19. A Wish & a Wife
20. A Flower Without a Story
A Message from Oliver
A Note from the Author
Also by Inka York
About the Author
Acknowledgments
Content Warning
Author’s Note
This is a companion tale to Two Souls & a Pocket Watch, not a standalone story. In an effort not to bore you to death, there are only some scenes that overlap what you already know, just to anchor you in the story’s chronology. You should read Two Souls first.
Please be aware this story is set in England and is written in British English by a British author. That word you want to flag as a typo? That’s just how we spell theatre here.
If you do spot a genuine typo though, please report it through the error report form on my website, where the reporting actually works.
The content warning is at the back of the book and is indexed on the Contents page.
For those who were born into families that don’t deserve them,
I wish you the strength to push through the dirt and ask for more, and the courage to blossom in your own time.
Turn your face to the sun, my friend, and find the family of your heart.
“Real family does not come from your blood. It is the people standing beside you when no one else is.” – Nishan Panwar
“A flower cannot blossom without sunshine, and a man cannot live without love.” – Max Müller
“Like wildflowers, you must allow yourself to grow in all the places people thought you never would.”– E.V. Rogina
Ninety Blooms & a Wishing Well
A romantic well-demon. A tenacious trans man. A love story for every bloom.
On the run from an arranged marriage, Bram escapes London with his best friend and a vampire protector. But in order to make sure nobody follows, Bram resorts to drastic measures to erase his past identity.
Oliver is mystified when the one he loves disappears without a trace, but when he meets Bram, he's certain the young man will help him overcome his heartache. In fact, there's something very familiar about the way Bram feels in his arms.
This is a companion tale to Two Souls & a Pocket Watch (AKA Victorian Vampire Daddy) and follows approximately the same timeline. It’s set in London in 1900 in the Cascade Apocrypha storyworld. It also features a pregnancy, romantic pining, the Archangel Uriel being exceptionally competent (*passes fan), and fun times in the folly.
1
The Water Jinn in the Garden
Bram was thirteen years old the first time he summoned a well-demon to the garden. He breathed his every desire into the penny clutched in his fingers. “I am so lonely,” he’d whispered. “My brothers are gone, my parents are empty. This house is my prison, this body my cell. All I ask is for a friend to call my own.” With an ache in his heart, he tossed the coin into the well, staring after it until it was swallowed by the darkness.
And just like that, he arrived. Oliver.
It was the beginning of a lifelong friendship. Every week, he would arrive with grand tales of adventure on his lips. In the beginning, Bram had believed every word, but as he got older, he recognised them for what they were; Oliver was born to entertain. Bram had no doubt that Oliver had travelled, though he was little older than Bram himself, but did he believe every embellishment? He did not. Oliver knew he did not, but it hardly mattered to either of them.
The first books he brought for Bram were confiscated by his father. Yet more were confiscated by his mother. Bram hid them in places he thought they would never look, yet only two remained now, both works by Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Twelfth Night. The former remained a favourite to this day.
Bram remembered the exact moment Oliver began to look different to him. He had always been impossibly handsome, but at thirteen, Bram had little idea what that meant. He knew that when young ladies grew up they were supposed to want a handsome man for a husband, but he had met the husbands of many women, and none were like Oliver, with his blonde hair set in waves, his eyes like sharp sapphires, assessing but never judgemental. He did not have a bulbous nose, or beetroot cheeks, or a chin so dimpled it had facial features of its own. His smile was startling, like a lightning storm in June. That night, in that moment, Oliver’s smile had jolted Bram’s heart to life in ways that eluded him thereafter.
This was a terrible trial for Bram. After all, he was expected to put on a pretty dress night after night and dance until his feet ached, simpering and curtseying. Soon, he would be expected to marry a man and live out a charade for the rest of his life.
Countless balls and dozens of men, and still there was nobody like Oliver. Bram wondered why Oliver never attended the balls himself. After all, everyone who was anyone was at those balls. And Oliver was someone.
As he often did in the dead of night, when his thoughts threatened to overwhelm him, Bram went for a walk in the garden. It had been his intention to go to the well and ask Oliver why he never attended the balls, but he was distracted by the silver pond. The moon was full, and as he drew closer, it shivered in the water, and there was Oliver’s face residing in the moon, smiling like he’d never seen a more delightful sight than Bram’s face. Bram smiled back.
When he heard Oliver’s laughter behind him, he turned to find Oliver closer than he thought, his head tilted to the side, his smile intimate and shocking. Bram felt suddenly that Oliver knew him, that everything he was lay exposed to him.
“I would not like to see you waste away like poor old Narcissus.”
This was just like Oliver. There was always a story waiting; some poor Greek attacked by meddlesome gods. Bram was of the opinion that Zeus, in particular, should keep his hands to himself. Who wanted to be saved by being turned into a peony?
Bram laughed. “I was not admiring myself.”
“You should. There is much to admire in you.”
