Chapter 19

When my handmaid had asked me what dress I preferred for tonight’s supper, I told her anything would do so long as it had pockets.

And now, as I walk down the long galley that leads to the supper hall, I rub at the warm selenite stone hidden in my left pocket. It was a gift given to me by a woman I shared a cell with in the Everland Tower Prison.

“For your worries,” she’d said and opened her palm to reveal the smooth crystal with it’s well-worn divot, perfect for the pad of any thumb.

I don’t know if there’s any truth to rocks and crystals having healing powers or metaphysical properties, but it’s always helped distract me from anxiety and so it’s a tool I’ve clung to ever since I cowered in that cold, dank prison cell.

Somedays, the terror of returning to that place threatens to swallow me whole. Somedays it’s so bad, I have to remain in my room sipping borsha tea just to calm my nerves.

Somedays I truly believe I am forever destined to be someone’s prisoner, in a cell or in a kingdom.

I enter the supper hall and the room goes silent and still.

This is normal. To be expected. But it still makes my skin crawl.

I don’t like to be noticed.

I grip the selenite so tightly, I’m worried it may crack.

“Her Majesty, Queen Wendellyn,” the court herald calls out.

Wendellyn is the name Hald bestowed on me when he decided I would be his bride and not a former prisoner with supposed allegiances to Peter Pan.

Even though Pan abandoned me on Everland, his motives mattered not. I had ties to him. So I was guilty by association.

Hald told me I needed to erase every semblance of my past, including my name.

And so Wendellyn was born.

Hald provided me with fake documentation that said I was a distant cousin of Queen Annabella from Southern Winterland, which made me fit to marry a king.

That story persisted until Hally decided to go digging. He eventually uncovered my origin story and my birth name. Why he hasn’t shared it with the entire court is beyond me. I can’t help but feel like he’s reserving it as a weapon to use against me, like a bomb he plans to set off when the mood strikes.

With my arrival officially announced, I make my way down the red carpet that runs from the entrance across the entire supper hall to the royal table at the head of the room where behind it, a giant oil painting of myself and Hald hangs from wire and an iron spike. We sat for hours for that painting. It did not escape my notice that the artist made Hald look younger than he actually was, a little trimmer around the waist, while my nose was done in sharper strokes, my eyes narrowed with cruelty.

Hald said it made me look regale. He did have a knack for making me feel like my worries were silly.

Everyone in attendance, some three hundred people of the Everland nobility and aristocracy, are lined up on either side of the red carpet, bowing their heads, dipping into a curtsey, as I pass.

When I reach the table, I give the prince and his betrothed a nod of deference and then take my seat, the queen’s chair, behind the long royal supper table.

There is a sudden pang of sadness, seeing Hald’s chair beside me, empty.

Seated now, the music starts up again and the court returns to their pre-supper chatter.

A servant pours me a glass of wine. My handmaid tastes it. We wait the required minute before deeming it safe.

When she remains upright, unaffected, I take the drink and sip.

“You look resplendent tonight, Your Majesty,” Hally says, lifting his chalice.

“As do you, Your Highness. That color of blue matches your eyes quite well.”

He smiles. “My betrothed picked it out for me.”

“You did well then, Lady Mareth,” I tell her.

She smiles, dipping her chin. Her voice is barely audible above the din. “Many thanks, Your Majesty.”

When Hally announced his engagement to Mareth, I truly thought he was joking. Mareth is the daughter of some lesser noble I can never remember the name of. She is barely pretty, not that that should matter. But with Hally I imagined there would be no greater requirement. Though perhaps he wishes to be the prettier of the match. He does like attention. I suppose it makes sense that he doesn’t want his bride to steal his spotlight.

“Have you seen our honored guests yet?” Hally scans the supper hall and my heart beats a little harder.

“You invited them, Your Highness. I would have expected you’d keep track of them.”

When my handmaid asked after my dress preference, I should have added no whalebone corset. Because right now I’m finding it difficult to breathe against the ribbing. It’s making me peevish.

But if Hally is put off by my attitude, he gives no indication of it.

“I’m sure they’ll turn up soon enough,” he says. “Oh look, speak of the devil.”

I follow Hally’s gaze to the supper hall’s entrance and my shoulders drop with relief.

The herald calls out, “Captain James Hook.”

James gives the herald a nod, then clasps his arms behind his back, entering the supper hall with all the grace of an Englishman who feels right at home.

I am relieved he is the first to arrive.

I think it’s possible James and I are cut from the same type of fabric. Both fine fabric with delicate stitching and very specific uses. We are the type of fabric meant to drape, not form.

I understand James.

I have never understood Roc.

He is like a summer storm blowing in out of nowhere, unpredictable in nature, at times violent and so darkly beautiful, it makes your eyes burn.

