Chapter Twenty-Eight Wilde
Later That Evening
The Grimnight Forest
Which Needs a New Name
After the incident with the imps, we traveled more quietly, like a pack of prowling wolves through the trees. Fitz and Trey led the party, one with a map, the other carrying twin swords. I hoped if more imps found us, he would ask questions before attacking.
They’d argued over the purpose of the ‘Lord of Grimnight’s message’, whether it was a misdirect or a warning.
Truthfully, I hadn’t given the champions a message at all.
The little miscreants had simply been drawn toward my argument with Trey.
The imps probably hadn’t expected to be caught by their master and had scrambled to convey a clumsy message: “Follow this route to find an easy path and nice warm beds.”
When we stopped to set up camp for the night, Delilah sidled over to me and asked, “Is there really a lovely cottage?”
“Probably several.” The minion applicants I’d turned away had spent the past two weeks renovating the old buildings in the forest. The ones near the city center would take more work, but the ones closer to the edge of the forest could be ready in a few hours with some cleaning and tree trimming.
Delilah sighed heavily and watched her cousin build a fire. “I wish we could tell them.”
My own gaze traveled to Maximus, assessing the food he’d brought and deciding what to cook for dinner. “I’m sure they’d listen properly and not jump to any conclusions,” I replied dryly.
She pursed her lips and pinched my side hard enough to bruise. “You don’t have to be a sourpuss. People have a right to be upset if you lie to them.”
“Upset, yes.” I watched Maximus’ hands, and my throat tightened, as if his massive paw was still closed around it. “I’m more afraid of their murderous tendencies.”
“Maximus is sorry he hurt you.”
I snorted in disbelief.
“Or … he would be if he remembered hurting you. He just wants to protect people from evil.”
“And who will protect me from good?”
Her brow furrowed and she quieted, unable to give me an answer.
Speaking of protections—I’d joined the quest under the guise of an assisting mage, so I needed to perform some magic to earn my keep.
Time would reset if anyone was grievously injured, but it would take less energy to lay a few protective wards around the camp to prevent the danger in the first place.
During the royal champions first quest, they’d been ambushed in the middle of the night by a tribe of minor dryads.
The dryads were just protecting their territory, but they were vicious, hard to kill fae who attacked in overwhelming numbers.
Better to avoid encountering them altogether.
As I drew a ward on one of the trees, a meaty hand grabbed my wrist. “What are you doing?” Maximus growled.
Not this again. I looked at his hand pointedly. “Let me go.”
Confusion mingled with the distrust in his eyes, like he remembered the last time he’d confronted me. The distrust won, and he squeezed my wrist until I flinched. “What kind of spell are you casting?” he demanded again.
A muscle in my jaw twitched. Why should I explain myself to you? I twisted my wrist, trying to break through the weak point in his fist, but his hand simply followed mine, holding me captive.
An arm slipped between us. “That’s enough,” Trey said, gently pressing his hand against Maximus’ chest. “He won’t explain if you’re bullying him.”
“I’m not bullying—” Maximus stopped and stared at my arm, where the pale skin had already turned red and agitated from his grip.
Releasing me, he took several steps back and ran a hand over his head, as if he could use his short, bristly hair to scrub away the sensation of touching me.
“He shouldn’t perform magic without telling us what he’s doing.
So we can prepare for the consequences.”
Trey pressed his lips in a displeased line, looking between us, then said quietly to me, “I don’t agree with his reasons, but he’s right that you shouldn’t be performing magic right now. You’ll wear yourself out—”
“I’m fine,” I interrupted, rubbing my abused wrist. Trey’s eyes locked on the motion. “Do you plan to kiss it to make it better?”
Heat flared in his blue eyes, and he leaned closer to me. “Make up your mind, Wilde. Are you going to flirt, or push me away?”
I’m going to push you down if you aren’t careful.
I opened my mouth, but I had no idea how to answer him.
How did I explain that I wanted him more than anything in the world, but I needed it to be forever?
If he walked away from me again—if he chose his family, his friends, his kingdom over me—I didn’t know what I would do.
Restart time again? Keep us trapped in an endless loop where he gave me just enough of himself to make it hurt worse each time he ripped it away?
