His Eminence pulled a face, released her tunic front, and stepped back. “Very well. I shall deliver your answer—and the boy—to his brother. Good luck to you, Princess.”
Without waiting for any further response, he turned for the door. He had reached it and was pulling it open when she called to him. “Wait, no. Don’t do that. Don’t tell him that. Tell him I accept his proposal. But I want something in writing signed by him, something in the marriage contract that says he will not harm Thom now or ever.”
His Eminence turned back and gave her a long, searching look. “Done,” he said finally, and went out the door.
Alone again, she collapsed onto the pallet and stared into space. Tears she was unable to hold back trickled down her cheeks. She wanted to bury her face in her hands and shut out everything, but she couldn’t do so while the magic held them bound. The room was dark and empty, and Thom did not return. She wished she were back in school or home or anywhere but here. She wished she had listened to a whole lot of advice that she had chosen to ignore.
What was she going to do?
She knew she couldn’t let anything happen to Thom, no matter what. If she were responsible for his death, she could never live with herself. The trade-off was horrendous, but she kept thinking that even if she went through with this, her father would find a way to undo it. But what if he couldn’t? What if no one could? She kept thinking that something would happen to stop all this, but she couldn’t think what that something would be.
She stopped crying finally and tried to think clearly about how things stood. She didn’t have the use of her magic and wouldn’t have while her hands were bound. She had to find a way to free them, if only for a minute. She didn’t have the rainbow crush, so she couldn’t summon help. But even if she had it, whom would she summon? Not her father—that was what His Eminence wanted. Questor? No, he had been duped once already, and Crabbit was probably the superior wizard. Her grandfather? No, no! She brushed it all aside as wishful thinking. There wasn’t much chance that she would be allowed back into her room unaccompanied, and that was the only way she could get her hands on the crush anyway. Thom could retrieve it if he knew it was there and was free to go get it. But he didn’t and he wasn’t, so that was that.
She got to her feet and crossed to the door and stopped, placing her hands against the rough wood, her mind racing. How could she stop this from happening? There had to be a way!
From beyond the locked door, she heard footsteps in the hallway.
She thought suddenly of Haltwhistle, whom she might still have been able to count on if she had remembered to speak his name and hadn’t gotten so caught up in her own concerns that she had forgotten him. Edgewood Dirk might have sent the mud puppy away, but she was the one who had made that possible. Was it too late to call him back? Was he gone from her forever?
“Haltwhistle,” she whispered, and it was almost a prayer. “Haltwhistle,” she said again, louder this time.
She jumped in shock as the latch on the door released. She wiped her tear-streaked face on her shoulder. She shouldn’t be crying, she told herself. She was tougher than this. She was better than what she was showing.
“Haltwhistle!” she said a final time, bold and determined.
But as the door opened it wasn’t the mud puppy who appeared but His Eminence, Craswell Crabbit. “Time to go, Princess,” he announced. “Your future husband awaits.”
And with a dramatic sweep of his arm he beckoned her through the open doorway.
BRAVEHEART
As she trudged from her storeroom prison into the hallway, dutifully trailing a clearly elated Craswell Crabbit, a strange thing happened to Mistaya Holiday. One moment she was subdued and submissive, riddled with self-doubt and fear, her future a bleak certainty from which she could find no escape, and the next she was so angry that the rest of what she had been feeling was swept away in a tidal wave of rage. It happened all at once and for no discernible reason that she could identify, a shift of such monumental proportions that it shook her to the core.
It also focused her in a way that nothing else had.
Her posture changed, her mind cleared, and her confidence hardened. She was not going to let this happen. It might seem to those who sought to use her so badly that it would, but they were in for a big surprise. Whatever it took, whatever she had to do, she was going to put a stop to all of it.
And to them.
