Page 25

December

We did not have the High King’s decision by December.

The beginning of the month came and went without a word from the unseen ruler—even after the full moon.

That’s why I was happy to see Brigid when she knocked on the exterior glass door two days after my first shift post-learning I was a bear.

She was a welcome distraction from my near constant thoughts of the incoming new year and the High King’s final answer.

“Come in, come in,” I invited, waving her into my suite as she waddled past me.

Her pregnant belly had doubled in size since our first meeting, but she seemed as bouncy and energetic as ever.

She pulled me toward the suite’s couch, which, like the bed, sat in front of the gigantic lake-view digital wall.

She told me she’d taken several pictures of me at magic hour, when the sun hadn’t yet set but the moon was on the rise, and came to show them to me—conveniently during my now-scheduled brunch and whittling time.

“When I knew those two obsessive kings would let you breathe and have a little company. I swear, have you ever met a more selfish pair of knobs? Oh, don’t give me that look, Sadie Strawberry.”

Brigid rolled her eyes at the look I hadn’t been aware I was giving her.

“You know I’m only joking. Sure, it’s fine that they trapped you in the palace and Stockholm’d you with 24/7 sexcapades while your arse of a High King takes his sweet time making up his mind.”

“That’s not all we do,” I insisted to Brigid.

First of all, we slept.

A lot. Everyone—not just me—had the Winter Sleepies, and our wake times were steadily dwindling.

Second, the kings still had to manage the general upkeep of their business.

“Checking in daily to make sure the wheels aren’t falling off the company we built,” Tadhg had explained apologetically when he and the Shadow King were late to our nightly dinner.

We’d fallen into a routine where I had brunch and spent the late afternoon alone.

Then they would join me for a veritable feast on the portico, which we always shared as a trio before returning to my room for what Tadhg had taken to calling second supper .

Third, the two kings had a lot of stuff to educate me about outside of the circular bed.

The Shadow King had taught me how to use a computer, set me up with a keyboarding program, and warned me off something called Reddit.

Tadhg was giving what he insisted were far more important lessons on the laptop they’d gifted me: how to “make a proper playlist of R&B from the ’90s and early 2000s” and how to “binge a multi-season series while picking your nose and doing feck all.”

Picking my nose, I was told, was optional.

The Breakthrough Mary J.

Blige album was not.

Between the human’s internet (minus Reddit) and an all-season viewing of a “completely accurate horror shitshow” called Industry and an outer-space show called Star Trek: The Next Generation , I honestly felt as if I was making real progress—catching up to and, at the same time, never wanting to join the modern world outside St. Ailbe.

But I still didn’t understand many of the things that came out of Brigid’s mouth.

I wrote down “Stockholm syndrome” on the little notepad the Shadow King had gifted me to house the many questions I wanted to ask either Tadhg or the internet later.

I usually opted for Tadhg.

The internet could be, to use a Naomi Speak phrase, a total dumpster fire .

Also, many of the results that came back for my questions included Reddit posts.

But no matter what Brigid said, I could honestly tell her, “We don’t only have sex.”

“Is that so?” Tadhg’s sister raised both red brows.

“How’s your wardrobe coming along, then?”

She cast a disparaging eye over the strawberry dress I wore, which, admittedly, I’d hurriedly slipped on along with a sports bra when the room nearly shocked me to death with a loud: “Alert: Mountain Princess Brigid Ryan approaching door! Alert: Mountain Princess Brigid Ryan approaching door!”

My cheeks heated.

“I like this dress.”

“Do you like it, or do you only need one dress because the lads are quite insistent on keeping you naked?”

Long pause.

Then: “I mean, both can be true.”

“Well, thank goodness they actually let you out for the full moon. Or else I wouldn’t have gotten these darling pictures.” She set her GoNoTo phone on her belly.

“Look at this adorable Sadie bear.”

Brigid, as she’d already confessed, could be prone to exaggeration.

But I couldn’t help but smile as she swiped through pictures and a couple of videos of a big fluffy black bear with a brown muzzle, frolicking and galloping around the lake.

“That’s me?”

“That’s you, babes,” Brigid confirmed.

“My High Prince husband almost joined you—said you looked like you were having so much fun. Even though the kings forbade anyone to shift within a kilometer of the lake during the full moon.”

I scrunched my brow.

“Why did they do that?”

“Uh, because you asked to shift outside, and they couldn’t just tell ye, ‘No, sorry, Sadie Strawberry, that would send us into a jeally rage.’”

Jeally .

.. was that short for jealous?

“But why would they be—” I started to ask.

And Brigid began her answer before the question was even done.

“An unmated female bear can attract unwanted bear attention, that’s why. And bears can be especially frisky on full moon nights. Why did ye think ye were out there all alone when ye went to strip naked in the hedge woods?”

I shook my head.

“I thought everyone else just preferred to shift inside.”

“ Nobody prefers to shift inside. Are ye mad? We’re bears, for Jayzus sake.”

Not in St. Ailbe.

“Was always shifting inside another one of your cult rules?” Brigid guessed off my look.

It was. And I couldn’t help but feel a little guilty that my freedom had come at the cost of everyone else’s.

