Page 10 of Enchantra (Wicked Games #2)

9

GRAVE MISTAKE

The chill in the evening air was biting compared to the fire in her lungs as she pushed her feet as fast as they’d go.

She flexed the magic in her veins as she dashed out down the front porch steps and met the beckoning entrance of the maze. She could feel the freezing air even in her Specter state, but she ignored it as she passed deeper and deeper into the maze. Her heart racing so erratically that her magic was flickering in and out, and when she heard heavy footsteps crunch in the snow not too far behind, her hold on her power broke entirely.

“ Damn it ,” she hissed as she paused and tried to regain control. But her concentration was utterly shot, and her reservoir of magic was running low from exhaustion. She could hear someone gaining on her and knew that she had essentially trapped herself in her haste.

Someone shouted behind her, making her feet mobilize once more as she began assessing her place in the labyrinth. The ten-foot walls of greenery made it hard for her to determine how deep she’d already gone, but at least these walls weren’t moving like they had been in the mirror-realm. So, she started guessing. Left at the first fork, right at the second. Every other turn she made seemed to lead to a dead end, and when she rounded one corner a bit too tightly, a sprig of thorns sliced through her sleeve and into her skin. She hissed in pain as she looked down at the fresh blood seeping from the jagged wound, thinking the thorns might as well have been talons for how easily they cut through the fabric of her cape.

“That looks like it might have hurt.”

Genevieve yelped in surprise and stopped short, her chest heaving as she scanned the darkness for him .

“Do not come any closer,” she spat.

Rowin tilted his head at her, hands shoved deep in his pockets, his golden eyes glowing in the moonlight. “Sevin was right. You do look like a helpless little rabbit.”

An offended scoff sounded from her throat. He took a step closer.

“You’re going to get devoured here,” he told her. “But I imagine the spectators are going to enjoy it. You might even edge out Sevin as this year’s Favored. If you stay alive long enough.”

She shuffled back a step. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“I’d appreciate it if you stopped trying to scare my bride, Remi,” a deep voice said from behind her.

Rowin’s sharp scent of mint and honey suddenly enveloped her, and she twisted around to watch him approach. She swung her gaze between the two men in disbelief. Aside from the hoop pierced through Rowin’s lip and a few other nearly indistinct details, the two of them looked like exact replicas of each other.

Identical twins.

“For fuck’s sake, there’s two of you?” Genevieve exclaimed.

Remi shrugged. “Our enemies are equally disappointed.”

“Leave us,” Rowin ordered his twin. “Father wants you to help Sevin and Ellin set up for the ceremony. He and Knox are discussing plans to update the masquerade invitations in the study, and he said that you could meet them in there.”

Remi countered with a shrug. “As if I care about helping you set up something that’s going to release you from this eternity of Hell while the rest of us are stuck with Knox forevermore.”

Bitterness laced Remi’s words, but not the kind held by envious strangers when they see others receive something they wanted. No, this kind was much more complicated. It was the sort of bitterness you had when it was someone you loved getting something you wanted. Your happiness for them confounded by your anger. Of not wanting to hurt them by taking it away, but perhaps deluding yourself into thinking you deserved it more, and that didn’t make you a terrible person.

It was a feeling she’d grown up with. One that had created a wedge between her and Ophelia for far too long. But the day she’d realized that Ophie would always be their mother’s priority, and that Ophelia didn’t even wish that were so, was the day she’d found peace. She’d watched as the pressure of upholding their family’s legacy had slowly stripped away Ophie’s hopes and dreams for her own life, and she’d known it was not her sister she ought to be angry with.

“We can have this fight later,” Rowin told his brother.

“When?” Remi asked, stepping forward. “The next time you decide to pay us a visit in Hell? The next time you write us to tell us what’s going on in your life? You haven’t done either of those things in nearly two decades, so I won’t hold my breath.”

“And I thought my household deserved the award for most tragically dramatic,” Genevieve muttered, mostly to herself.

Rowin’s eyes snapped to her face, irritation heating his gaze.

Remi huffed a humorless laugh. “I hope she’s everything you deserve, Rowin.”

Genevieve watched as Remi began doing that strange shadow thing she had seen Rowin do earlier, the wisps of darkness slowly enveloping him until he disappeared.

“You really don’t know when to be quiet , do you?” Rowin growled as he turned on her.

“It’s never been a talent of mine,” she agreed.

In two steps, he was in front of her, walking her backward until she felt the prickling twigs of the labyrinth’s wall poking at her spine.

