Page 16 of Wickedly Ever After (A Fairy Tale Romp, #1)

Ida

The one awful thing about being a good witch? You aren’t allowed to throw a decent hex to save your life.

Magic and Mischief—A Thousand Years of Happily-Ever-After: A Memoir

Ida North

Ida wanted to take out her travel wand and hex Hector with a terrific case of butt boils. But she was a good witch.

There he stood on the landing, glowering down at her from his considerable height advantage.

How unfair. She was shrinking as she aged, but he stood straight and tall as a dragon-lance, the asshole.

A frosty smile turned the left corner of his mouth upward, but the rest of his face could have been made from marble and the expression fixed somewhere between annoyance and outright dislike.

Big old butt boils, the kind that would mean he couldn’t sit for a solid week. She gripped the handle of her wand and forced a pointed smile. “Why, Hector, I didn’t expect you to be at the game. I thought you couldn’t stand seeing the Thieves lose in person.”

“Oh, I would never miss an opportunity to watch the Rogues go up in flames.”

King Rupert laughed, a large, hearty guffaw, as he clapped his meaty hands on her shoulder and Hector’s, pulling them together. “Now, you two! Save the trash talk for the big day tomorrow.”

Boils for him too, right on his forehead, in a pattern that read, “Royal Prick.” Nobody ever taught that man to respect his witches.

“Shall we?” she said, shrugging out from under Rupert’s arm and waving Hector ahead. “Wickedness before goodness?”

“In that case.” Hector stepped aside.

So they proceeded up the stairs ahead of the king, stride for stride.

“I didn’t expect to see you here, Hector,” she said. “You usually shun company.”

“I thought it would be nice to get out of the hotel tonight.”

“Oh, did you?” Ida’s words slipped between her teeth.

That ass. She was right. He had planned it after all.

His gnome was probably just as bad as him.

Neither one of them would have any reservations about destroying literally the sweetest soul in the world to hurt her.

She’d spent the better part of the day begging Hari to go to the game with her and not to dinner with Tinbit.

***

“But I can’t,” Hari had said miserably as he’d styled her hair for the game. “I won’t stand him up.”

“But he stood you up, didn’t he?” Lying hurt a little, but she was responsible for his happily-ever-after.

If Hari ever found out that he’d been used as Hector’s pawn to punish Ida, he’d never forgive himself.

Worse, he might never trust anyone ever again.

She couldn’t live with herself if that happened.

Damn Hector. She’d never wanted to permanently curse him into stone so much in her life.

“Maybe he came before us. Or after us. It’s not his fault. It’s mine.”

She reached back and touched his hand. “It’s absolutely not your fault! Did you tell him you’d meet him in the garden? No. He did. And he’s the one who didn’t show up. He’s not worth your time. And I don’t want you to be hurt, sweetheart. You mean too much to me.”

He squeezed her hand back. “I know, but you’re right. I need to give this a chance. I’ve never talked to anyone who I connected with so well.”

Oh, she could kick herself for that “let love kindle” talk. “You haven’t talked to him at all! You can’t get to know someone through letters, Hari.” She turned back to face the mirror with a huff.

“I don’t know about that. You seem to know Hector pretty well,” Hari said. The clipped tone in his voice let her know she might be overstepping the bounds of their friendship.

“That isn’t the same thing! Those letters are—They were—”

Hari pulled a curler out of her hair. “Were what, exactly?”

She pursed her lips. “Jokes,” she said. “It started as a joke.” Up until five hundred years ago, she and Hector only really interacted at the Happily-Ever-After and at the Witches’ Council afterward, secure and comfortable in their mutual loathing for one another.

Any letters that passed between them were short and to the point.

But one year she needed to ask him a question regarding his dragon.

What was it? Something about the arrangements for the cave lair and the princess being allergic to something.

Oh, yes, nettles. The poor child had been knitting shirts made out of the nasty things since she was twelve and now they broke her out in hives.

On a whim, she’d slipped a tickle charm in the letter to annoy him.

He’d written back taunting her about how he planned to hex the princess’s lips with a fever blister curse that would make hives seem like a spa treatment and sent a sample.

She’d turned his hair green in retaliation.

He said baldness would be the next fad in hairstyles, and then she’d needed to buy a wig…

“I suppose I simply like sparring with him,” she said, knotting her scarf in her lap. “And anyway, he’s not writing to me now.”

Hari stabbed her gently with the blunt end of a hairpin. “You were lonely, Ida. That’s why you wrote to him. And I bet he’s lonely too. So don’t tell me you can’t get attached to somebody because of letters.”

“Hector is not my friend.”

“I didn’t say he was.”

“Don’t go to dinner with that gnome.”

“Is that an order?”

She turned toward him, frowning. “Call it a premonition. I feel it’s wrong for you and possibly wrong for him.”

He raised his eyebrows. “I’m a big boy. I can take care of myself.”