“Don’t go feeling guilty.” Brigid rolled her eyes again.

“This is why my brother didn’t want me to mention it to you. Made me promise three times I wouldn’t bring it up if he let me visit.”

“But you just brought it up,” I pointed out.

“Well, ye know, feck that cunt. He ain’t the boss of me.”

I stared at Brigid.

Then burst out laughing.

“Alright, that’s the reaction I’m looking for, Stockholm Sadie. Blink twice and all that.”

Brigid shot me a conspiratorial grin and rubbed her hands together over her belly.

“Now let’s really piss ’em off by going into town in the one dress ye’re allowed. I say it’s time we do a bit of holiday shopping—just for ye, of course. Those arsewipe kings deserve nothing under their tree.”

I didn’t have any desire to piss off the kings who’d been so generous and kind to me.

But I was honestly curious about the darling town I’d only seen in the distance on the lake wall.

And maybe I could “do with,” as I’d been learning to say since coming to this Irish underground kingdom, a new dress.

Chances were I’d only be here until the New Year, and I’d need a few pieces of clothing before I left.

…

But I pushed those sad thoughts down as Brigid drove me into town in a golf cart that bumped and rocked so hard over the dirt roads, I had to ask her, “Aren’t you afraid so much jolting will send you into early labor?”

I eyed Brigid’s considerably larger stomach warily.

“I can only hope these heavy bastards come sooner rather than later,” she replied.

“Be happy ye didn’t go into estrus, like Tadhg was hoping. I could’ve done with a couple of years of marital bliss with just me an’ the boys I didn’t have to squeeze out of my nether regions. But wouldn’t you know, I’m a big ol’ sentimental marshmallow on the inside. Caught my cycle on our wedding night.”

Brigid’s words sent a pang through me.

What would it be like to have a wedding night on the same day the bear version of a heat cycle hit?

It sounded glorious.

She was right, though, to assume that wouldn’t happen for me before the New Year.

Tadhg hadn’t mentioned it, but I was pretty sure he’d given up on the High King accepting me because I went into spontaneous estrus.

A squeaky beep sounded in the distance, and Brigid waved to a couple of older ladies approaching comically slowly on their own golf cart.

“Good morning, O’Neilly Sisters. Top of the day to ye!”

“Is that The Potential, then?” one of the sisters called out as we passed them by.

“Shouldn’t she be at the castle until the High King makes his decision?” the other sister asked.

“It is, and she should!” Brigid yelled back over her shoulder.

“But I’ve stolen her, and I’m not giving her back until she has a couple more proper dresses.”

“Good for you!” the non-driving first sister yelled back.

“Shouldn’t you be keeping your eyes on the road?” I asked Brigid, fretting my bottom lip.

“For you, babes, anything,” Brigid answered with another breezy grin.

That only got wider when we stopped at a line of shops lining the main road.

My breath caught as we climbed out of the golf cart.

I knew it was a god-tech overlay—specifically, a holiday god-tech overlay that the Shadow King had worked on the entire week while Tadhg explained all the things I didn’t understand in the show Industry —which was everything.

But the village looked like something pulled straight from a storybook or one of those Christmas movies they kept advertising at the top of our show viewings.

Every shop along the main road had a wreath on its door and windows sparkling with lights.

The thatched roofs were no longer just dusted but covered in a thick layer of snow that looked so real.

Even though it was warm enough for me to be comfortable in nothing but my strawberry-patterned dress, I couldn’t help but wonder if it would be cold to the touch.

Either way, the fake snow, combined with the garlands of holly wrapped around every pole and the twinkling lights, gave the town such a festive glow that it seemed nothing short of absolutely magic?—

“Oi! Is that The Potential?” a gruff voice called to the left of us.

“Isn’t she supposed to be locked away in the palace?”

“She’s fine, Bat,” Brigid called to a huge male in a tweed cap and jacket lumbering out of the butcher shop.

He looked to be of Asian descent and had to stand nearly seven feet tall.

“I’ve just kidnapped her from her captors for the day, is all.”

Brigid was asked pretty much the same set of questions by every customer and shopkeeper we encountered—and then even more when she confirmed my identity.

“Is it true they kidnapped you all the way from Scotland, then?” the butcher asked when Brigid stopped in to order a Christmas ham.

The butcher seemed pleasantly unconcerned with the kidnapping part of his inquiry.

“Is it true she told the High King he had 'til the New Year or he could go stuff himself?” a female couple who were both well over 6'4" stopped to ask Brigid on the street.

“Is it true she used to be part of a cult that brainwashed her into thinking she was a wolf?” asked the shopkeeper who ran the only decent—“not just for old lady bearies,” Brigid told me—dress shop in town.

I might have felt offended if everyone weren’t so large and didn’t seem to mind me staring at them right back.

Also, the dress sizes at the store started at an XL. Not only were they not plain blue, but everything was designed to fit me.

I teared up as I pulled a Christmas-green wrap dress off the rack that would look perfect on me.

“Have the townspeople upset you, then? Oh babes, I swear they don’t mean anything by it. They’re curious about you, is all.”