“From here on out you are either on my side or in my fucking way,” he told her, enunciating every word carefully, so close that their chests were pressed together, and she swore she could feel his heartbeat. “You have no idea what I’m putting on the line to save your ass. Knox appeared just after you ran away, and he’s speaking with my father now. But he could decide to join us any second. Even this conversation is a risk.”

“I thought we already established that I’m the one with all the risk, while you stand to reap a very big reward,” she retorted.

“High rewards are bred from high risks,” he explained. “If you die in the Hunt, we both lose, and everything I’ve been working toward goes out the window.”

“Then why are you so insistent that we work together?” she implored.

“Because, yes, the reward I’ll get if we do win is worth the odds. And…” His jaw clenched as his words trailed off.

“ And? ”

“And you stepped into the house on my watch. Therefore you’re my burden to bear,” he muttered.

“I will never be your anything to bear,” she vowed with a scowl.

“You’re going to have to be very careful not to talk like that from now on. Knox is already anticipating tripling his spectator list and the amount of wagers on this year’s game. If you want to be the one to tell him all of this is a ruse, be my guest.”

She swallowed, and a corner of his mouth lifted.

“That’s what I thought. The marriage ceremony must be completed before midnight. My father is explaining to Knox that we left it late because we wanted my family to attend. And Knox himself, of course. As far as he’s concerned, we’ve had a whirlwind romance, and we were eagerly awaiting his blessing on our union.” Rowin flicked his eyes over the bloody state of her dress. “His excitement about the money he’s going to make seems to be outweighing his suspicions. For now. All we have to do is keep up our facade.”

“I’m not the girl for this,” she whispered, more to herself than him. “I can’t pretend to be in love with someone I’m not.”

“I’m sure you can pretend just fine,” he murmured, as he raised his hand and began to twirl one of the curls that framed her face around his index finger. “Think of it as playing a character. Inside the walls of Enchantra you’re no longer Genevieve Grimm. You’re my wife.” He tucked the strand of hair he’d been playing with behind her ear, letting his fingertips graze her cheeks ever so lightly and making her suck in a breath as she resisted the urge to lean into the touch. “In front of everyone you’ll smile and pretend like you actually enjoy my company. There can be no arguing .” A wicked glint entered his eyes as he said that last bit, and she shifted her gaze away before she could blush at how attractive she found that look. “And when we aren’t fighting for our lives during the Hunt, if there’s a moment we can play up for the viewers’ entertainment, a kiss?—”

That snapped her right out of his trance.

Fuck, how did he do that?

“No. There will be no kissing, no pretending, no wedding ,” she spat at him now, placing both her hands on his chest and shoving him away from her as hard as she could. He didn’t budge.

He sighed in frustration. The expression of sincerity and heat he’d been wearing moments before melting away in an instant. It made her stomach churn.

“Might I remind you this is equally, if not entirely, your fault,” he told her. “ You decided to open an invitation that was not yours. You decided to break into the house despite my very clear warnings to leave. And what sort of mother forgets to mention the sadistic curse her dear friend’s family have been suffering through for centuries?—”

“The sort that’s dead ,” Genevieve seethed, cutting him off before his words could slice into her any deeper.

At Genevieve’s statement, Rowin stiffened. She glared up at him, hoping the revelation made him feel terrible. Before he could offer any sort of empty condolence, however, someone called his name from somewhere outside of the maze. Sevin.

“We need to get inside,” Rowin told her, his tone only slightly softer than before. “As I said—the ceremony needs to be completed by midnight.”

He began to turn away, but when she didn’t move, he paused with an expectant look.

“No,” she maintained. “This is absurd.”

“Have we not already established that you do not have any other options? If you make me chase you any further, I’ll?—”

“You’ll what?” she pressed. “Kill me? Isn’t that likely to be my fate, anyway? At least if I make you do it now, I’ll save myself some trouble.”

“You really think death by my hand would be better than taking it in marriage?”

“And if I do?”

His smile turned devious, and her heart began to thunder in her chest at the sight.

“You know what, trouble? Let’s make our own little wager.”

She held her breath.

“You manage to make it out of this labyrinth and get to the front gate before I do—without using your magic—and I’ll give you the choice. Play on your own or play with me. If I win, however, you come back inside and put on a damned wedding dress.”

“You already know your way through the maze,” she accused.

“I’ll give you a head start, then,” he allowed.

“Fine. When?—”

“ Now. ”

Genevieve whirled around and darted out of the corridor without a second of hesitation as soon as the word crossed his lips. The sound of her blood rushing in her ears was so loud that she could barely hear her own footsteps pounding through the snow.

