Kathryne Kennedy - Everlasting Enchantment

“I… love… you.”

Those golden eyes blinked.

“You betrayed… me.”

Whiskers twitched.

“But only so I… could be free. I… forgive you.”

And suddenly the weight lessened, and Millicent’s beautiful human features loomed above him. “Forgive me?” she snapped. “There is nothing for you to forgive. I loved you enough to give you up—you should be thanking me.”

Gareth smiled. “You are back.”

“Well, of course…” Millicent rolled off him and sat up, raked her wild hair away from her face. “No. Wait… how could this happen? My beast should have torn you apart. I felt its rage… I did not think I would overcome it this time.”

“Love can overcome all odds.”

Her eyes widened. “You. You brought me back.”

Gareth sat up, a bit shakily, but that had been a close one. “You do love me, Millicent. Enough to bring you back to me. I had truly thought that when you gave the bracelet to Lady Yardley—”

“And yet you opened the door to the cage anyway? Are you mad? My beast could have…” She shuddered.

“But it did not.”

“No.”

They stared at each other for a timeless moment.

“You broke my heart,” Gareth murmured.

“I am sorry you felt that way. Where… where is the relic?”

Gareth rose, extended his hand to her. “I gave it to the Master’s spies.”

Millicent stared up at Gareth in horror. “You did what?”

He shrugged his broad shoulders. “It was necessary.”

“But why? Surely they believed Lady Yardley about the Duke of Ghoulston’s schemes. The relic was only supposed to grant her an audience.”

“We haven’t told them about him yet.”

“Then why—”

The prison door burst open, and the were-lion who had taken Millicent appeared in the doorway. She spun and growled at him. He had been the one to take her… the one to put her in a cage. And now she realized why Gareth had handed over the relic. So he could free her.

“Don’t shift,” murmured Gareth, placing a warm hand on her shoulder.

Amazingly, he prevented her from doing so. Her beast now succumbed to Gareth’s will. The realization should have shaken her. It did not.

“Madam,” said the were-lion, “please accept my sincere apologies. I should have suspected your reaction to being… caged.” He winced, then his rather handsome face hardened. “But you have given us a merry chase over the last few weeks. I did not want you slipping from my fingers yet again.”

Millicent growled.

The shifter sighed, then shrugged his broad shoulders, transferring his gaze to Gareth. “Sir. I believe you mentioned something about a plot to overthrow the Crown? I would be most interested to hear of it. Now.”

Claire suddenly appeared in the doorway, her lovely face near purple with exertion, her hand to her chest as she gasped for breath. “Millicent? Good… good heavens! Are you well? If they have mistreated you… in any way… they shall hear from my father! He wields incredible influence with the House…”

“From which the Hall holds a certain amount of immunity,” interjected the were-lion.

Claire narrowed her eyes and glared up at the man. “What is your name, sir? I wish to make sure I mention it when I recount this… debacle, to the queen. Or were you not aware that I am a Lady of the Bedchamber?”

If Millicent had not hated the shifter so very much, she might have felt sorry for him at the moment. The spies might hold a certain autonomy in dealing with magical troubles, but everyone answered to the queen. And someone who held her special confidence was not to be taken lightly.

The man collected himself and bowed. “Sir Harcourt, at your service, Lady Yardley—if I recall your name correctly? And may I say, this is a dangerous business for a lady such as yourself to get mixed up in.”

“Such as myself? I do not like your tone of voice, sir.” She turned away from him in dismissal and held out her hand to Millicent. “Come out of there, this instant. I cannot bear to see you in such a place.”

Her concern soothed the trace of fury remaining within Millicent, and she stepped forward, clasping her friend’s hand. The were-lion narrowed his eyes, glanced from Claire to Gareth, and wisely kept his mouth shut.

Millicent felt Gareth protecting her back as they made their way out of the dungeons beneath the Hall of Mages.

“We are taking you to the Master,” said the were-lion, who had taken the lead in front of them as if he still had control of the situation.

Claire threw him a glare as he glanced at her over his shoulder.

Millicent could actually feel the hostility crackle between the two of them.

“Yes, yes you are,” agreed Gareth. “I believe he is attending a ball with the Duke of Ghoulston and the queen.”

“How did you know?”

“A good guess. I fear the Master will have to leave the ball early, Sir Harcourt.”

He turned his head again, avoiding Claire’s gaze. “What do you mean?”

“The Duke of Ghoulston has used the relic to seduce the queen.”

A series of snarls and growls from the shifters behind them followed his words, and Millicent could only admire Claire’s stoic bravery as she ignored them. They had reached a balcony overlooking a garden, and while Sir Gareth outlined the duke’s evil scheme and how he had managed it, she studied the plants below them.

Millicent could not remember anything between the time she had left Lady Yardley’s mansion until she woke up in that cage. She had never been in the Hall of Mages, had never thought to, and wondered at the contrast of the interior of the place. Some sort of spell had apparently expanded the inside of the building to a maze of passageways and rooms all seemingly for the experimentation of magic. But unlike the Underground, dark sorcery didn’t appear to be practiced here. The garden contained mazes of bushes growing fruits and flowers she had never seen the likes of before. At least, she assumed the globes of emerald with purple liquid inside were a sort of fruit, for a swarm of tiny jeweled bees swarmed the ones that had fallen to the ground. Miniature birds with wings like scarves perched on the globes, pecking at the skin, then pushing their sharp beaks inside to reach the liquid. Tall stems lined with satiny petals reached to the ceiling of the room, the flowers swaying to some nonexistent breeze. Trees with leaves sporting tiny gems twinkled, the stones falling to the ground when they reached the size of her thumb.