She sighed. “Well, I’m coming home at halftime. I don’t want you here all alone when things don’t work out.”

Hari smiled. “You won’t. The Rogues are going to win and you’ll want to celebrate.”

“You are more important to me than a game.”

“Are you sure you’re not sick or something?” Hari scoffed. “You’re going to be late.”

Way too late. If she’d been on time, she could’ve stopped Hari from ever sending his first letter to Hector’s gnome: Tinbit. What a ridiculous name. Probably Hector gave it to him when he was a gnomelet, a moniker to make him feel subservient. That would be properly wicked.

***

But as she walked beside Hector now, almost the same way Tinbit had walked with him last night, she wondered.

He hadn’t quite sounded like an evil overlord conversing with his henchman.

He sounded more like her when she talked with Hari.

Yes, Hari was her manservant, but she never called him that, never thought of him that way, never wanted him to feel anything less than her equal.

And he’d more than equally told her to mind her own business when it came to his love life. Had Tinbit done the same to Hector?

Maybe she was wrong. Hector might not have set this up. He might be as much in the dark as she had been. Things like that could happen, particularly when the blasted Fates got involved. Perhaps she should pull him aside, and just ask…

“Where were you last night?” she asked. “You weren’t at the Prince’s Dinner.”

“I didn’t feel well.”

“That makes what? Zero dinners you’ve attended in forever? You might at least try to show some enthusiasm.”

“That’s your part of the magic, not mine. Love potions—ugh. Never touched the things, even when they weren’t illegal.”

“Clearly,” she jabbed. Time to test her suspicion. “Where exactly are you staying?” she asked, innocently. “Mage Suites was closed, or so I heard.”

“The Golden Dragon.”

“I didn’t see you arrive.”

“I came a little early to settle in.”

“Travelled alone, did you?”

“Not this time,” he said. “My butler came with me. He had something he wanted to do in town.”

So Tinbit was his butler. Not a henchman at all then. That explained the deference. Hector probably didn’t want to be prematurely poisoned.

She forced a smile. “What a coincidence. I brought my manservant, Hari, with me. But you know I usually do. I enjoy company, unlike you.”

“I don’t dislike company,” he said. “Only present company. Excuse me.” He sailed off with Rupert as Annabeth pounced.

“Ida! Idaidaidaidaida—my dear, Ida! Isn’t this the most delish?

” She wrapped her arm around Ida’s waist and pulled her forward into the crush of evening gowns.

Evening gowns at a sporting event? What on earth?

Ida straightened her jersey, glad Hari had insisted on silk pants and sequined flats.

She’d have preferred khaki shorts and a low-slung sandal, as spring was so warm in the capital city.

Meanwhile, Hector strutted around in that ancient jersey and equally ancient pants, carrying an ancient staff, and somehow he managed to look more put together than anyone there.

It was the way he carried himself, wearing that aura of dangerous magic like robes—perfectly poised.

He hadn’t even flinched when she mentioned Hari’s name.

“Let me take you away from that horrid Hector,” Annabeth said, sticking out her tongue in Rupert’s direction.

“You come with me. I’m just dying to hear about this Common Princess and how you came to pick her for my son.

The Star says you went against committee to do it, you naughty thing, but then you were never one for rules, always said you’d do exactly the right thing no matter what, you’re such a rebel, and—”

Amazing. Annabeth didn’t seem to need to breathe. Ida let herself be swept into the well-dressed crowd of socialites.

“So tell me, darling, what is the deal with this girl?” Annabeth popped a pastry in her mouth, but she didn’t stop talking.

“Won’t come to tea, won’t come to the gown fitting for Happily-Ever-After, you should see the dress I’ve picked out, it’s absolutely dreadful, I’m not going to just take rudeness from my future daughter-in-law, I plan to spit in her eye, I mean Happily-Ever-After doesn’t apply to mothers-in-law, does it?

Oh, wait until the wedding reception, Ida, I ordered red-hot dancing slippers for her, I plan to take her shopping before the big day, I can’t wait to see her howling all over her smug little face when she puts them on, don’t worry, I’m blaming an evil fairy… ”

Ida pasted a pleasant smile on her face and tried to focus on Annabeth’s endless prattle.

She might be worried for nothing. Tinbit was likely to be like Hector—acerbic to the point of absolute acidity, evil to the bone, and far more likely to break a person’s heart than carry it off with him on a white horse.

Tinbit would stand Hari up. Hari would be inconsolable.

Surely Hector wouldn’t let it go further than that.

Afterward, she’d sympathize with Hari, soothe him.

She’d tell him that he was lucky he’d not lost his heart to someone so wicked and it would all be fine.

Speaking of wicked, she’d better send a message to Amber in the morning advising her to never go shoe shopping with the queen. Ten hours and blisters were even worse than red-hot dancing shoes.