Rose Red: The Thorns Series, #2

By Amanda M. Blake

Hair as black as night, skin as white as bone, lips as red as blood…

Just because the princess wakes up doesn't mean she's saved.

 

After Sylvaine and the Sleeping Kingdom awaken from their enchantments, the Hunter Brotherhood struggles to help the cursed population adjust to life in the modern world.

 

But when Sylvaine turns up in New York City with no explanation, then goes missing, the search leads Olivia, Griffin, and companions old and new deeper into even darker stories, more grim tales with endings that hadn't gone as planned.

 

From giant rats to stolen hearts, it turns out saving princesses isn't as simple as a kiss.

 

Series Advisory: Scenes of sexual and physical assault, violence, and torture. Because fairy tales can sometimes be gruesome and grim.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Amanda M. Blake
• Release date: Dec 10, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393937203

Book preview

FAE is unprepared.

The Assimilation and Education of the Enchanted program—called Fantasy Assimilation and Education or FAE by Hunter operatives around the world—has worked frantically and with as much efficiency as one can expect from a silent, secret intergovernmental agency to get things ready for the arrival of the Sleeping Kingdom. But with just a day’s notice, there is only so much they could do. They are rushed, harried, coordinated but spread thin.

Although Adelaide and Caspar speak with her on the way, the rest of the royal family and the nobility around them have no loyalty to the girl. When they arrive at the compound—composed of squat, ugly, tan buildings and fields of giant white tents, where the sound of farm animals to the east of the buildings is overwhelmed by the rumble and hum of generators and air conditioning units—she becomes separated from them.

Disorientation doesn’t disguise that some of the priests intentionally push her back. Veins of fear run through their disdain as they step in front of her, crowding her away after all the buses are emptied of their inhabitants. They don’t know she was a princess, only that she wears strange, mannish clothing and that she looks like a witch.

Away from the prince and princess, she knows no one. She is alone among hundreds, which is more alone than by herself.

The Hunters and the people who work with them direct everyone away from the buildings and to the tents instead. The FAE staff apologizes for any inconvenience, but the tents are for everyone’s protection.

They herd her three tents down from where the royal family is taken, and after that, she doesn’t see them again.

Her group mostly consists of knights and lords, their wives and children, and a cluster of monks. A man at the front of the line asks each person their name and occupation, then inputs them into his computer. Many of the kingdom’s denizens stare at the machine as they pass, but there is so much that is unfamiliar that it doesn’t merit any more confusion or attention than the composition of the tent, the man’s glasses, the strange white suit with the clear mask, or the guards’ walkie-talkies.

The man appears frazzled, hurrying through each question and each person as fast as he can take the information down.

When she reaches him, he doesn’t even look up.

Name? He pushes up his glasses through his Hazmat mask and puts his fingers back to the keys of the computer.

She gives him her name. The man blinks when she speaks English instead of the Old French that he is speaking to the people from the kingdom. She notes his translation amulet, and he glances up to note hers, but he doesn’t see her, not really. He merely takes advantage of her English.

Occupation?

A princess? A maidservant? A cadaver? She doesn’t know, and that’s what she tells him.

The man huffs impatiently.

When he completes the short questionnaire, with fewer answers than he realizes, the man gives her a number—00107—and tilts his head toward the zippered door at the back of the enclosed room.

Following the census, the FAE staff divides their group again, men from women, for physical examination. Children under twelve are separated from their parents. The staff meets protests with insistence and mild force. Then magic, if force is not enough. They have little patience for their subjects’ alarm and ignorance—there’s no time for it. They need to process each person as quickly as possible and get them into their quarantine cells. Families can speak to each other through the walls. Then, if their tests come back clean, they will be reunited at the end of quarantine. Full explanations would be more forthcoming during assimilation classes.

She stands with women already overwrought from a lengthy, cramped plane ride with passengers who never imagined flying in the air in a giant metal tube and hadn’t fully trusted it—women who have just been ripped from fathers, brothers, husbands, children. They cling to each other, holding hands, arms around shoulders. Many already shed their tears on the homeland they left. They are dry-eyed, weary, and frightened.

No one holds her hand. No one knows her, the quiet, slight girl in the corner. In spite of the cramped plastic corridor, she still manages to have her own space in which no one else wants to intrude. Their reaction to her is involuntary and unconscious. She doesn’t mind.

In the next room, women dressed in the same bulky suits as the census taker instruct everyone to remove their clothing for inspection. The ones inspecting have translation amulets. The assistants do not. When the inspectors speak to the assistants, only the girl can understand them.

Number? a woman asks her when it is her turn.

She gives the woman her number.