Millicent narrowed her eyes and concentrated, using her immunity to magic to see past the illusion. But the garden did not waver. The wizards must have used the natural fauna of England and altered it with magic to create entirely new species, which were now as real as Millicent herself.

But the fountains that sprayed crystal water high into the air were conjured from illusion, as well as the statues shaped like mythical creatures, who gazed benevolently around the garden, an occasional smile flitting across the face of a fairy, a gnome, an elf.

No twisted branches or deformed stalks or creatures formed from nightmares.

But Millicent remembered her glowing forest, and thought her Underground could hold just as much wonder.

The were-lion interrupted her musing, and she focused back on the conversation.

“So, you are saying Ghoulston has not used magic, specifically, on this enchantment over the queen?”

“Correct,” replied Gareth. “So Her Majesty cannot detect it. Nor the Master himself.”

“If you hadn’t given me the relic,” said the shifter, “I might not have believed you.”

Millicent narrowed her eyes. She had no intention of allowing the were-lion to keep the bracelet. She could not understand why it had not chosen her friend, for Millicent had thought Claire would surely be the one to break the spell. But she did not imagine that the Master would allow it to leave his sight once he had it, and then Gareth would never have a chance of becoming free of the cursed thing.

No. Millicent could not allow Sir Harcourt to keep it for long.

“You must take us to the queen at once,” said Claire. “She will still be under the influence of the potion, but she will listen to me.”

“Not without his knightness, over there,” replied Harcourt, cocking his shaggy head at Gareth. “For we must convince the Master of this first… not that I doubt your influence with the queen, Lady Yardley. But if Queen Victoria is still as much in love with Ghoulston as she appeared the last time I saw her, we will not be able to convince her until the potion wears off.”

A door ahead of them opened; a purple-robed acolyte stepped into the hall. He took one look at the pack of shape-shifters and ducked back inside the room, slamming the door on a cloud of lavender magic.

“We will not interrupt the queen’s ball,” continued Harcourt. “I will send for the Master, and he will speak with you first, and then decide how to approach the situation.”

Claire made a disgruntled noise, but they all continued on in silence through the maze of passageways, up circular staircases, until they reached an elaborately carved door and Sir Harcourt threw it open.

“You will wait in here,” he began, when a crash from inside the room interrupted him.

Sir Harcourt shifted from human to lion to human again so quickly that Millicent barely blinked between the transitions.

“Lord Sussex—Master! You are back… what are you doing?”

Harcourt stepped into the room and Claire and Millicent followed. Gareth stayed near Millicent’s elbow, a strong, quiet… disturbing presence. She had thought she would never see him again, nor had she fully realized how his feelings of betrayal would affect her. Her insides twisted when she thought of the look on his face when he’d told her she had broken his heart. She did not want to think of how he must be feeling. Fortunately, events conspired so she didn’t have time to delve too deeply into them at the moment.

The Duke of Sussex, Prince Augustus Frederick, Master of the Hall of Mages and the queen’s favorite uncle, looked to be having a fine temper tantrum. For a man of over sixty years, he had done a rousing good job of scattering a silver tea service, a dainty set of porcelain china, and papers and books across the oak-paneled study. His jowls shook with fury, and his face appeared beet red against the contrast of his neatly groomed white beard and hair.

“She is mad,” snarled the Master, his hands beginning to glow with magic. Millicent could see it, could smell it, and although it couldn’t harm a shifter, Claire and Gareth held no such defense against a magical backwash of power.

Sir Harcourt looked stunned by the scene before him. Apparently, the Master wasn’t prone to such fits of temper.

“Who is?” asked Millicent, stepping in front of Claire.

“The queen—who else?” The glow within his hands grew brighter, until it illuminated the entire room. A duke had the ability to change matter, and as a direct descendant to the royal family, his spells held more power than anyone save the queen—or a relic. Millicent truly did not want to see what he might conjure with the spell he was building up.

“What did she do?” she continued, hoping to keep him talking, and perhaps distract him from his magic.

“She is acting like a besotted young girl—and she has always shown such a level head for her age. She has always known she would be queen—she has always conducted herself accordingly. And now this!”

Gareth kept trying to position himself in front of her, and she held him back only by the grace of her were-strength. Millicent kept her voice low. “She is not herself, Lord Sussex.”

“Damn right she isn’t! A queen cannot hie off to Gretna Green and elope! The country would not stand for it.”

“These are not her decisions. She is being coerced, and we must save her.”

Her words finally seemed to penetrate the older man’s fury. The glow within his hands faded somewhat. He narrowed his eyes and peered at her. “Who are you?”

Sir Harcourt appeared to have regained his senses, and cleared his throat. “This is Lady Millicent, Lady Yardley, and Sir Gareth, my lord. He is the magic man from the relic—and brought it to us in hopes of saving the queen from Ghoulston.” The were-lion held up the bracelet like a ritual offering.

The Master’s eyes widened. “He brought it—but what is this about Victoria being coerced to marry that swine, Ghoulston?”