Brigid had a peculiar way of being both devil-may-care and empathetic to my every change of expression. It made me wonder, not for the first time, how she and Tadhg had grown up. Even with all the weeks we’d spent together and a co-teacher who didn’t talk, the subject of his mother and father hadn’t come up again since that day he’d walked me home.

“No, it’s not that,” I answered with a watery laugh. “It’s just—I like it here so much. I was kind of hoping maybe I’d hate the town, and that would make it easier to leave if the High King says no.”

“Oh.” Brigid gave me a wholly sympathetic look. Then she asked, “So then, yes or no to a spot of tea at the café down the road? Though I should warn ye, if ye’re crying over this dress shop, that place is going to gut you. Charming as feck, it is.”

So no, I didn’t always understand Brigid, but she made me laugh as we ordered cups of Christmas blend tea at a café just down the road from the dress shop.

She was right, I was a bit gutted by the place. The shop oozed cozy charm, with mismatched furniture, twinkling lights, and shelves brimming with handmade goods, like candles, thick knitted sweaters, and soaps. A roaring fire in the hearth filled the air with the smell of woodsmoke but emitted no actual heat—more sci-fi god tech I suspected.

But Brigid loudly bragged about how the huge, shiny industrial coffee machine sitting behind the counter was 100% real human tech—no sci-fi. Apparently, the café owner had brought both it and a Portuguese outsider bear back to the Secret Kingdom after her time working in The Above as a barista.

“I mean, it breaks down all the time with no one here to service it, and we end up having to use the sci-fi more often than not to get our caffeine fix. Really, it’s become a bit of decoration and nothing more. But it’s the sentiment of it all, isn’t it?” Brigid told me in a much quieter voice as we went to find a table with our steaming mugs of tea.

Somehow, that only made the café even more charming. It was the kind of place I could see myself walking to with a book from the palace library tucked under my arm.

Brigid kicked two teenage boys out of a two-top beside the window—literally, she kicked at them with the bottom of her Adidas sneaker as she said, “That’s what you rotten teenyagers get for not offering a pregnant lady and her friend yer seats when she walked past ye!”

Brigid was nothing like Tadhg. I knew this because she announced, “I’m nothing like Tadhg” after I told her what shows I’d been watching. She then proceeded to make me a written list of shows “my feckhead brother should have led with.”

She shook her head as she wrote in my little notebook. “How have ye seen Industry , but not Buffy the Vampire Slayer ? I swear, you’ve been kidnapped by devils!”

Brigid’s animated words turned into an unintentional shout when all the sound dropped out of the room and everyone, including us, turned their heads to the new arrivals at the café’s door.

It was Tadhg and the Shadow King—looking wholly out of place in the café, even though they were technically the rulers of this kingdom.

There came a stark several beats of silence.

Then everyone but Brigid and me either dropped to one knee or sank into a deep curtsy.

“Your majesties… your majesties… your majesties…” dropped down like the rain Cian always scheduled for three to four p.m. as they made their way over to us.

“Wow, stalk much?” Brigid whispered to me under her breath before standing up with a bright smile. “SK! MK! So glad ye could make it out to your own kingdom town, which you haven’t visited in donkey years. Sit! Sit! I’m just making Sadie Strawberry a list of shows she should watch—that’s not that shitty space and business drama stuff you like.”

This greeting struck me as typical Brigid. But there was a tense moment in which the whole shop seemed to hold their collective breath, turning their heads to Tadhg to see how he’d react.

He’d been nothing but kind to me, though—okay, pretty wicked in bed, but mostly kind. Not to mention generous.

I always had to ask him to slip and slide , as he called our technically non-penetrative sex. Otherwise, he and the Shadow King took turns quietly attending to themselves in the bathroom after showering me with multiple orgasms.

But these people were looking at Tadhg like they expected him to go off like a bomb.

Behind glasses I hadn’t seen since I first arrived in the secret kingdom, the Mountain King glowered at Brigid for several long seconds. His face was like the thunder clouds Cian had told me he only scheduled on a holiday called Samhain.

I was beginning to wonder if the townspeople had it right. Maybe there was a side to Tadhg that I hadn’t seen.…

But then a wry grin split across Tadhg’s face, and he told his sister, “If you suggested Buffy the Vampire Slayer , I swear I’m going to excommunicate ye.”

“Holy psycho bear. What kind of absolute maniac doesn’t appreciate Buffy the Vampire Slayer ?” Brigid immediately returned, making me suspect this argument wasn’t new. “Vampires are obviously the best, and you’ve got to put this in the rotation right away. I’m serious about this, Brother King. Right away. ”

“Vampires are not the best when shows like Star Trek: Deep Space Nine are still out there, waiting to be watched. Besides, Farscape is next on deck.”

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me. Sadie, please use your pussy power to make him see sense.”

My face heated. This argument in no way struck me as an appropriate one to have in public. But soon the whole shop was involved in a sci-fi vs. fantasy argument.

Two more chairs and special Christmas blend teas magically appeared at our two-person table. To my surprise, we spent a perfectly pleasant afternoon in the charming town that was nothing like St. Ailbe.

And, unfortunately for my heart, somewhere I could definitely see myself wanting to live forever.