Page 63 of Deals & Dream Spells (The Charmed Leaf Legacy #2)

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Mariselle drifted toward consciousness on a gentle current, the familiar weight of dreams gradually lifting as morning light painted gold across her eyelids and awareness filtered in.

She registered sensations one by one—the softness of worn cotton beneath her cheek, the distant chirping of birds, and most curiously, the steady rhythm of someone else’s breathing very close to her own.

She opened her eyes slowly, the world resolving itself in gentle increments, and found herself looking at Evryn’s sleeping face mere inches from hers.

His features were softened, and he had one arm curled beneath his head while the other lay outstretched toward her on the coverlet.

For one disorienting moment, she couldn’t reconcile where they were or how they’d come to be lying so close together, but a single startling thought filled her mind with perfect clarity—that she would happily wake to this sight every morning for the remainder of her days.

And then she remembered.

Her parents. Being confined to Brightcrest Manor. Pouring so much of herself into the dream core. Shouting at Evryn. The room tilting in a frightening and dizzying way.

Her heart pattered faster for several moments, clouds attempting to gather at the edges of her mind, but she surrendered to the sweet haziness of leftover sleep, comforted by the simple fact that Evryn was near.

After another minute or so, he stirred. His eyelids fluttered open drowsily, blinking several times as though filtering reality from dreams, until his gaze finally landed on her. Their eyes met.

“You’re awake,” he breathed, the words escaping him like a prayer he hadn’t dared offer aloud.

“I am.” A small, tired smile tugged at her lips. “You’re lying beside me.”

His mouth curved. “Astute as ever.”

She would have teased him, but her voice caught on the next breath. There was something raw in his gaze as it traveled her face. Something that made her pulse stutter.

Softly, almost reverently, he reached toward her and brushed a strand of hair away from her temple. “Darling,” he murmured, the word barely more than air, “your hair is golden again.”

“Oh.” She managed a faint smile. “I’m sorry. I know you preferred the blue.”

Evryn let out a shaky breath, his expression twisting in a way that made her chest ache.

“It does not matter to me what color your hair is,” he said, emotion thick in his voice.

“I love you regardless. If I am granted nothing else in this life but the chance to show you, every single day, how utterly, unconditionally, and completely you are loved for exactly who you are, then I will count myself the most fortunate man in all the realms. You, Mariselle Brightcrest, are treasured beyond measure.”

Her breath caught as his words settled into places within her heart that had always stood empty. Tears gathered, silver and bright, and she pressed her trembling lips together.

Utterly and unconditionally.

Treasured beyond measure.

And then her mind caught on another three words: Every single day.

“Evryn Rowanwood,” she managed to whisper. “Are you asking me to marry you?”

An uncharacteristic vulnerability wavered in his eyes. “Yes.”

Her smile stretched wider despite the lump in her throat.

“Don’t worry, this isn’t the official moment,” he added. “I have a whole production planned. You know how I excel at performance. ”

“Oh, I have no doubt. Will it involve magically multiplying floral arrangements?”

“Of course. At least a dozen varieties.”

“And dreadful poetry?”

“The very worst. I know how much it delights you.”

She let out a quiet laugh, and the sound seemed to soften something in him.

He reached for her hand, his fingers entwining with hers as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

“I mean it,” he said, his voice dropping to a husky timbre that sent warmth cascading through her veins.

“I fully intend to go down on one knee, and I am fully prepared to do it right now, no flowers, no poetry, no pageantry?—”

“No.” She reached for his sleeve, fingers curling to stop him as he began to shift. “I find I rather like you exactly where you are. Lying right here beside me.”

He stilled, then leaned in a fraction closer, the ghost of a smile on his lips. “Mariselle Brightcrest,” he said in a low and scandalized tone, “how delightfully improper of you.”

“It’s what we’re known for, isn’t it?” she murmured, voice hushed.

They lay there for a long moment, breathing in the hush that had settled between them, hearts thrumming in time, fingers tracing slow, gentle patterns across each other’s palms.

“You scared me,” Evryn whispered, eyes never leaving hers. “You terrified me. No, you very nearly unmade me. I thought I might never see your beautiful smile again or hear your laugh.”

