He’d returned three hours later, his father’s written blessing in hand.

Then he’d taken my parents aside and spent another three hours convincing them to give us their blessing too.

And then, in true Evander fashion, he’d asked me to marry him.

“You already asked me that,” I reminded him.

“No, I know. I mean tonight. Marry me tonight. Even better, marry me right now.”

I’d glanced over at my parents, sure they were about to rescind any blessing Evander might have secured, but my father had only let out a bellowing laugh, and my mother, my sure and steadfast mother, looked as though she might swoon.

“What did you say to them?” I hissed.

“That, my dearly betrothed”—he tapped me on the nose, to which I scrunched it up—“is for me to know, and for you to spend the next decade hounding me about.”

“We can’t get married right now,” I whispered.

He blinked, much more innocently than was warranted. “Whysoever not?”

“Because…Because…”

He shot me a look.

I dug my heels in. “Because.”

He grinned, then, that look of pure adoration in his eyes threatening to knock me off balance.

I was dizzy. Why couldn’t I marry him, again? Surely there was a host of reasons, some pragmatic, some more serious.

My brain couldn’t seem to latch onto them.

His stare softened, and he tucked my curls behind my ear. “If you want to wait, I’m not going to pressure you. I’ll wait decades if I have to. I don’t mind.”

I forced a smile to my lips. “Good,” I said, though the word fell, thudding to the ground, echoing the sound of my heart. Why did I feel so disappointed? We were still going to get married. Just after we’d planned a wedding, like normal people. “Because we have cakes to order, and dignitaries to invite, and…” I swallowed, then let out a slow exhale. “And honestly, I don’t care about any of that. I just want to be your wife. Right now.”

Evander had picked me up and twirled me around, and both of my parents had winked, and that had been that.

My father, who apparently had a license to perform wedding ceremonies, had married us in the workshop. We’d waited a few hours, long enough for a messenger to retrieve the queen. The king hadn’t bothered to attend.

During the ceremony, a few of my mother’s chickens had snuck in and pecked at Evander’s ankles.

A few days later, Evander and I had hatched a plan.

Well, it wasn’t quite international espionage, but we’d both enjoyed feeling like we were scheming.

I still wasn’t quite ready to forgive Blaise for her part in putting my life in danger. It wasn’t even just my life, but the lives of the guards Cinderella had killed, lives that could have been spared had Blaise come forward with the truth earlier. Then there was the fact that Cinderella had come to my home, where my parents had thankfully remained asleep in bed.

I shuddered to think what might have happened had my father woken to the commotion, if he’d heard my cries when she etched my face with her knife.

Thankfully, Peck had managed to heal my wounds before they scarred.

Still, that didn’t mean I wanted that horrible magic to continue inhabiting Blaise’s body.

“Allow me this dance?” Evander asked, extending his hand as the musicians plucked a new song on their lyres.

“How about I let you have the last one?” I winked, and the mischievous look that overcame his face had my toes curling in my shoes.

Not glass slippers, by the way.

With the gentle instruction of my father, I was starting to relearn glassblowing, but I received little help from muscle memory, and I was practically starting from scratch.

Still, I was making progress, and that was enough.

I nodded toward the Queen of Naenden, the true reason I denied his request for a dance. I was too antsy to enjoy the dance anyway, at least until Evander could get some answers.

We’d planned the wedding on the night of a full moon intentionally, and though I’d been checking the windows all night, and it had yet to crest the horizon, I still couldn’t help but feel a shiver racing through my blood at all times.

Blaise was in prison. Locked up. I shouldn’t be this nervous, but still.

There was nothing the magic inside her wouldn’t do to get to Evander. Three weeks ago, Evander and I raided Madame LeFleur’s old shop and found a collection of recipes for love potions. Love perfumes, to be more exact. Each recipe was concocted with a specific target in mind with the intent of “causing obsession directed toward whoever is wearing the potion when the target first scents it.”

The one with Evander’s name on it had included lilac and rosebuds.

He was a little than more relieved, to say the least. I supposed I would be too if I found out my undying obsession with a psychopath could be blamed on a love potion.

I tried not to bring it up, given he was still sensitive about it. Especially since Blaise had worn it in front of him the night before the third trial. I’d thought at the time that he’d simply found the scent unbearably strong, but I now knew he’d been smelling a love potion made specifically for him. Except that time, it had been a girl he thought of as a sister wearing it. No wonder his nose had curled in disgust.

We hadn’t asked Blaise about it, but I liked to think she really had thought she was borrowing it from Imogen. That she’d had no idea it was the dark being inside of her that had stashed the perfume in their room. Imogen hadn’t even had the opportunity to deny the perfume was hers, since Blaise had whispered where she’d gotten it.

I’d mostly avoided the topic with Evander, lest I embarrass him, but I hadn’t been able to help asking him if Cinderella had forgotten the perfume the night she tried to seduce him.

His tanned cheeks had gone red, and he’d said, “I remember scenting it on her that night. Now that I think about it, every time I smelled it, it was like I would get a burst of…desire for her.” He’d coughed uncomfortably. “But El, you have to understand. I missed you so badly, there was no amount of wanting her that was going to make me jeopardize the slim chance I had of getting you back.”

I’d found that answer quite satisfactory, indeed.

Evander traced the direction of my gesture to the corner of the ballroom and let out an exasperated huff. “Promise to protect me if the Naenden king gets it into his head that I’m flirting with his wife?”

I shot him a devious grin. “Just make sure you don’t flirt with her, or else I might just put some ideas into his head. I hear linen is quite flammable,” I said, gesturing toward his suit.

CHAPTER 58

EVANDER

It was with utmost hesitation, and a generous dose of prodding from my beautiful bride, that I approached the Queen of Naenden.

Not that I didn’t enjoy her company. Actually, I found her dry personality to be quite refreshing.

But then there was the matter of her husband.