Two right turns and she finally happened upon the heart of the labyrinth. It looked just as it had in the mirror-realm that Knox had led her to. Except the circular pool at the base of the fountain was frozen solid in this reality, the arched streams of water unmoving. As she fled past, she saw that every angle showcased a different animal carved into its glittering tiers. A large mink. A serpent. A wolf. An owl. The rest blurred together as she ran.

She didn’t know how long it took her to get out of the maze, how many frustrating dead ends or false exits she’d run into, but when the gleaming, thorny gates appeared ahead, with Rowin nowhere in sight, she nearly wept with relief. Inches before she reached the gate, however, a shadowy form appeared right in her path. She smacked straight into Rowin’s suddenly solid figure, ricocheting off his chest and slipping on the snowy ground.

“Took you long enough,” he drawled as he quickly wrapped an arm around her waist to steady her back on her feet.

She ripped herself from his embrace. “ You said no magic! ”

He smirked. “No, I said you couldn’t use magic.”

She wanted to scream. To lash out at him for fooling her with such an easy trick. She knew better than to make deals without choosing her words precisely.

“You lost,” he stated, stepping past her with a beckoning wave. “Let’s get this over with.”

But she didn’t follow him. Instead, she lunged forward, slamming her hands into the bars of the gate, entirely unconcerned by the frozen thorns wrapped around them digging into her wound. But that little bit of pain was the least of her worries. When a jolt of agony seared through her body the moment she touched the bars, she cried out, a pulse of power erupting around her and sending her tumbling backward with a heavy thud.

No. No. No.

She scrambled to her feet, shifting into her non-corporeal form to try again. As she went to pass through, however, it jolted her right out of her Specter state.

“ What the fuck? ” she hissed as she looked down at her now-solid hands.

Whatever enchantment coated the metalwork now seemed to nullify her Specter abilities. She tried once more, and the cold metal sent her flying back. Her skin felt like it had been set aflame. A feeling she knew all too intimately.

She turned and retched into the snow.

When she’d thoroughly emptied the contents of her stomach, she swiped the back of her hand across her mouth as she watched the flurries of snowflakes fall from the sky, feeling them dissolve on her feverish cheeks and coat her lashes. No. No. Fucking Hell, this could not be happening. If she couldn’t leave, it meant she was trapped in yet another treacherous game. She’d made such a grave mistake coming here.

She reached over to touch the ring on her left finger in comfort. Remembered it was gone. Heaved once more.

Boots crunched through the snow, pausing next to her. She didn’t bother to look up as Rowin crouched down to her level.

“I warned you there was no getting out,” he reminded her. “Getting sick over it now is a little pathetic, really.”

Pathetic.

Genevieve tensed at the word. A word she knew all too well. One that haunted her during the witching hours when she couldn’t sleep. The anger that had been slowly extinguishing in her belly reignited instantly. Not just anger, spite . Because as devastated as she was that she’d trapped herself yet again, spite would give her strength. She was used to doing things out of spite. Excelled at it, actually.

Flashes of last year’s Mardi Gras parade went through her mind. A carefully choreographed scene involving Farrow walking in on her and Basile Landry in the throes of…

She quickly shook the memories away, refocusing all her anger on the man in front of her instead. She twisted around and launched herself at him. He grunted in surprise as she pinned him down, straddling his waist.

“You’re an absolute bastard —” she seethed.

In a blink he rolled her over until her back was pressed into the dirty ground, the melting ice soaking through her dress. She let out a shriek of frustration as she tried to reach up between them and claw at his face. He easily gathered both her wrists in one hand while he flattened the other on the ground next to her head to hold the brunt of his weight off her.

“And you’re half wild,” he observed, a spark igniting in his golden eyes.

She bucked her hips, trying to shove him off her, but likely only proving his point further.

“I’m not going to let you go unless you promise to behave,” he threatened.

She gave a bitter laugh. “Then I suppose we’ll have to stay like this forever.”

He stared at her for a long, tense moment, and something about the intensity of his gaze made her breath hitch. She suddenly realized how close they were. How much of his body she could feel pressed along every inch of her own. The sculpted planes of his stomach, the hardness of his…

He rolled off her, blithely climbing back up to his feet in one fluid motion. She sighed in relief, until a blink later, when she found herself being lifted and thrown over his shoulder like a sack of flour. Never had she been manhandled like this before.

She growled with rage as she pounded her fists against his back. But his stride never faltered as he stalked toward the house.

“You’re a fucking brute !” she snarled.

She felt his shoulders shake with laughter. “You’re going to tire yourself out long before you hurt me, trouble.”

Her jaw clenched as she pulled her punches, the blood rushing to her head giving her a migraine. Then she did the only other thing she could think of: she bit him. In the ass.

His grunt of surprise echoed well into the cold night around them, but he never loosened his hold.