She shook her head, bit her lip, trying not to give in to the emotion that threatened to overwhelm her.

“I’m so sorry. I should not have pushed myself that far.

I couldn’t see how close I was to the edge until I was already falling.

I was so desperate to finish. Desperate to …

” She shrugged, her shoulder pressing into the mattress.

“I wanted to achieve something of my own before my family takes possession of my magic.”

And speaking of her family …

“Evryn,” she whispered, her heart sinking as the terrible confrontation with her parents surfaced in her mind. Had she really allowed the dreamy haze of sleep to lull her into thinking that any of this could be possible? “My family will never?—”

“Your family will not be a problem. ”

“Evryn, unless the very foundations of the earth have shifted beneath our feet since yesterday, nothing has changed to suggest that my parents might?—”

“Mariselle?”

The voice came from the next room, and Evryn scrambled off the bed so fast, Mariselle could have sworn it had caught fire beneath him. He knocked the chair over, caught it, righted it, then almost stumbled into the wall.

Mariselle sat up. “Was that … my grandmother?”

Before Evryn could answer, Lady Nirella Brightcrest herself appeared in the doorway, draped in a traveling cloak over what appeared to be a nightgown.

Her hair—which Mariselle had never seen in anything but an impeccable arrangement—tumbled in disarray around her shoulders.

Despite this unprecedented state of dishevelment, she carried herself with the same rigid posture she might display at a formal reception at Solstice Hall.

Her sharp eyes took in the scene—Mariselle sitting up on the bed, Evryn standing awkwardly by the wall as though he’d been magnetically propelled there—and her lips betrayed the faintest of quirks.

“I see Lord Rowanwood possesses the reflexes of a startled hare,” she remarked dryly. “How fortunate, as it spares me the effort of reminding him about proper distances between unmarried young people.”

“Grandmother,” Mariselle breathed, still struggling to reconcile this version of Lady Nirella with the immaculate figure she’d known all her life. “What are you doing here? How did you?—”

“I received an urgent message last night regarding your condition,” Lady Nirella replied, moving into the room.

“Though I’m relieved to see you’ve recovered.

” Her gaze slid to Evryn, who appeared to be attempting to blend into the wall.

“No doubt thanks to the remedy that Venna—” She caught herself with a loud cough and immediately forged on. “That Lady Rivenna and I prepared.”

“Lady Rivenna?” Mariselle echoed, feeling as though she’d awakened in an entirely different reality than the one she’d left.

“Yes,” her grandmother confirmed, her tone suggesting this was merely a minor inconvenience rather than an earth-shattering development.

“She is presently asleep on the window seat, while I managed a few hours on the sofa. Not the most comfortable arrangements, but needs must when dealing with magical exhaustion. ”

Mariselle swung her legs over the edge of the bed. “I don’t understand. How did you both?—”

“It seems you and Lord Rowanwood agreed to fulfill the Dreamland restoration contract,” Lady Nirella cut in.

“A fact I might have appreciated knowing before discovering you unconscious from magical depletion. I believe it is time for the two of us to return home— my home, not Brightcrest Manor—where we may discuss the implications of this in private.”

Mariselle’s head spun with everything that was happening.

Her limbs were still heavy from sleep, her mind still trying to reconcile the presence of both grandmothers in this cottage, and her heart still processing a proposal.

Evryn Rowanwood wanted to marry her! And now she was simply expected to … leave?

“Would someone kindly explain what this mysterious contract is that everyone except myself seems so intimately acquainted with?” Lady Rivenna’s irritated voice carried from beyond Nirella.

As Mariselle peered around her grandmother, she spied Lady Rivenna standing in the adjacent room, similarly disheveled, with arms crossed firmly over her chest. She wondered briefly if this was the first time the formidable proprietress of The Charmed Leaf was not the first to be privy to the machinations occurring within her own family circle.

“Let me explain,” Evryn said with a sigh, walking out of the room.

After a brief hesitation, Lady Nirella inclined her head, signaling that she and Mariselle should follow.

“Lady Mariselle and I discovered this cottage during one of our—” Evryn paused, clearing his throat, “—nighttime excursions.”

Both grandmothers’ eyebrows shot up in perfect synchronization.

