Chapter 23
Chapter
Twenty-Three
A flaming chicken struck me, throwing me back like a cannonball, away from the fire, clucking wildly all the way. Of course, because we needed a flaming chicken to add to the chaos. How could I stop the fire? I wasn’t supposed to be able to draw heavenly fire. My soul and blood weren’t pure enough. But there it was. Apparently, music trumped everything.
A falling ball of white light came down right into the flames, and then with a few words of pacification, the heavenly flames curled around him until you could see the commander in his shining armor, wings spread and glowing gold as liquid fire dripped off him to the ground. With the orchestration in the background, he was really something.
I sat on the ground, holding Yaga while I stared at the most terrifying person in the world. Yes, I knew, intellectually that he bathed in heavenly fire from time to time, but it’s not something I’d understood until that moment, when a mortal person commanded flames, and then in the next moment, they were gone, leaving nothing of the troll and her poisonous blood other than an outline showing where she’d been.
“Were you trying to break every single one of your ribs?” he asked, voice like thunder, making everyone in the stadium jump, including me.
“No, sir,” I stammered in a shaky voice. All of me was shaky.
“Stand, soldier,” he snapped.
I scrambled to my feet immediately, dropping Yaga, who flapped her wings around my face until she landed on top of my helmet.
“Tell me the conditions of this duel.”
I stared at him. I was still holding Hero, because my sheath had gotten ripped off me at some point. Conditions of this duel? “Battle to death, winner takes all,” I mumbled.
“Describe the prize more clearly.”
I cleared my throat and tasted blood, so I had to swallow it so I wasn’t spitting in front of the commander. “One betrothal to ogre Rook the Luthier,” I said as crisp and clear as I could. It still wasn’t very.
“Very well. Where is this ogre?” He looked around, and I followed his gaze in time to see Rook leap off the stage where all the musicians had been, and then in the middle of that leap, he shifted into the Magr, landing lightly and then running so fast, so huge, so deadly dangerous until he stopped abruptly on the other side of my father, Commander of the Holy Order of the Swords of Truth.
“Ogre, do you verify this person’s claim?” my dad asked with heavenly fire still burning in his eyes, visible beneath his helmet.
“I do,” Rook/Magr rumbled.
“And will you have this prize?” he asked me, gesturing at the most wonderful ogre in the entire world.
It may have been a concussion, but he looked even more glowingly beautiful than ever, even without the pretty Rook. It took me a few more swallows to keep down the blood before I could speak. “I will.” I sounded certain, in spite of being so breathless.
My dad nodded and raised his hands. “By the power vested in me by all that is holy and good, I pronounce you husband and wife.”
The weight of his announcement was a physical blow that took me and Rook to our knees. Wait, what? We were married? That seemed sudden.
“Do you have rings? No? Convenient that I brought some.” My father handed Rook a pretty band that was too small for all of his fingers, then handed me an ogre-sized band in heavenly gold.
I slid it onto Rook’s finger in a daze, but quickly because we had to get this finished so I could go to the hospital. I kept having to swallow blood. That meant internal bleeding. And my armor was still so hot. I’d been baked inside of it. “With this ring, I you do wed,” I said and then the words hit me. I was going to marry Rook? Really? Someone really wanted to marry me? My heart glowed even while everything else ached. Were those the right words? Probably not, but who needed words when they had love? He was so beautiful.
Rook frowned at me, concern in his eyes, along with something hot and sweet. “With this ring, I you do wed.” We were saying it wrong together. Had anything been sweeter? He was going to marry me even though he was ‘He-Who-Runs-From-Women.’
He slid a ring onto my finger, but not the one my dad had given him. No, he put that one on my other hand. Perfect. I had two rings. It looked like four, because my vision was getting blurrier and blurrier along with a ringing in my ears, but it didn’t matter, because however many Rooks swam in my vision, I’d take them all.
“Now I’m taking my daughter home,” my dad said, before he picked me up and then launched out of there with his pretty wings, carrying me away.
Wait! He couldn’t take me away from my new husband before I’d been thoroughly kissed. Then again, no one was going to stop him. The world was a blur. Miles passed in seconds, and my stomach would have rebelled if it hadn’t already been turned into hamburger. Happily, I lost consciousness and didn’t wake up until I was strapped to a bed with tubes in my arms and nose. I must look so pretty.
