Chapter 4
Copper Gates
The one in the middle–the tallest one–removed his hat and spoke first. “Princess Norah of the Bianne line?”
Norah stared at him. She couldn’t make out any details or features, as it was the middle of the night, and the wind that blew in through the door had snuffed out her candle, but she resented the respectful, almost familiar tone he used when saying her name.
As if this intruder had any right.
Instead of answering, she searched the dark for Nanny’s shadow. But the older woman was nowhere to be seen.
The tall man took a few hesitant steps forward. “Are you Princess Norah?” he asked, pronouncing her name as though it were a caress.
Still, she didn’t answer.
“I’m sorry if we frightened you,” he said, coming yet closer. “That wasn’t my intention.”
This was more than Norah could handle. “Well then, you probably shouldn’t have broken down my door at such an evil hour like a petty thief!”
The man froze. This pause placed him near a window, letting in just enough of the moon’s weak light that she realized his features were familiar.
His hair was dark and thick, as were his brows and the scruff that was growing on his cheeks and chin.
His jawline was strong. In fact, his entire face was unusually angular and would have been quite pleasing had he not just broken into her house in the middle of the night.
Where had she seen this man before?
“I truly am sorry,” he said in a gentle voice, holding out one black gloved hand.
“I would have called like a decent gentleman if that insufferable woman had ever let anyone in.” His voice hardened as he said this, and Norah’s face flushed as she realized that Nanny’s fear–as overbearing as it often seemed–had absolutely been founded.
“Do you not recognize me?” he asked softly.
Norah’s heart, which had slowed slightly, began to race again. “You’ve seen me before?” She wasn’t about to admit to this man that there was something familiar about him. No, he could supply that information himself if he was so desperate for her to know it.
“Seen you? Princess, you are the kindest, most beautiful soul I’ve ever met.” He chuckled ruefully. “It’s not often that a man falls in love when he’s nine. And yet, I’ve never even kissed another woman for all my thoughts of you.”
She was dreaming. Norah had to be dreaming. Here was a handsome stranger in front of her who might as well be speaking romantic poetry–all while threatening Nanny and everything Norah held dear, simply by standing in her house in the dead of night.
“I’ve tried to speak to you so many times,” he said, taking another step closer.
“But each time I discovered you again, that woman would move you somewhere new, so we would have to begin our search once more. Very inconvenient.” His voice softened again.
“But finding you now… it was worth every year of my search.”
He was close enough now that he could almost touch her. And he seemed to wish to do so, stretching his hand out toward hers. As he did, the flash of his ring–a ruby–caught the weak light of the moon through the window, and Norah’s heart nearly stopped.
His signet was that of a pirate.
Nanny had been right. After all these years, the pirates had come for her.
But while Norah was alarmed, she wasn’t fully unprepared.
As fast as she could manage, she stumbled backward, trying to seem as though she were very afraid.
And while she was most definitely afraid, the man fell right into her trap.
He followed, his arms still outstretched as if to comfort her, his words soft and melodic.
Just as she and Nanny had practiced, Norah fell onto her bed. But as she caught herself, she reached behind the pillow to grab the iron fire poker Nanny insisted she keep hidden there. And with one hard swing, Norah managed to hit him on the head with a strike so satisfying it rattled her bones.
The man fell to his knees, and Norah, gripping the fire poker hard, tried to leap past him. But he managed to grab the bottom of her nightdress, pulling her to the floor so hard that all the air was knocked from her chest when she slammed against it.
“I promise!” the man said, stiffly getting to his feet, “you have nothing to–”
That was as far as he got. A glowing green whorl appeared above them, then shot toward him, making him scream as he let go of Norah’s skirt to cover his face.
The other men began to shout as well, racing out of the house and trampling the little garden gate in their haste, leaving their companion behind.
“Go, Norah!” Nanny’s voice came from the green whorl. “Run!”
Norah didn’t hesitate this time. She didn’t even stop to get her shoes or her cloak, but instead darted out into the night behind the two men.
They were out of sight now, so Norah turned and ran toward the only place she knew to go.
It was the place Nanny had said she would go to look for Norah, should they ever get separated.
The castle stood at the top of a hill, just beyond the wealthiest streets in the large port city.
During the day, the streets would have been teeming with people and carts and stalls full of food.
But as it was night now, they were empty and dark.
And they grew darker still as storm clouds rolled in.
Fat raindrops began to pelt Norah as she pushed herself, barefoot, up the ridiculously long hill.
Unfortunately, Nanny’s insistence that Norah remain in the house as much as possible had not made her a good runner, and she very soon tired and was forced to walk.
Knowing Nanny wouldn’t be able to hold the man off forever, Norah moved into the shadows as she continued to trudge uphill, trying not to think about how heavy the rain was making her nightdress, and how indecent she felt walking around sopping wet in the thing in the middle of the night.
Instead, she tried to think about Nanny.
Nanny would be unharmed as long as she remained in her fae form.
Unfortunately, though her fae form kept her safe, she wasn’t able to harm anyone in her fae form–only frighten them.
If she wished to physically stop the intruder, she would have to take a more material form.
And that material form was one which could be injured as easily as her own.
The memory of Nanny’s fae form should have frightened Norah.
Fae were the stuff of nightmares–something Destin’s royal family had experienced not many years before.
But Norah’s earliest memory of Nanny’s fae form was one of comfort.
She’d first seen it the night of the great fire, the one that had killed her entire family and most of her people–the night the pirates had burned her home and most of her island to the ground.
Norah had been small, and she’d been huddled on her bed, trying to lean away from the flames that had enveloped her nursery.
She vividly remembered the sticky, hot feeling of the sweat rolling down her face, chest, and back, and how she had cried out from the way the very air seemed to burn her skin.
But then Nanny, in her green whorling form, had flown into Norah’s room.
There, she had taken her human form, snatched Norah up, and raced out through the door, shielding Norah with her own body and cloak.
Then they had–though Norah had no memory of that part–made the journey from her family’s island over the water to the mainland of the western realm into TiFiore, her kingdom’s nearest neighbor. Then Nanny had taken her directly here, to the very gates which Norah came to a stop at now.
Hopefully, this time, they would let her in.
There was a very long moment in which she considered not knocking or asking to be let inside.
After all, she and Nanny had come countless times over the years, begging for an audience with the prince.
What would make tonight any different, when she looked like a drenched cat in what might as well be her underwear?
Surely, she could just wait for Nanny to–
Lightning flashed overhead, followed almost immediately by the crack of thunder.
“Please!” Norah began banging on the copper gates. “Please let me inside!”
Another violent clap of thunder shook the ground, and Norah tried harder.
“My name is Princess Norah of the Bianne throne, and I beg for an audience with–”
The sound of metal on metal made Norah turn to her left to see a much smaller gate open down the stone wall that surrounded the castle. Standing in the open gate was a man. He wore the official colors of the royal guard–burgundy and gold. And he bore a sword.
Norah froze with fear. Had she alarmed them? Was this man coming to take her to the dungeon for trying to break in?
But the man only banged the sword on the little metal gate again and beckoned her toward him.
Norah stood rooted to the spot. Did she dare go inside? Did she dare disobey?
But when she hesitated still, the young man only pushed open the little gate farther and beckoned her to him again, gesturing for her to come inside.
An even louder explosion of thunder nearly knocked her to the ground, making up Norah’s mind for her. Surely, the dungeon would be safer than this. As soon as she was steady on her feet, she hurried past him onto the castle grounds.