Page 58 of The Midnight King
He opens his mouth to respond, but at that moment, someone raps lightly on the bedroom door, then enters without waiting for an invitation.
Gilda steps into the room, her lips compressed and her eyes feverishly bright with anticipation.
This is her moment of triumph.
“My lady!” Brantley exclaims. “May I ask what you’re doing in here?”
“I’ve come to fulfill a family tradition,” says Gilda. “Tell him, Cind—I mean, Celinda.”
One more command to fulfill.
“In our family, it is tradition for the bride to wear a special heirloom on her wedding day,” I tell the Prince. “On the wedding night, the bride’s father or mother transfers the heirloom to her husband, to symbolize a new connection in the family tree, a bond stronger than blood. It will only take a moment. Please, Brantley… for me.”
I hate every word I just spoke, and I hate how readily he accepts the lie. How am I any better than Killian in this moment? I’m bound by the anklet, but if I had really tried, could I have found some way to warn the Prince? Some way to avoid this?
It’s too late now.
“Sit side by side on the bed, against the pillows,” says my stepmother. “Feet outstretched.”
Brantley and I obey. The anklet glows golden against the pale skin of my ankle.
My body tightens, my eyes scanning the room for weapons that are not weapons. I could smash the lamp on the table against Gilda’s skull, then choke her. But I will have to be quick, before she snaps the anklet around Brantley’s leg, or killing her might end his life as well.
“First we anoint the bride,” says my stepmother. She takes out a flask and sprinkles its contents over the anklet and my leg. She never mentioned that step in the removal process, but it occupies her for a moment, so I let my hand creep nearer to the base of the lamp.
“And now, the removal of the heirloom, and its transfer to the groom.” My stepmother takes out a pair of thin black gloves and pulls them on. When she touches the anklet, it unclasps immediately.
She pulls it off me.
My fingers close around the base of the lamp. But when I try to lift it, there’s no strength in my arm. I can’t lift the lamp at all.
I try to grip it in both hands, but the same weakness pervades my other arm, too. I can move, clumsily, but my muscles feel like gelatin. My entire body is helpless, my strength gone.
“What’s happening?” Even my voice is weak, and my protest is barely a whisper. “What did you do?”
But even as I ask the question, I know the answer. The “anointing” was a trick, a ruse so Gilda could sprinkle some kind of toxin on my skin. She used the gloves to protect herself from the liquid. I don’t know if it’s fatal or temporary—all I know is that I’m useless, and that Killian hasn’t come. He’s not here to save us. And I can’t stop Gilda from closing the metal band around Brantley’s ankle with a decisiveclick.
The moment it touches his skin, he cries out in pain.
Gilda draws back, startled, her mouth agape as Brantley’s body shimmers and transforms into a slim, tall figure with purple hair.
Killian.
He’s writhing, his face contorted with agony as the anklet sears his skin. Smoke hisses from the blackening wound—a wound that’s expanding with every second he wears the anklet.
“Take it off him!” I try to shout, but I can barely speak. “Take it off, please take it off!”
“What is the meaning of this?” gasps my stepmother. “Tell me, now!”
Killian is white with pain, beads of sweat forming on his forehead. “It means your reign of terror is over before it began, bitch.”
“Whoever you are, you will obey me,” she says. “Tell me your name.”
He lets out a groan of anguish, but he manages to say, “No.”
A single word of defiance. The anklet was never meant for a Faerie, and though it burns him, it cannot control him.
He did this for Brantley. For me.