Once this is over and he isn’t distracted by the Kingdom Defense Spell or the Desolated Lands or his family, I’ll tell him everything.
“It’s a protection spell,” I said, offering him one truth. “To keep us safe through the night.”
Trey watched me for a moment, and I couldn’t read his expression at all. Finally, he turned back to Maximus, who I’d forgotten about, and said, “See? He’s doing his job.”
Maximus glowered but said nothing else, returning to the pot of stew simmering over the campfire.
I continued drawing wards on the trees until I’d completed the perimeter, then sat on the side of the campfire furthest away from everyone else.
Fitz cleared his throat and said, “So, Wilde, what all does this protection spell do?”
I shrugged. “It will prevent anyone from seeing us through magical or mundane means. Any monsters on a midnight hunt will walk right past us without knowing we’re here.”
“So, will it keep out the Lord of Grimnight’s spies?”
I didn’t have any spies, but I soothed his worries anyway, “Yes.”
“Then this is an excellent time to discuss the manticore in the room.”
I frowned. “Did you see signs of a manticore?”
Fitz’s brow furrowed. “What? No. I’m talking about the large problem with claws and fangs everyone is ignoring.”
“You shouldn’t ignore manticores,” I replied solemnly. “They’re extremely dangerous and I don’t have any antivenom with me.”
“There isn’t a manticore,” Fitz assured me.
“Didn’t the mayor mention one?” Angelica asked. “Perhaps we should keep an eye out—”
Fitz threw his hands in the air. “It’s an expression! A segue into a necessary conversation about your argument with Trey!”
I tensed. Whether or not a manticore still prowled through the forest now seemed like the least of my problems. “That was a private conversation.”
Maximus snorted. “Didn’t seem private.”
“Maximus is right,” Fitz said. “Your argument was loud enough to attract imps, so of course the rest of us heard it. The part I’m stuck on is you accusing Trey of forgetting you. I also feel like we’ve met before, but I can’t remember where.”
I raised my fingers to snap, but a small hand clutched mine. Everyone needs to stop grabbing me, I thought as I glared at Delilah.
She leaned in close and hissed in my ear, “I do not want to start this damn quest over again.”
I lowered my hand. She was right, we’d already put too much effort into this timeline. I needed to find another way to defuse the situation. I looked Fitz straight in the eye as I lied through my teeth. “The first time we met was at your residence a few days ago.”
“Are you sure?” he asked, clearly unconvinced. “Perhaps we met somewhere by chance before. What’s your family name—”
“I don’t have one.”
Activity around the campfire halted. The orange firelight reflected off Fitz’s glasses, hiding his eyes, but it couldn’t hide his stunned expression. His mouth worked up and down like a fish blowing bubbles before he asked, “What do you mean you don’t have a family name?”
“Wilde is the only name I have.” It’d been hard enough to find one name I liked for myself, I wasn’t going to waste the effort on trying to think of two. Besides, evil mages didn’t need names once they earned a title.
Fitz cleared his throat awkwardly. “I suppose it’s a memorable enough name that if we had met before, I wouldn’t forget it.”
Crisis averted, I turned away from him—
“That still doesn’t explain your argument,” Maximus said.
My lips pursed in displeasure. This problem would be so much easier to solve if I could reset time back to before we’d had that argument at all.
“We had a one-night stand a few years ago,” Trey said.
Everyone turned to stare at him in shock—including me.
“I was a stupid kid who fucked him and left before sunrise. Since I did that shit a lot at eighteen, I forgot about it.”
Everyone forgot about the ghost of memories from dead timelines as they tried and failed to process this blunt reveal.
Trey had a special talent for derailing a conversation by spouting the most outlandish, personal information possible.
Even I was stuck on the confession, wondering which parts of his past were true, and which parts were made up solely to hide our relationship.
I knew he remembered bits and pieces from the other timelines—more than Fitz, less than Delilah—but it only seemed to be enough to taunt me with what we’d both lost.
Angelica recovered first with a snort of disgust. “That sounds like something you would do.”
Trey locked eyes with me and his voice lowered into an intimate promise. “I won’t ever forget you again.”