Please take off your clothes. Let me know if I do anything that hurts you or makes you uncomfortable. We’ll have to do a blood test after inspection. The needle may sting a little.

The girl sheds the clothes that Olivia gave her and that Griffin tailored to her, though she refuses to remove her translation amulet and they don’t insist. Holding her arms out to the sides and standing with her legs slightly parted, she feels no shame, but she senses eyes on her, and not just by the woman inspecting her.

The woman looks over her body for distinguishing marks, a means of personal identification as well as to detect any lesions that might suggest disease. The woman was all brisk business before, but now she pauses as she runs her gloved hands over the girl’s body, searching for bumps. The woman finds not a single mar. No freckles, no scars, no rash, no adolescent acne. Nothing. The skin is as smooth as polished jade.

The woman considers making a note in the file, stylus hovering above the tablet, but she doesn’t have a code for an unnatural lack of identifying marks.

Then the woman takes some of her blood, where it mingles with racks of other vials. The girl notices that the woman, bewildered and rushed, forgets to label the vials before she hands them to her assistant. Her distraction is understandable. Those vials are probably not the only mistake made that afternoon.

When the woman finishes, she tells the girl to put on white cotton underwear, a plain white shirt, and white pants. The assistant approximated her size when choosing the clothing. The clothes are loose, but the pants have a drawstring. They will do.

A different woman escorts her to a small square cell a little wider than herself if she were lying on the floor.

It takes another two days before a nurse reaches her to take her picture for a photo identification card. The nurse calls her 00107.

Two more days pass before a doctor enters the small cell and gives her a complete physical. He stays longer than a few moments to complete a lengthier questionnaire. When the doctor discovers that the slight, odd girl—with skin only a shade darker than the bedsheets—can read, he shows her the medical chart, explaining what different notations mean. He asks if she has a surname or a preference for a surname as they finalize their information for modern identification purposes.

She tells him who she is. The doctor nearly drops the chart. She is not where the Hunters would have put her.

Consider yourself fortunate they spelled your name correctly, the doctor says, and I apologize for all the mishaps over the last few days. It’s been an ordeal for us as well. We’re not used to so many at once. If we had known you were Princess Sylvaine, we would have processed you through with the rest of the royalty.

Princess Sylvaine is dead, left behind in the coffin, though left behind first in a castle that is no more. The Hunter woke her into a world in which she is simply Sylvaine White. It sounds so similar, and yet she feels like a different person—more herself than before, if that is possible.

If the royals don’t want her, that’s nothing new, and she isn’t beneath mingling with those born from humbler roots. She tells the doctor so.

Well, you seem in remarkable health, Sylvaine, the doctor replies. Your blood tests still aren’t back yet, but everything else is in order. It’s an honor to have you here. And a relief to speak English. I’ve never gotten used to translation amulets or spells.

She asks whether she can contact Ian, Olivia, or Tobin and inquires whether FAE can return her possessions.

After quarantine, says the doctor.

Four weeks pass. The nurses keep televisions on outside the patients’ rooms so they can watch the news and children’s learning shows from their cells—to aid with literacy. All the patients marvel at what they see, unable to distinguish between the advertisements and the shows themselves, between fiction and real life.

She can tell the difference, and she sends the message through the thin but hermetically sealed walls, educating the rest of them on what the ads are for and how they shouldn’t be trusted, on how animation is no more witchcraft than puppetry, nor intended to represent reality. When the women next to her asks how she knows, she cannot tell them. She just knows.

Because she can read, the Hunters arrange tests to gauge her knowledge so they can plan her educational curriculum. When she asks, they provide books—not textbooks, but fiction popular with her age group. She does their tests and reads the books.

She tests off the charts, beyond the basic education given by her tutors, her mother, the priests, and the court magician. She doesn’t understand some of the things she knows. She solves equations she’s never seen and shouldn’t comprehend. She speaks languages she’s never heard.

When she suspects the translation amulet has something to do with it, she removes it to answer a question about physics. The words become gibberish—she has not worn the amulet for more than six months, the requirement for full lingual osmosis. But she remembers the meaning of the question and answers it accordingly with what her language has words for.

At the end of quarantine, they still can’t find her initial blood tests. She is in perfect health, so they retest for some of the diseases they found in a few other subjects—diseases of the time they came from and not of the time lost in between. As they suspected, the curses provided their subjects with full immunity from centuries’ worth of plagues and pandemics, down to innumerable common colds.

The blood tests find no disease. The staff remains pressed for attention, and because she seems fine, they release her into the general population.