James I can handle. There is no such thing as handling Roc. You can only hold on tightly and hope he doesn’t consume you whole.

James makes the required greetings and then he’s spotted me at the head of the hall and the way he looks at me, it’s like he’s spotted land for the first time in ages.

My heart kicks up again.

Butterflies fill my stomach.

He makes his way to me with determination.

“Your Majesty.” He bows. I notice his arms are still clasped behind him, hiding his hook. Does he worry about frightening me?

When we were together, he had both hands and by the gods, did he know how to use them.

James’s touch was always gentle, warm and passionate.

By contrast, Roc’s touch was bruising and possessive.

If I were a respectable girl, I would say I preferred James’s touch.

But I am not.

If pressed to choose, I couldn’t.

Which is exactly why I found myself torn between them all those years ago. I wanted them both for different reasons, in different ways.

I was always the rose bush, both soft and sharp.

All these years later, and I think I have not changed.

I want to be terrified by Roc. I want to be adored by James.

I want it all, all of it and more.

And knowing I can never have it makes my heart break all over again.

They should have left.

No, they never should have come.

James and I stare at one another. He’s clearly been to the royal closet. He’s dressed in a fine tailcoat with silver handiwork done by none other than Bittershore the Tailor.

Bitter is half fae, though the court will not admit to it. The court frowns on anything magical, unless the magic makes us look good.

Truly, there is no one better with a needle than he. And James is benefiting from Bitter’s eye and his craft.

The tailcoat fits James as if it were sewn especially for him and the military style gives him command and presence.

I imagine after Bitter, he was sent to the Whitdrey twins, the royal coiffurist, because he’s been clean-shaven, his hair styled and tamed.

He looks dashing and it doesn’t escape me that most of the court is assessing him with hungry eyes, both men and women.

And if all eyes of the court weren’t on us, I would pull him aside and I would sink into his warmth and pry his secrets from his lips.

Why is he here now? Why is he with Roc, his mortal enemy?

And then I would warn him.

You must escape this maddening place, I’d tell him. Before it kills you.

“Your Majesty,” James says, “your beauty rivals the sun.”

Hally snorts beside me and James’s jaw clenches at the sound.

“You flatter me,” I respond because it’s what’s expected.

“James,” Hally says. “As our honored guest, we’ve given you a seat at our table. You’ll join us in a position of honor, to the right of the king’s chair.”

James eyes the empty chair beside me, then the two further down. The last must be meant for Roc. If he ever decides to show up. Fashionably late, as always. If I didn’t know better, I’d guess he was in some coat closet fucking a servant.

And the thought makes my stomach turn sour.

It makes me want to smash things.

He better not be fucking anyone under my roof.

Oh calm down! He doesn’t belong to you. He never did.

“I would, of course, be honored,” James says and gives another shallow bow to the prince before taking his seat on the other side of Hald’s.

But it’s impossible to converse with him, what with a large chair between us.

My nerves prickle as I consider how I might remedy that.

Of course, all of this is a game and I know Hally has been playing it since James and Roc stepped foot on Everland soil and started asking for Wendy Darling.

So why not play the game with him?

I wave over one of the pages. He bows and waits for my command.

“Could you please remove the king’s chair so that I may properly converse with our honored guests?”

Though I am facing away from Hally, I can feel his ire like a sharp winter’s frost.

I know this is a dangerous move.

But I want to remind him that I don’t always play by the rules.

The page sputters for a second then nods and says, “Of course, Your Majesty.” Then he wrestles the chair away from the table, pulling it back to the wall.

“Come, James,” I say. “Join me.”

James gets up. The page moves his chair to my side and then one of the servants shuffles down the table settings, both for James and for Roc.

“There,” I say and smile over at Hally. “That’s better.”

The vein running down the center of Hally’s forehead bulges against his skin. Lady Mareth sets her pale, delicate hand on his thigh and gives him a reassuring squeeze. Some of his tension fades.

I will pay for this later. But right now, it’s worth it.

James’s glass is filled. I waggle my finger at my handmaid, and she tests his drink.

James gives me a look, but I pretend not to notice.

“Are you being treated well?” I ask him.

He licks his lips. I remember kissing them. I remember the tender way his mouth met mine, the hungry way his tongue took a taste of me.

For the first time in a very long time, there is a flash of heat between my legs and it catches me so off guard, I blush.

“Your court’s generosity knows no bounds,” James says.

I scan the supper hall. People are slowly making their way to their tables.

“Where is Roc?”

James groans. “I wish I could tell you.”

I sip from my chalice. So they are not so close that they are intimately aware of the comings and goings of the other.

I will admit, seeing them together, there was a pang of envy. I think I am jealous of anyone who gets to exist in their orbit.

Seeing them on their knees, shoulders touching, I wanted to be angry at James for being where I wish I could be, and at Roc for having what I’d always wanted in James. But of course, that’s ridiculous.