“We were racing each other on pegasi,” he clarified hastily.

At this, they looked even more horrified.

“I suppose that explains the unconventional choice of attire,” Lady Nirella muttered, eyeing Evryn’s riding gear with distaste.

“In any case, we found ourselves here, at Windsong Cottage. When our hands touched the door—Mariselle’s was cut, mine scraped—the door opened, and we discovered a contract inside.

A binding magical agreement stipulating that Dreamland would remain sealed until heirs of both families willingly consented to its restoration.

The contract clearly stated that the signatories’ blood would activate it when freely given alongside a sworn oath. ”

“And you both … what? Accidentally swore an oath?” Lady Rivenna asked incredulously.

“Uh, yes. In the heat of argument. As one does.”

Lady Rivenna shook her head, muttering something that included the word ‘fools.’

“This contract,” Evryn added with a pointed look at Mariselle’s grandmother, “was signed by Nirella Brightcrest and Valenrik Rowanwood.”

At the mention of these two names, Lady Rivenna’s gaze shot instantly to Lady Nirella, her eyes filling with betrayal. “You drew up this contract with my husband, and neither of you ever bothered to mention it me?”

“You and I were not exactly speaking to one another, were we?” Lady Nirella said primly.

“I cannot imagine what Rik’s excuse was,” Lady Rivenna muttered, directing her look of betrayal at the oak table now.

“I always wondered if he told you about it,” Mariselle’s grandmother said softly.

“If it’s any consolation, I don’t think either of us believed that any Brightcrest and Rowanwood heir would ever agree to it.

” Her gaze shifted back to Mariselle then.

“And I should note that we did not specify the exact nature of the binding mark. Curious that it should take the particular pattern it took.”

“Indeed.” Lady Rivenna crossed her arms and directed her gaze at her grandson. “So this ‘soulbond’ the two of you claimed to have suddenly developed—this ‘love’ you apparently have for one another—is all a complete lie?”

“No!” Mariselle and Evryn blurted out at the same time, their eyes immediately finding one another across the room.

“Well, it was at first,” Mariselle corrected. “But … things have changed.”

Evryn gave her a small smile. “Things have most certainly changed.”

Lady Rivenna groaned with dramatic distaste. Then she rolled her shoulders, straightened, and very firmly said, “Evryn, it is time we left.”

Mariselle watched as Evryn faced his grandmother and very simply said, “No.”

Lady Rivenna blinked, then fixed him with a glare that could have silenced an entire flock of gossip birds. “Evryn.”

“More than five decades, Grandmother. More than fifty years .” Evryn’s gaze slid to Lady Nirella, then back to his grandmother. “Have you not hated each other for long enough?”

Lady Nirella drew herself up. “You do not know what you speak of?—”

“Then tell us!” he roared, throwing his hands up. “All these cryptic statements, these vague allusions. We are the ones who bear the weight of your hatred. A feud whose origins remain shrouded in secrecy while its poison continues to shape our lives!”

Lady Nirella huffed. “Now is not the time. Mariselle is still recovering, and we?—”

“I’m perfectly fine, Grandmother,” Mariselle said quietly, “and I shall remain here until this matter is thoroughly resolved.”

“You will do no such thing,” her grandmother told her. “You and I?—”

“I LOVE HER!” Evryn burst out. “Do neither of you understand that?” He turned his desperate gaze toward Lady Rivenna. “Grandmother, I love her . She and I will have a future together, and we would very much like it if both our families could be part of that future.”

Silence descended. Mariselle’s heart thrummed as Evryn’s words rang in her ears.

I love her.

She and I will have a future together.

But the two grandmothers stood rigid, their gazes fixed on anything but each other, the weight of decades pressing down upon all of them like a physical force.

“You were friends,” Mariselle said quietly, and the look that shot instantly between her grandmother and Lady Rivenna told her that her guess was right. “Close friends,” she added. “That’s why there is so much hurt here. The deepest wounds can only be inflicted by those we hold dear.”

Another silence fell as the two grandmothers regarded each other, something unspoken passing between them.

“Perhaps,” Lady Nirella said carefully, “it is time certain truths were told.”

Lady Rivenna’s expression remained impassive, but she gave a single, terse nod. “Very well.”