The dormitories are still sex-segregated, at least until FAE can arrange mixed housing for families. Meals are communal. The girl refuses to be moved in with the nobility. She prefers the company of the commoners, who view her with caution but welcome her knowledge of the world outside these sterile white tents.

The people attend language and literacy classes, but for her, the Hunters arrange further tests and a tutor, a young man with thick glasses and straight blond hair like a bowl over his head. His eyes are keen, and she doesn’t like him, but he doesn’t do anything but watch her as though through magnifying glasses.

He brings her more novels. She prefers those over the philosophy, science, and history texts they also expect her to read, which have nothing new to offer her. She breezes through them, excels at each and every test her tutor throws at her while the Hunters struggle to teach the people from the Sleeping Kingdom the alphabet without the use of translation amulets for each person. Shaky translation spells supplement the shortage.

The amulet she wears is hers. She makes that clear whenever someone asks her to loan it for someone else’s use. It was given to her. It belongs to her. None of the Hunters dare to contradict her. After all, she is their Snow White.

They say Ian is busy and that Olivia doesn’t pick up when they call. Their lies are as transparent as their greed—not for wealth but for understanding. They are fascinated by her. They wish to study her without interference. As long as they are not too intrusive, she permits it. It has only been almost two months.

Soon after, she realizes something is very wrong.

She doesn’t tell the Hunters, because she can’t articulate what has changed. Once, when she loses herself in silence during her private lessons, her tutor yells, his blandly attractive face twisting into something unpleasant. He pounds on the textbook to rouse her, but when she returns to herself, she walks away from him. He grabs her arm like it’s a piece of meat, demanding to know what the hell she thinks she’s doing. She meets his eyes until he releases her, until he remembers that she is not his science project but the reason he has any power at all. If she feels uncomfortable and wishes to close her eyes in her bed instead of taking lessons she doesn’t need, she will do so.

But not to sleep. She doesn’t like to sleep.

More time passes, and that’s when the stares begin, secrets behind their eyes as though they understand and she does not. When she leaves her bunk and enters the communal area, she senses conversations abruptly ended, thoughts interrupted and unspoken, chastisements they do not want her to hear.

She cannot read their minds to understand what they know. She cannot even understand what she knows. It lies beyond her grasp—covered by a veil she cannot find the opening to pass through. If she could speak to the Hunters, it might be at the tip of her tongue, but instead it tightens into a tense, painful knot at the base of her spine. The more they want from her, the warier she is to share.

Then she becomes angry. They know something and won’t tell her. Do they intend to protect her? To save her from herself? To keep her pretty little head from bursting with whatever truth they hold? Or is it more insidious? Perhaps they intend to leverage their knowledge for hers.

But she has nothing to give them. Whatever she knows is lost in the mansion of her dreams, dreams that span a thousand years. How is she supposed to parse through the hell of her nightmares to find their answers, answers they do not truly need?

Before she enters a room, fingers are pointed, staff members fired, accusations flung. Drawn brows insufficiently smooth when they see that she eavesdrops. They lower their arguments to hisses. The doctors want to tell her. The Hunters want to wait. That is all they give her, all they discuss in what they think is her absence. They save the more substantial arguments for the world beyond this white, plastic isolation.

She fears what they keep from her, what she cannot say, because whatever it is eats away at her from the inside.

When she does sleep—and oh, how she hates to sleep—she dreams that she reclines in a scarlet lotus flower that opens over and around her like peacock feathers and spread skirts. She hears music, deeper than a flute, but she cannot see the player in the darkness around her, like the deepest parts of the dark forest. Her white dress, pristine, blossoms red. When she opens her mouth, she sees herself as though in a mirror, but what she sees isn’t right. Just as she reaches out to touch her reflection, the other girl begins to change.

But never enough for her to know what the girl will become, because she blinks and wakes up to the white room, the white sheets, her white clothes—everything so white, too white. In the harsh, electrical light, she sometimes has to squint against the pervasive whiteness around her, its purity as artificial as its composition.

She wants the forest back, grass under her feet, dirt between her toes, the rustle of a breeze through leaves. Even hearing the farm animals on the other side of the compound would remind her that a world did indeed exist beyond the tent walls—instead of some empty, deserted wasteland under a cold sun. The more desolate the stony, wintry pastures of her heart, untended and uncared for by the very protectors she created, the more she believes that the world beyond reflects it.

She recognizes the ridiculousness of this, but her thoughts are slippery, sliding through her fingers like a gold chain. Surrounded by white as she is, her imagination—fraught with the weight of centuries of torment and her present dreams and disquiet—projects shaky scenes on the walls like old silent movies.

