Page 40 of The Ruthless Fae King
He cut me off. “The courts will be told King Thorne mistreated you. Not hard to believe. And then when the treaty with the Nightfall queen is announced, no one will care what King Thorne does. We won’t be part of Thorngate anymore. He can do as he likes with his Winter soldiers and leave us out of it.”
Panic rose up inside of me because the more he spoke, the more I realized that his plan was believable. Pulling my engagement ring from Lucien off my marriage finger, I slipped it into my pocket for safekeeping without Marcelle noticing.
“The dowry is paid on the day of the wedding.” That, I knew, was a legal rule.
He nodded. “And we will be married today. Right now in fact.”
He yanked open my front door and then his men pulled back their hoods, showcasing the Summer Court insignia. The Winter Soldier Lucien had sent with me was unconscious on the ground, and I whimpered thinking of Piper, who was nowhere to be seen.
The blanket was ripped from the carriage and I was shoved inside.
“My things!” I shouted.
“Will be brought to you by my staff.” He had an answer for every question. It drove me mad.
When I stepped into the carriage and saw a priest sitting next to a Summer courtier, my stomach dropped out.
Married now as innow. In a carriage?
Marcelle slipped into the carriage and pushed my shoulder down, forcing me to sit. He then looked at the priest and made a gesture indicating he get on with it. “Remember, Madelynn’s father stipulated that I marry his daughter and keep her safe, otherwise he wouldn’t join us in our separation,” Marcelle told the priest.
“Lies!” I yelled.
Marcelle leaned in then, whispering in my ear. “Cooperate or I would hate for little Libby to have an accident.”
My entire back went rigid, the fight going out of me in an instant. He had my mother and sister at the teahouse in town. He wouldn’t hurt them, would he?
A tear slid down my cheek as I resigned myself to my fate. Nodding, I gave him a panicked look.
The priest began to read the wedding rites, and bile rose into my throat.
This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening.It was like my soul left my body. As we rode away from town, I nodded my agreement to the priest and relented to marrying Marcelle. When I looked out the window to say goodbye to my childhood home, I saw a flicker of hope.
Piper was running into the woods around the back of the house, towards the secret hunting trail that led to Winter Court.
TEN
I was numb the entire ride through the realm and into Summer Court. It all happened too fast. I couldn’t process it. My powers had been bound, I was legally married to Marcelle, Thorngate was splitting, including Fall Court, and this would leave Lucien to fight the Nightfall queen by himself.
The thing that hurt most of all, the thing that I couldn’t bear to think about, was my father’s betrayal. The man who had kept me safe my entire life just sold me to the real monster. In his mind I was sure he thought he was doing right by me. This deal Marcelle had brokered with the Nightfall queen seemed great on the surface. Avoid an upcoming war, who wouldn’t want that? But they were assuming she played by the rules, and I knew she didn’t.
I just prayed that my mother and sister were unharmed and that Marcelle had only been testing me when he threatened them.
The thought of Lucien waiting for me to arrive and marry him tomorrow cut into my very soul and carved a mark on my heart. His mother died, his father was a lost cause, and now he didn’t even have me.
We arrived at the Summer Court palace and I walked like a Necromere, devoid of life, through the castle gates with my head hung low as Marcelle led me to a room. The priest was still with us. Why the Hades hadn’t he gone? We were married. He could—
Fear seized me in that moment and my head snapped up to Marcelle.
“Marcelle, I need time to adjust—”
He cut me off. “The marriage must be consummated to be legal.”
I fully died inside then. Every bit of strength I once held as a powerful woman shriveled up and expired. Pulling for my power, I felt nothing. I felt for my rage but it was hollow. I was in shock. I was a shell of who I used to be. I must have blacked out, detached from what happened. There was a faint awareness of the priest confirming my purity, and then I barely felt it when Marcelle undressed me and lay me on the bed. He whispered into my ear that my mother and sister would be safe as long as I cooperated. There was a pinch of pain between my legs and then I got lost inside my head.
I remembered the day Lucien said that he saw me as he was passing by. I had been outside playing with Libby. She was practicing her wind power and was frustrated she couldn’t make the leaves pick up off the ground and make a funnel like I could. So as she tried and tried and then started to cry, I told her to take a break. She needed to relax and just feel the wind. I made the leaves dance around us as we twirled carefree among the breeze. She laughed and threw her arms in the air as the leaves swirled around us. It was a happy day. I had so many happy days to focus on.
Like the night Lucien first kissed me. I hadn’t expected to like him at all, let alone fall in love with him. But he’d crawled his way into my heart and now I was hungry for him, desperate at the thought that I would now never have him.
