Evelyn, on the other hand, sags against Richard. Her gold empire dress is loose around the middle, but I swear I can see the outline of a bump. How far along is she?
The moment the doors swing shut behind us, I’m enveloped in a winter wonderland. Snow—real fricking snow—drizzles from the high ceilings and pools on the floor. The tiny snowflakes catch in our hair and the folds of our dress. But it doesn’t melt.
They’ve been spelled to stay perfect.
The walls, too, have been spelled to look like a snowy forest surrounds us. But there are real trees too, scattered around the enormous room, owls swooping from their branches.
I touch Evelyn’s arm, shocked at how cold she feels. “This is beautiful.”
She regards me quietly with dull, uncomprehending eyes.
Richard looks at me and shrugs. “I’m going to grab us some drinks. That might pep her up.”
I watch her stumble across the dance floor with Richard. Poor Evelyn. All this preparation, all this planning, and she can’t even enjoy it.
The dance floor writhes with Fae and humans. Some of the Fae are half-shifted, and most wear outlandish clothes that I’m sure are the latest fashion. Small white moths with glittering wings flutter above the throng of students. Higher up, sprites dive and twirl in frenetic, choreographed moves.
The sprites’ bodies have been spelled to glow; it’s like watching the stars dance.
Mack and I stand by a crooked tree while we wait for Asher to bring us our drinks. Against my will, my gaze scours the dance floor for a certain prince. Part of me celebrates when I can’t find him. But a much larger part of me mourns.
If anything, after last night, that tether between us has only grown stronger. More insistent. And now that I know his name . . .
Where are you, Valerian? I remember his father, how terrifying and imposing he was, and shiver.
Asher comes back with steel goblets brimming with a metallic silver liquid. Already his lips are stained with the stuff, making him look like he wears lipstick. His eyes drift to Mack, a little smile playing across his face. “Ready to dance?”
She looks at me, torn, but I gesture to the dance floor.
“Go,” I say. “I’ll be fine.”
Minutes pass. I sip the drink, but whatever’s inside makes my head spin and my pulse quicken dangerously fast, so I toss it. The students on the dance floor don’t feel the same way. Their lips and chins are stained silver, the mercury-colored liquid glowing softly beneath the neon lights.
The music grows wilder. The dance floor pulses with charged energy. I see a few of our professors acting as chaperones, but they retreat as the party becomes crazier by the second. o;Anything,” he pledges, his voice thick with excitement.
The chill of his cool breath against my ear makes me sigh. “Don’t hurt me.”
A long pause. “I promise to always protect you.” He punctuates his answer first in the form of a languid, penetrating kiss. Then with his fingers as they glide between my breasts, across my stomach, between my thighs, and inside me.
“Always,” he repeats. “No matter the price.”
We don’t have sex, but the acts we do are just as intimate. Maybe more. And through it all, he kisses me. My neck. My lips. My breasts. Other places. Until there isn’t a spot on my body his lips haven’t claimed.
That gentle act sprinkled between the passionate, almost desperate clash of our bodies is enough to undo me completely.
In this tiny sliver of time, I am his and he is mine.
Hours later, I fall asleep against his chest, so tired I couldn’t move if my life depended on it. When I finally come to, the prince is whispering my name. “Summer.”
“Sleepy.” I bury my head in a pillow to avoid the silvery light trickling from the crack between his heavy blue drapes.
“I have to leave,” he says. “Feel free to stay as long as you need.”
With his voice comes reality. A startling, sobering reality.
I am naked and the room is freezing and . . . oh my God, the others must be so worried about me.
Fisting the plush duvet between my fingers, I drag the covers around my body and sit up. The prince sits in bed, naked, sipping some type of fragrant tea from a gilded teacup. But all his attention is on me.