Just when she thinks she cannot contain herself anymore, she wakes up in the middle of the night and stares down at her sheets, at the spreading shadow that reminds her of the fleeting remnants of her dreams, like black feathers in her hair from birds in flight.

But it isn’t the shadow that wakes her—it is the pain.

She moans, wrapping her arms around her abdomen as though that will keep everything in should she split up the front. She wants to take a zipper at the base of her belly and yank it up between her breasts, let it all spill from her. Maybe that will make her better, letting whatever festers within out—a beast released from the cage under her ribs.

Go back to sleep! someone grumbles at her.

Her feet slap against the plastic floors as she stumbles out of the dormitory and into the dimly lit corridor to the bathrooms. At first, her footsteps sound like rustling paper, but then she steps in puddles with a wet squish. She glances down and realizes that she walks in her own blood that spills down her legs and stains her pants dark.

She doubles over as every muscle and organ in her abdomen seems to clamp down at once, an agony of extended contraction. She falls to her side. Her shirt rides up when she rolls over, exposing a pronounced curve of belly that was not there a few hours earlier.

Skin white as snow, lips red as blood, hair black as the raven’s wing. My little girl is becoming a woman.

She swears something moves in her abdomen, pressing out against the delicate flesh.

Another wave of contractions rolls through, and she screams, covering her face with hands smeared red. She arches her back as she expels childhood between her legs.

Modern men and modern women rush to her with their mouths open wide and with knowing, pitying eyes. Their pity turns to horror when they pull her pants and underwear off and see what awful secret she has carried with her through the curse, a secret kept even from her.

At first, her vision goes black.

Then all she sees is red.

The pink rubber ball hovered over Olivia’s face. Her hair draped over Griffin’s lap, which cushioned her head as she stared up at the ball. It dipped closer to brush the tip of her nose. Olivia giggled.

Concentrate. But he was too late.

The ball swept back up into the air. Olivia lost her hold on it, and it fell onto her face, hitting her right eye.

And this is why we work with rubber balls, Griffin said, which only made Olivia laugh harder.

For months now, Olivia had come to the Castle every Friday night or Saturday afternoon, depending on her schedule. On Sundays, Griffin taught her magic. She would never achieve the ease with which even Hunters cast some mid-level spells. She wouldn’t be able to conjure images in Griffin’s scrying glass or float anything larger than a watermelon, but although she wasn’t looking to run headlong into another fight, she thought she should have at least a few weapons in her arsenal if one happened upon her.

Back home, she’d resumed her knife-throwing, which had gotten rusty. She was also visiting the range for shooting practice. She’d asked Tobin whether he wanted to join her. He had raised an eyebrow and returned his attention to his tablet without a word on the subject.

They had talked about the events of five months ago, but not often, and they hadn’t discussed the deaths involved since the plane ride back. Olivia thought that if Tobin could shoot straight when the occasion called for it, they could both afford her leaving him alone.

In spite of the ill winds that had brought them together, the days Olivia spent in Griffin’s apartment seemed untouched by the strange numbness she sometimes saw in Tobin’s eyes and that she knew reflected within her own. In the light, the wonderful light that filled his bright, gleaming penthouse, it was much easier to forget the darkness.

Especially with the radiant blooms of the roses sweeping their scent through the apartment every time she opened the greenhouse door, and the way Griffin seemed so much freer when he could remove his scarves and outer robes and walk through his apartment as himself when she was around. Any time the slippery finger of doubt ran over her spine before she fell asleep, his massive hands stroked softly over her back to ease the chill. During the days, her cheeks hurt from smiling so much.

Olivia couldn’t explain to him how important it was that he didn’t even question her desire to want to learn how to protect herself with magic. No nattering on about how he was powerful and could protect her—although he was powerful and, under most circumstances, he probably could protect her better than she could protect herself. But he only had her two or three days a week. He couldn’t be with her the rest of the time, and even if he were, that was no guarantee that he could protect her when he wasn’t always able to protect himself. After all, Tobin and Olivia had killed Dianne and Bluebeard. Not Griffin. Not the Hunters.

So next time she had to fight against insanely powerful sorcerers, she could float a ball or make little flash-flares of fire at them before they eviscerated her.

She was aware that her efforts were more to make herself feel better than to truly prepare her for battle, especially since she would die happy if she were never in a battle like that again. She certainly wasn’t going to look for trouble more incendiary than a shouting match. In a more dangerous situation, though, these magic lessons really wouldn’t do her much good. She would need stealth and cunning, not power.