It’s not like they’re together together.

I cut a glance at James. It occurs to me, suddenly, that I may have misread their closeness as perfunctory.

What if there is more between them?

What if I am the odd one out?

And just when I think that perhaps I’m making it up in my mind, more paranoia than fact, Roc walks into the room and James sits up straighter, his breathing shifting, more shallow, excited.

He swallows, his Adam’s apple sinking in his perfect, beautiful throat.

And my stomach drops.

No. No.

The jealousy springs up, threatening to drown me.

“The…ahem, Crocodile,” the herald calls.

The hush that goes over the crowd can only be described as buzzing.

It’s like the king himself has walked into the supper hall.

While Roc may not be royalty, he does have a reputation.

If you are not charmed by his charm, or enraptured by his beauty, you are terrified of his power.

It’s impossible not to be alert when the Crocodile walks into the room.

We are all caught by him now and he knows it. While it’s impossible to handle Roc, Roc knows exactly how to handle us.

He smiles at the court with all his perfect white teeth, sharp incisors flashing.

My breath stutters down my throat.

He, too, has been to visit Bitter. But while Bitter dressed James in an elegant military suit, he knew that anything embellished would only detract from Roc’s beauty.

He’s wearing an unadorned black suit that skims his body in all the right ways.

Beside me, James sighs and I glance back at him.

“This is always what I hated most about him,” he admits, his voice low and hoarse.

“What?” I coax.

“How damn good he looks in a suit.”

My jaw drops a little, nose burning.

If I needed any further proof, here it is.

By some twist of fate or magic, the once mortal enemies are now indulging in one another and I am barred from them, a queen in name, but a beggar still, looking for scraps of the only two men who ever made me feel something.

Why did I ever leave them?

Some nights while I lay in that cold, wet dungeon, I would silently sob in the dark, asking myself why I had chosen to run away.

Looking back, I know why I thought it was the right decision. Roc and Pan had already terrorized Hook, taking his hand simply for daring to touch me. And the whole reason I was with Hook was because he kidnapped me from Pan, looking to settle a score.

I wanted no part of their violence or their war. I wanted to love. I wanted to feel safe.

I think a little part of me thought that one of them would chase me, proving their devotion.

What a stupid, vapid girl I had been.

Roc saunters through the crowd, flirting with the entire court as he makes his way to the royal table.

Every step he takes, every foot of distance he closes between us, my heart beats a little harder until it’s hot and hammering in my ears.

I still feel like that stupid, vapid girl. One look from Roc and I’ve lost all sense.

When he finally reaches me, he stops and bows. “Your Majesty.” When he straightens again, his smile is crooked and dissolute. A smile of a rogue.

“Good of you to finally join us,” I say.

James chokes on a laugh beside me.

Roc never falters. “If you’ll forgive me, I was caught by the beauty of your great castle.” He nods at Hally. “Your Highness, I must say, your family has great taste in art and architecture. Was it Vison who designed the castle?”

Hally sputters, searching for an answer. “I believe it was, yes.”

“I thought so.” Roc’s gaze turns to the high, arched ceiling, to the curved beams and the cherubic faces hand carved into the eaves. “It has his delightful sense of humor.”

It wasn’t Vison though. It was Morsoni Maracopa III. It’s literally carved into the cornerstone.

When Roc’s attention comes back to me, he winks.

So he knows Hally knows nothing about his own house. Leave it to Roc to play a game that only he knows he’s playing.

The fact that he’s pulled me into it though…

I flush again and my belly dips.

“If you’ll join us at our table,” Hally says, nodding at the empty seat at the other end. “Our first course is due out soon.”

“Wonderful.” Roc shows off his teeth again. “I’m famished.”

Hook adjusts next to me, but I can’t tell if it’s boredom or discomfort.

Roc takes his chair on Hook’s right side and once he’s seated, he leans into Hook and whispers into his ear and Hook scowls at him, cursing beneath his breath.

The rest of the court settles into their seats. The band’s music fills the great hall, the lyrical notes echoing above us in the beams.

We are served our first course — an aromatic creamy onion soup poured over crispy potatoes.

I have no appetite but I try to eat some of everything so as not to fuel more gossip.

Somehow I make it through all five courses. The constant stream of wine helps and by the time our dessert plate is carried away, I’m warm and buzzy and bold.

The band’s tune picks up in tempo and the court fills up the dance floor.

I push back my chair. My handmaid helps me disentangle myself, straightening out the skirt of my dress.

I make my way over to Roc. “Join me in a dance.”

It’s not a question.

Roc and James share a look and then Roc is rising to his feet, towering over me in that dominant way he has. I always felt small next to him and that hasn’t changed.

“I would be honored, Your Majesty.” He takes my hand in his.