Rook was sitting beside my bed in the comfortable chair my dad had spent a lot of time in the last time he’d brought me home. Rook’s eyes were closed, his head resting against the left wing of the floral chair, but he wasn’t sleeping. I could smell his thoughts, and they were heavy, slightly panicked, also a complicated tangle of something like perfect complex harmony.
“Are you composing?” I mumbled, then I realized how dry my mouth was.
His eyes popped open and he studied me for a breathless moment before he shook himself and poured me a glass of water.
“You’re awake.” His relief was palpable, both in his beautiful voice as well as the scent of him. “Your skin has taken its natural tone, a green tinge like glittering scales. If you’d like to replace the glamour, you can,” he said, voice steady, calm, but I could smell his relief and worry and the song. I could smell the song. What a useful thing to be able to smell.
I took a drink while he supported me around my shoulders, holding the beautifully cut glass to my lips. But it was nothing compared to his scent, rich, heady, like a cello warming up.
“What do you play?” I asked once I’d gotten a few swallows.
His lips tilted in the slightest smile. “That’s what you want to know? Of course it is. I play a little of most things.”
“How much is a little?”
“Not enough to impress the music master of Singsong City.” He picked up my right hand and held it up, slowly raising it to his lips, and pressed a featherlight kiss that barely touched his tusks to my skin. He had such pretty tusks.
“Why are you wearing this skin?” I asked, tightening my grip on his hand.
“I don’t fit in the chair with the Magr. You can smell me composing music?” He raised a brow and looked so rakish and disrespectable that I shivered in delight.
“So, you are composing something?” I tried to grab him with my left hand, and then I looked at it, or the bandages it was wrapped in. That hand was not doing so well. Was my ring still on it?
I blinked at it, then remembered the bite of heavenly fire. Baking inside my armor. Yaga knocking me away from the fire before my dad saved us all. I took a slightly hyperventilating gasp as I squeezed his hand. “You composed a new version of Singsong’s symphony. How did you get those musicians? You promised them instruments, didn’t you? You’re going to spend the next decade paying them off instead of making me anything.” But what if I never recovered full use of my hands? What if I never played again?
He smiled and pressed my right hand to his cheek. How had it not burned? That was the hand that had been holding Hero. She must have protected me from the flames. What an excellent weapon. And to think that I’d actually wielded her, and defeated the troll, and gotten married. I should focus on the good things, not on the rising panic. Music was my life. What if I couldn’t play?
I curled my fingers around his jaw, holding on with all of my strength. “You married me?”
He nodded, covering my hand with his, pressure on my hand that made me aware of all the bruises and the formerly dislocated finger. It wasn’t burned, but it still wasn’t great. “Of course. Your father would have chopped off my head otherwise.”
“Hm. At least it would be a quick and painless death.”
He shook his head. “I can’t die yet. Ever since I’ve met you, my head has been full of music that I need to write, that I need to hear you play.”
I stared at him while my heart ached and my stomach churned. “How bad is my hand? You think I’ll be able to play again? Heavenly fire…”
He caught my face in his hands, gazing at me with an intensity I’d never seen before. “You will heal. Even with only one hand, you’re the finest, most capable and breathtaking musician in the world.”
I swallowed hard while my eyes watered. This is what marriage was supposed to be like. Even if I was ruined, he could still see the beauty. I cleared my throat. “You know all those musicians, the best in the world, but you want me to play, even if it’s with one hand?”
He leaned forward until his forehead was against mine, eyes flickering gold while his thin lines of magic came to life under his skin. “You are the only musician in the world to me. How do you feel?”
I loved him so much. And he loved me too. That really was a miracle. “I’m mostly numb from the painkillers, but how much of my body I can’t move is a pretty bad sign,” I admitted.
His eyes grew stormy as he stared at me. “You almost drained all the musicians as you laid those souls to rest. You would have died if not for your grandfather’s efforts. I really don’t like you almost dying, however good it is to lay souls to rest. Please don’t do it again,” he rumbled, rubbing my hair with his cheek.
I gave a shaky laugh. “I have no plans to ever do anything like that again. I left the HOSTs because I didn’t like all the blood. You don’t have any other secret troll fiancé’s I have to defeat, do you?”
He growled. “No. And if I did, I wouldn’t let you deal with it. My precious love, I’m not worth fighting for.”
I snorted. “You’re Rook the Luthier and my favorite composer. You’re also the only person I want to snuggle for the rest of my life. What could be a worthier cause than music and snuggling?”