One could argue that Olivia had cunning. Business cunning, anyway, although at least thirty-seven percent of that came from her New York gallery manager, Angela, her Eureka Springs gallery manager, Donna, and of course Tobin, her partner in crime—formerly assistant. But even Tobin would snort at anyone who suggested she had stealth. Somehow, Olivia thought peacock blue hair, lurid tattoos, and a propensity for brightly colored clothes and shoes would give her away.

In the tug of war between normal and Olivia, Olivia didn’t always win. Hell, sometimes she rooted for normal, like when it came to football, pizza, and cocktails. But it wasn’t always about winning. It was about showing up for the fight in the first place, and showing up with style.

Usually with pants.

She kicked her bare legs up and crossed her feet at the ankles as she stretched her arms above her head.

You won’t distract me. But Griffin smiled and glanced up the length of her legs before his gaze returned to hers. Now pick up the ball again. He placed a hand on her shoulder when she started to get up. No, from here.

She sighed dramatically, turned her head, and found where the ball had rolled against the foot of the coffee table. Focusing the place inside her skull she associated with magic, she thought, Rise up, little sister.

The only word she needed was ‘rise,’ but magic didn’t mind a little improvisation as long as the foundation was solid. It even seemed to respond better when the words came from her more naturally rather than when she used the somewhat stilted, formal speech in the beginner’s spell book that Augusta had given her.

The pink rubber ball lifted from the wooden floor as though held by a string. Olivia beckoned it to her until she could roll over onto her back and hover the ball above her face again.

A familiar ache pressed between her eyebrows. She had to be careful that pressure didn’t turn into pain. She could flex her flimsy magical muscles all she wanted as long as she didn’t force it too hard. Then came the nosebleeds, headaches, and bouts of unconsciousness.

But now she could float a ball for more than five minutes, and that was something.

Nicely done. Griffin snatched it out of the air with his own magic and dropped it into the center of his palm. It looked like a large marble in his hand.

Any day now I’ll move up to Happy Meal toys, Olivia said as Griffin set the ball on a side table.

While it’s important to push your limits, it’s just as important not to push yourself too much, Olivia. If you want to develop your abilities, it must be at a pace that won’t cause irreparable harm. Your reaction to too much casting alarms me.

It was an old, unworn argument, but a man who had lived alone for multiple centuries knew a little something about patience. To be honest, though, her impatience was more of a running joke than a true complaint.

Did you have to pace yourself when you were learning magic? Olivia asked.

Those were different circumstances. You may have been able to spray paint a flawless rose on the side of this building at age seven, but I couldn’t go down to the alley and do that myself, could I? Even with art lessons, I’d probably never manage much more than a mockery of what you do.

She knelt on the couch, facing him. Point made. So what’s next before dinner? A little telepathy to go with the telekinesis? A duplication spell? A puff of smoke? Or do you want me to raise something else?

That was an awful segue. His smile displayed sharp teeth, teeth that had tested the limits of her skin and even bitten through when he couldn’t control himself in time. Thank goodness for healing spells, which were probably next on the docket.

Hell, heck, havoc, Cain, Lazarus… Rise up, brother, and walk. Grinning, she leaned in and guided his face toward hers. Kissing him was like kissing no other man, but over the months, she’d grown accustomed to his strange mouth on hers, his sheer strength when he picked her up as though she weighed nothing to lift her over his legs, the soft, textured sensation of his fur against her skin as she held him.

Their Saturday nights were usually enthusiastic enough that lazy Sundays earned their title. Their kiss was unhurried, as sweet as it was slow. He slid his tongue over hers as though beckoning her closer. She couldn’t repress a slight whimper, and she tightened her fingers in his mane.

Olivia gently ended the kiss, her forehead against his, still grinning, but this time at herself. Before you distract me…

"I distract you?"

I know you can’t come to the city on any kind of permanent basis, but I’m unveiling my new series to friends and sundry this Friday, and I wanted to invite you to the gallery. Olivia settled back on his thighs. She chewed on her lip for a few moments before adding, It’s a fairy tale and fantasy show.

He tensed slightly underneath her, but his voice remained even when he asked, Am I included in that number?

"I have a painting of you, yes, but it’s not of you you. It’s a representation, not a portrait. Look, I’m not going to T-Swift you. I wouldn’t do that to you or Sylvaine or any of the others. I painted what it all meant, not what you are. I’ve used models for paintings in the past, of course, but…"

But you didn’t want to ask permission. His hands were still on her thighs; she counted that as a sign of encouragement. Just forgiveness.

"I know these aren’t just stories to you. They aren’t to me either. These paintings, they mean something deeper than just My Winter Vacation to Ambiguously Medieval Europe, by Olivia Rowe. You opened my eyes to another world. You can hardly expect an artist to just let that lie."

