“I think that’s enough for one night,” Carter said.
I didn’t wait around for more. Wiping tears from my cheeks, I got out of the bath, wrapped a towel around myself, and walked into Ivy’s room. The sound of my wife’s wet feet padded behind me until she shut the door, enclosing us there together.
“Don’t listen to him,” Ivy said. “He was scared for you. He doesn’t always know the best way to?—”
“I know,” I said, shaking my head while I yanked on a pair of Ivy’s shorts and one of her tank tops. “I’m exhausted, and I don’t have the strength to talk about it more tonight. Can we just…can we just go to sleep?”
She nodded and wrapped me in her arms before leading me to her bed, scooting in behind me. I was asleep moments after my head hit the pillow, and I vaguely recalled Carter and Lex making their way to the same bed sometime later, but I hardly woke up. In that small moment of intimacy, I found the first bit of peace I’d had in months and slept with little fear of what would await me when I woke.