He sighed heavily, music in every breath and movement of him. “I suppose I’ll have to put more effort into my snuggling skills.”
“You’re awake?” my father demanded as he threw open the door and walked in, golden wings spread like he was going to cut off someone’s head with them. I’d seen him do it. His wings were terrifying, although they could be cuddly when they were in the right mood. This was not that mood.
Rook sat back, letting my father get a good look at me.
“The prodigal returns home,” the commander said, gesturing at me broadly. We were doing drama then.
I wrinkled my nose at him. “That’s right. Where’s my fatted lamb?”
“You can have meat when you can chew it. You haven’t noticed? You broke your jaw.” His frown at me was definitely an accusation.
“My jaw feels fine.” More or less. Mostly less.
“That’s because you can’t feel it. Now then, let’s discuss this case, shall we?” He gave Rook a suspicious glance, like he suspected the ogre, but there’s no way he would have given me Hero, and not chopped off Rook’s head with her if he didn’t trust Rook. My husband. And my dad had married us. Wow. There were miracles all over the place.
“What case?” I asked, trying to focus.
Rook started counting off his fingers. “There was a collapsing stone wall, a goblin bomb, an elven arrow, as well as the troll.”
I looked at him in surprise. “You think Garnagth was an assassination attempt?”
Rook nodded. “How else would she have known about you? Someone transported her and her friends to Singsong City, but no one has a memory of their passing. They simply appeared. That means transported using a portal, most likely.”
My dad scowled at Rook, but it was a thinking scowl, not a killing one. No, he looked quite serene when he was channeling one of his lethal weapons. “A wall? Someone dropped a wall on you? That’s deep magic. Goblin bomb means money while an elven arrow means connections. A portal means high magic. I’d bet my wings that it’s someone in the elven aristocracy.”
I nodded at him and then stopped because I was getting some feeling back in my jaw, and it was not a good feeling. “That’s why Rook thought it was my grandfather, the emperor, but that’s a dead end, because he worked so hard keeping me alive.”
My father patted my head like I was still five years old. Also, ow. “That’s why he’s here.”
“To keep me alive?”
“No, to catch the person who wants to kill you, although I suppose the two are complimentary. You don’t go around shooting elven arrows into ogre princes without getting reported to the very highest levels. I believe your elven musician friend reported the case.”
“Tiago reported it? He didn’t say anything to me.”
My dad shrugged. “Elves don’t speak unless it’s necessary. Now then, your grandfather’s the emperor? And your husband is the Ogre Prince. So, you really are my little princess.”
He smiled the most irresistible smile. I couldn’t help returning it and feeling like everything was going to be okay.
I held out my arm to him and he immediately folded me into a solid hug, golden wings snuggling around me like a massive chicken. For a second, I held onto my dad and let him protect me from the rest of the world, needing to be safe from all the uncertainty and pain. After a few minutes, I pulled away, feeling like an idiot, but also slightly better.
I smiled at him and he smiled back.
Then he said, “Now, princess, we go to war.”
“War?!” I grabbed onto his sleeve. “What do you mean? I fought that fur bikini abomination so that there wouldn’t be a war!”
My dad took my hand and squeezed it slightly while he smiled at me. “That’s the way things go sometimes. We’ll leave first thing in the morning.”
“I can’t go to war like this.” I gestured at myself with my one good arm, which was still hooked up to a needle.
“Ah, no, of course you can’t. You’ll sleep here tonight and then take the train back to Singsong City while I go with Rook to put down the troll uprising. Gavriel will be your guard.”
I looked from him to Rook, and when I looked at my luthier, my husband, I couldn’t look away. My heart sank. “You’re going to war without me?”
He hesitated, then nodded. “Your father has allied himself with us in this particular cause. Once the trolls have been pushed back, you should be healed enough that we can go visit my father so that you can be officially crowned.”
I stared at him, then at my dad. “Crowned? Me? But I need to get back to Singsong City and deal with the aftermath of that ridiculous jubilee.”
My dad shrugged. “You’re the one who had to marry a prince. You’ll have to stand beside him in his duties like he’ll have to stand beside you in yours. Mirabel, the Music Master, hm? And of Singsong City? You couldn’t find somewhere slightly more structurally sound?”
“All the other cities Music Halls were already taken. Still, ogres aren’t supposed to have a royal structure.”
My dad snorted. “It’s about politics. You’ll be his propaganda princess. You know all about that.”