No, I never expected that. But you’ve been very secretive about your new projects.

I’m always secretive. Otherwise there’d be nothing to unveil. I’m not ashamed of doing it, if that’s what you mean.

Griffin closed his eyes, but his lips twitched. No, you wouldn’t be.

Look, the reason why I want to you come, other than the fact that it’s a big deal and I want you there, is that I want you to see your painting and let me know if you’re comfortable with it being on display. She stroked his mane, framing his face and staring him straight in the eyes. I’d be perfectly happy keeping it in my personal collection, hanging it up on my wall in my apartment or in the back of the gallery. The series is sufficient without it.

Griffin tilted his head with a knowing slant. But not complete.

"No. But I know that you’d be more self-conscious about your representation than, say, Sylvaine, and I’d know the collection was complete, even if everyone else didn’t. The important thing is that I painted it, that inspiration made it to the canvas."

Am I inspiring?

It would be easy for Griffin’s black, glistening eyes to seem flat and inaccessible like some dark eyes she had known, but his were always impossibly profound, the full depth of his time carried within. Even so, Olivia couldn’t tell whether she had offended him with her insensitivity or whether he was just moved that she considered him a muse. Maybe a little of both.

If you have to ask the question, I’m obviously doing something wrong, she said.

I wouldn’t dream of dictating the direction of your exhibitions, Olivia. Griffin ran the back of one claw over the line of her jaw.

It’s not dictating if I’m asking. Besides, how do you know this isn’t just some subtle scheme to get you on my portrait couch for a nude study?

Because mentioning it eliminates all subtlety.

Someone needs to bite my tongue. I’ll leave it up to you to decide who.

Of course I want to come to your exhibition. Griffin combed his fingers through her hair, apprehension giving way to his usual tenderness—tenderness that sometimes stung like salt over an open wound.

Olivia had watched those claws rip through wolf pelt and scrape over stone. The strength of his hands could shatter glass and bone. He wasn’t always gentle with her, and she relished those moments, but his tenderness frightened her more than his ferocity, although occasionally they were one and the same.

I’ll inspect the painting. But I know your work and integrity, and I wouldn’t want to challenge that. I have only a few selfish reservations. I can suspend them until I see what you have done with me.

Wonderful. Olivia shifted her hips closer. I think you already know what I’ve done. The question is what I might want to do. The proper tense is essential.

How about what I’m doing now? His large fingers and retractable claws could have been ungainly and undelicate, but he deftly undid the rest of the buttons on her half-undone shirt, then made short work of the leather corset belt.

And what we will be doing. She drew him in by the collar of his shirt and captured his lips again, moaning softly when he pressed the points of his teeth against her lower lip. His magic, with the scent of a pine forest, began unfastening the buttons on his shirt as well.

The sharp sound of the door knocker filled the apartment.

Griffin and Olivia broke away from each other and stared in the direction of the door. They hadn’t called Mrs. Kingsley to bring up dinner, and no one—no one—ever came to Griffin’s door unannounced.

Griffin’s penthouse was his haven. When he’d first invited Olivia five months ago, she’d known how significant that move was, as significant as the moment he had unwrapped the scarves from his face to reveal himself to her. Most of his tenants either respected his privacy, feared him, or both. Not even the kids dared pull pranks on him. Olivia had been pushing it with her own juvenile vandalism, but that had been at the bottom of the building. She would never have dreamed of bringing the spray paint cans up twenty-one stories and painting on top of the piece of Renaissance art that was Griffin’s front door.

Were you expecting someone? Olivia asked.

Griffin shook his head.

She swung her legs to the side and quickly did up the majority of buttons on her long, yellow tunic shirt, then grabbed her dark red, damask-style pants and pulled them on.

You don’t know who’s on the other side of the door, Griffin protested as she bounded to the entry hall.

Neither do you, and what if it’s someone who hasn’t seen you before? Olivia whispered back.

It probably wouldn’t have killed him to have a peephole, but a peephole for him would probably be too high for her to see out of anyway. As she wrapped her hand around the doorknob, it occurred to her that Griffin’s in-person associates seemed to oscillate between the magical and the Mob, and there wasn’t much Olivia could do with either of them except turn on the charm.

Thank God she could be charming. She’d be more charming with heels on, but at least she’d look interesting, in a primary colors kind of way. And at least she had pants.

She put on her brightest smile, opened the door, and froze.

The man on the other side of the door wore a sports coat over pressed khaki trousers, and every hair had been wrestled into place, swept over his head like a vacuum cleaner salesman. He prided himself on unwrinkled professionalism, Monday through Sunday. One never knew when one would meet a potential client.