“If she doesn’t want that burden, she won’t have it,” Rook growled, glaring at my dad and stealing my hand in his to hold it carefully, like it and me were precious.
My heart melted as I soaked in his love. “My dad’s right. I understand the need to promote the cause you believe in. Don’t worry. If I ever start resenting the cause, you can make me an instrument.”
My dad chuckled and stroked my hair. “Integrating ogres into civilized society? It’s a worthy cause. Ogres are more than war machines. Like angels. Some of them are Music Masters, holding together undeserving cities with will and faith.”
I blinked at him and my eyes watered. Really? He thought my cause was worthy? Was I going to cry?
He stepped back. “Rest. We’ll likely be gone when you wake up. Sleep as long as you like. There’s no rush.”
“Why am I going back to Singsong City when the medical team… Ah. They’re going with you.” That made sense, but I still hated that Rook was going to war without me. I’d just learned such good shield spells. I could put them on him so he could be safe.
My dad nodded then raised a golden brow over his sky-blue eyes. “One thing, my Miracle. How, precisely, did you summon heavenly fire?”
I stared at him. How had I done that? “It was the music. It was so heavenly and those musicians were on fire.”
He snorted. “The music? You mean that you have no idea. You’re just on a battlefield and suddenly you kill thousands of people, and you have no idea how, and then you’re facing a troll, almost have her killed, and only then do you accidentally summon heavenly fire.” He tsked and then bent down to kiss my forehead before he pulled back to study me with twinkling eyes. “This is why you should stay home to raise the next generation. Leave the fighting to the men.” He winked while Rook rumbled.
Yeah, like his first wife, who hadn’t raised my brother at all. She’d been more career driven and less interested in kids than he was. That’s why he hired my mother, the musician, to help with Rich. And then my dad fell in love with her and had a love match.
I shook my head. “It’s a little late for that. I married an ogre.”
“There are absolutely no obstacles to children between you and your husband. Do you think I would have given my consent if it would set you up to die in childbirth? Certainly not. It’s your duty to continue the line of angelic blood.”
Still? I hadn’t escaped that? “With an ogre?” I glanced at Rook, to see if he was offended, but he was looking at me with the intensity that I reserved for sushi and his instruments. It was hard to look away from a gaze that sweetly burning.
My dad said, “With whatever, as long as it’s already part of what makes up my precious Miracle. I am relieved that you didn’t fall for an elf, with the way you were always going on about their music. I’m not sure if I could have lived with that. At least ogres are honest.”
I smiled at him, then threw my arm around him and squeezed him tight before I pulled back away. “Thank you.”
He studied me then nodded soberly, his serious commander nod. “You should rest now. Once the trolls have been defeated, I’ll accompany you to be crowned.”
I wrinkled my nose at him. He winked at me, and then he gave Rook a slight bow, and sauntered out of the room like he didn’t have a care in the world. He always looked like that when he was going to war. I watched him leave while Rook landed on the edge of the bed and stared at me, so close that I could smell the music stronger than ever.
“When are you going to write it down?” I asked, aching for him to take me into his arms and never let me go. But he was going to war. I understood that, and I wasn’t up for much of anything.
“On the trip north. I’ll play it for you when we come back. I shouldn’t be gone long.”
“I love you.”
He smiled and then carefully wrapped his arms around me and then shifted so I was lying on his shoulder. “I love you, Mirabel Miracle.”
I closed my eyes and sighed happily. “Rook, thank you for the music. I wouldn’t have made it without you.”
“Nonsense. You’re amazing.”
I shook my head, rubbing my face against his shoulder and neck. I inhaled deeper and deeper, drawing his rich, delicious scent into my lungs. “I like the way you smell.”
He rumbled a growl that reverberated through every part of me. “Do you? Finally, you’ve fallen for my irresistible appeal. I have you in bed, but you’re too injured to touch. I suppose I’ll just have to drown in your sweet, beguiling, endlessly mesmerizing scent. Do you mind? You always hate when ogres smell you.”
I rubbed my nose against his throat. Even my nose was bruised, but his skin was silky and so sweet. “You aren’t an ogre. You’re my ogre. Let that be a lesson to you not to use someone as your propaganda poster child without giving them proper compensation.”
He held his large hand against my hair, holding me like he wouldn’t ever let me go. “And what would proper compensation be?”
“Instruments, naturally.”
He rumbled the sweetest laugh and tucked me even closer, so gently that it didn’t hurt at all. And nothing ever would again.