Your mother said she saw you come in, he said.

Olivia had been standing on her toes, but she dropped down to her normal height, almost as tall as him. Her smile fell from her face as soon as her brain registered who she saw, and she lowered her eyes.

Hello, Olivia. His expression remained impassive, seemingly unaffected by the sight of her.

Olivia wished she could say the same. Hi, Dad.

Your mother says she sees you come in almost every week, and we’ve been told that you do, in fact, come here on a weekly basis. Yet not once have you come down to say hello to your parents.

Olivia resisted the urge to rub her nose the way Tobin rubbed his when she exasperated him. Rebecca must have told them she was meeting with Griffin every week. Olivia hadn’t given Rebecca all the whys and wherefores on the matter, but Olivia still had a good relationship with her sister and hadn’t thought she’d turn around and tell their parents about it when Olivia had been perfectly clear about keeping that door closed.

I don’t come here for you.

I know Mr. Griffin supports you. I’ve seen some of your things around the building. But I don’t think that’s any reason to waste his time with—

Griffin stepped around the corner into the entry hall with his robes over his clothes and the scarves over his face. His voice was rich enough that a layer of fabric barely muffled him. Your daughter is welcome here whenever she wishes. I believe we’ve never formally met.

He extended his hand around Olivia’s tense shoulder. After a beat, her father shook it.

Henry Rowe, her father replied. And may I ask what it is you do with my daughter every week?

Cthulhu’s unholy tentacles, you can’t be serious. Rolling her eyes, Olivia ducked under Griffin’s arm and strode back into the great room. She refused to humor her father for a second longer than she had to. The last time she’d had to—her sister’s wedding almost four years ago—things hadn’t gone very well.

A father can’t be concerned for his daughter? Henry called after her. Especially a daughter hanging around a man significantly older than she is?

Please come in. Griffin maintained his composure much more easily than Olivia.

You’re not concerned, Olivia yelled back. I don’t remember you caring about the company I kept until you thought they’d make me a starving artist.

I told her, Henry explained to Griffin, that as long as she kept her grades up and her nose clean, she could make her own decisions. Then she kept taking those art classes in college when she didn’t have the time to spare…

Olivia rocked down onto Griffin’s armchair, her legs over the side. I wasn’t aware that acrylic was a gateway drug to the derelict. I got your precious degree in addition to my art classes, and I did it all with an acceptable GPA. Then I established a steady source of income without any help from you. I’m not sure what more you want from me.

I want you to face reality. Henry rounded the corner into the great room. He paused to take in its delightful, bright sumptuousness, quite contrary to the dark figure that Griffin cut. But I’m not here to argue.

Then why are you here? Olivia kicked her legs and stared at her dark red pedicure instead of her father.

I believe that when the lease is signed, it comes with a reminder that I prefer visits to be announced or made by appointment, Griffin said.

I apologize for my abrupt appearance. I wanted to catch Olivia before she went flying off again.

Why? Olivia asked again, glancing up with more than a trace of sullen resentment.

Because we haven’t seen you. Our landlord has seen you more often than your own parents.

The last time we saw each other didn’t turn out so good. I wasn’t looking for an encore.

I think we can be civil adults.

"You’d have to acknowledge I was an adult first. I don’t want to argue about this anymore. If you want to talk with me—actually talk with me and not at me—pick up a phone and we can start from there. Until then, I have nothing to say."

For someone with nothing to say, you sure have a lot to say.

Griffin slowly walked around the couch. In spite of his size, Olivia almost didn’t notice his surreptitious observation of them from a safe distance, and she didn’t think her father did at all.

"And for someone who didn’t come here to argue, you’ve done nothing else, which is what happens every time."

You’re arguing back.

I never said I wouldn’t. I only said that I didn’t want to argue. It doesn’t mean I’m going to sit back and let you sneer at my life choices and ask me when I’m really going to get serious.

The way you outfit yourself, I’m not sure it’s even an option.

You’re really going to go there, aren’t you? Olivia stood and wrapped her arms around her stomach. She wished she’d fastened the corset belt on, because it would have pissed her father off even more.

It occurred to her that the leather was still discarded on the floor, which would only fuel her father’s assumptions. Not that they were wrong, but it was such a guttery place for his mind to go so quickly. For all he knew, she could be with Mr. Griffin in a friendly, visit-with-the-senior capacity. Before it had turned romantic, Olivia would have been perfectly happy with the friendship they’d maintained through correspondence after she’d left for college.

I don’t know how you expect anyone to take you seriously when you don’t even take yourself seriously, Henry said.

And you went there. People who don’t take me seriously either learn to take me seriously when I prove through my attitude that I take myself seriously, or they’re not worth my time. I’m not trying to impress them, just like I’m not trying to impress you, Dad. I stopped trying to do that when you looked at what I did better than anything and basically said it wasn’t much more valuable than a middle-school notebook doodle, now study for your LSATs.

You still got your Pre-Law degree, Henry said pointedly.

I like being well-rounded. Did you know they discovered that the elegant beige palette we’re accustomed to in Roman art and architecture might all be a result of the degradation of dyes and paints of the time? You probably had to be as colorful as me to be taken seriously in Ancient Rome.

This isn’t Ancient Rome, Henry began.

"And do you know that in some cultures, you wouldn’t be taken seriously unless you had a full, manly face of hair?"

This isn’t those cultures, Olivia…

"All I’m saying is that our borders and boundaries are fucking meaningless. We create them for ourselves and enforce them as though they’re really that important. Well, I don’t have to. In fact, this kind of eccentricity is practically de rigueur in my profession, so perhaps I’m more conventional than you think." She struck a hip-cocked pose, tilting her head to the side so that her blue hair spilled over her shoulder.

Your profession. Skepticism practically oozed from his pores.

Olivia was going to Hulk out any minute. This was why she didn’t do family dinners. I show you what has been marked as Defendant’s Exhibit No. 547, ladies and gentlemen of the jury.

"Yes, Dad. It’s a profession. I get paid and everything. I live below my means in a loft apartment in New York City. I’m half your age, and I’m probably coming up close to the same amount of money you’ve saved for retirement. I wasn’t aware that ‘profession’ only meant nine-to-five plus overtime. I’m not a nine-to-five artist. It’s more than a full-time job. It’s my life. Art is my life. She spread her arms as though her very appearance were one of her works of art. Sometimes it was. Do you understand that?"

It’s a frivolous way to spend your time, Henry said. And a frivolous thing for others to spend their money on.

At this point in the fight at Rebecca’s wedding, Olivia had considered throwing a tumbler of whiskey at her father’s head. I’m not going to wait around for you to notice that I’m a better woman than I would have been in any of those other comfortable, ordinary niches you built for me. You told me as long as I continued this ‘foolish path’ as an artist, you wouldn’t support me in any way. I accepted those terms. And guess what, Dad? I’m doing just fine without you. And now I’m going to walk away while I have the last word, because I’m this close to doing something I’ll regret.

She stormed toward the greenhouse for the calming influence of the roses.

I’m only looking out for you, Henry called after her. That’s what fathers are supposed to do. Forgive me for not wanting you to turn out like that friend of yours, Frankie Something.

You could only hope to be half as happy as Frankie V. She didn’t slam the door behind her, because it was made of thin glass amid the whimsical latticework. Instead, she made a conscious attempt to make as little noise as possible. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of a more dramatic exit.

Henry watched his daughter blend in with the colorful cacophony of Griffin’s generous rose garden, her clothing and hair unlikely camouflage. The last time I saw my daughter, she swore she would never come within ten miles of us. She doesn’t make idle threats. Even threats most people would call petulant, she takes them seriously. So imagine my surprise when I discovered that she’d been coming here, within sixteen floors of our home.

He tried to sound intimidating, which might have worked on a young man Olivia’s age. Griffin could tell that Henry was used to being a commanding presence, a figure of authority and stature in spite of his modest height. But for all the rumors of Mr. Griffin as a reclusive eccentric, he was not a passive, cringing old man like Henry might have expected.

She made her promise to me first, Griffin said.

Henry narrowed his eyes. And exactly when was this promise made?

When she vandalized my building. I believe she was seven years old at the time.

Rage swelled bright in Henry’s eyes. Griffin realized how he must sound, but there had never been anything inappropriate about his interaction with Olivia in her youth. One could make the legitimate argument that it was odd, but prior to the events of last winter, Griffin’s regard for Olivia had been purely proprietary—with perhaps a glimmer of fateful hope, but there was nothing Griffin could do about that. His curse demanded it, and he hated it like he hated his reflection. Love, however, hadn’t kindled until she’d returned to fulfill her promise.

Love. The very word he couldn’t say to her, for fear of her response.

She promised to greet me if she saw me, he said. And she promised that when she became the extraordinary artist she is today, she would visit me. The condition was only to visit once. All subsequent visits were beyond the scope of that promise and of her own free will. I am very fond of your daughter, Mr. Rowe.

So fond that you ensnared her at such a young age. Henry tightened his hands into fists. I could have you arrested.

"If I had indicated any interest at all in