Midnight Beauties (Grim Lovelies 2)

She shook her head. “I drew it out of you. I saw it. It poured out of your hand, that awful black mess.”

He gave her a sad smile. “It was too late, Dust Bunny. A dose had already gotten to my heart. That’s why I agreed to Jak’s deal, don’t you understand? Either way, I’m going. I might as well go with a kiss.”

Anouk blinked, trying to make sense of what she was hearing. She twisted toward Cricket, Petra, and Beau, but they were too far away to have heard Luc’s words. Rennar was closer. His whisper wavered when he overheard Luc’s confession, but only for a moment. His face was hard. He was used to losing those close to him.

Anouk wasn’t.

Angry, she spun on Jak. “Did you know he was dying?”

He blinked lazily at her accusation. “I know a lot of things, and I knew that too.”

Anouk felt tears pushing at her eyes. They’d lost Tenpenny. They’d lost Saint. They’d lost Duke Karolinge. They’d lost Viggo. Beau was without sight and they didn’t know if he’d get it back. She’d traded her hand in marriage to Rennar in a deal that had pitted the Courts against one another, and they were now on the brink of a Royal war.

She couldn’t lose Luc too.

She grabbed his lapels in both hands, made fists out of the fabric, and gave him a good solid shake. “Luc, you idiot.”

She’d faced losing him before—?where had that gotten her? Alone in Paris, unmoored, like a ship without a captain. It was true that in his absence, she’d learned to stand on her own two feet and do incredible things: ride a motorcycle, kill witches, twist time itself. But she’d never looked to Luc to do any of those things anyway. He’d been her friend. His stories had taken the place of memories she never had; if it weren’t for his fairy tales, she wouldn’t have known about the Pretty World, about monsters, love, and luck.

“You won’t lose him.”

She was so focused on Luc that she’d forgotten Jak was there. At his words, she frowned. “What do you mean?”

“A kiss from a Snow Child doesn’t kill.”

“What about the frozen girls in the Black Forest?” Her voice was hard. If this was another one of his tricks, she’d lost her patience for it.

Jak glanced over his shoulder at one of the other Snow Children. A girl, on her own, by the opposite lamppost. She sat on the railing, kicking her bare feet in the air, one arm wrapped around the lamppost. Her hair was the color of frost, like the others, but there was something oddly familiar in the hunched way she sat.

Anouk’s eyes widened. “The girl in the woods. The frozen corpse. It’s her.”

Jak nodded. “A kiss from a Snow Child might end one life, but it starts another. There are so many realms, lovely. Did you think yours was the only one?”

It began to dawn on her that Luc must have known this. Luc was a story master, and he’d shared so many tales with her, even ones about the Snow Children, but he’d never told her the ending.

Before she could stop him, Jak clutched the lamppost, crouched on the railing, and leaned forward. Luc hesitated for a breath before leaning forward too. Their lips met as the snow fell around them. At first it was simply a kiss. Two young men on Westminster Bridge sharing a moment. But then Luc’s body stiffened. It shook. Black lines threaded over his mouth and down his neck, and he started to convulse. Jak grabbed his head, not letting him pull away. He softened the kiss and, after a shiver, Luc’s body relaxed. The black lines settled deeper into his skin. His face took on a sheen of ice, and when he at last pulled away from J

ak, frost laced his breath.

Anouk grabbed his shirt. “Luc!”

“I’m here.” His icy breath fogged in the air. His eyes were threaded through with black that bled into the whites. His eyelashes were coated in ice. His lips were tinged with blue. His scalp, where he had a shadow of hair, was like frost at dawn.

She felt a sob in her throat. “You’re ice cold.”

To her surprise, Luc smiled. “I feel warm.” He tilted his head. “For now.”

Jak jumped down from the railing, hopping over with nimble limbs. “See, lovely? Your friend is not gone. Dead, yes, but not gone. Every time it snows, you’ll have him again.”

She looked sadly at Luc. She couldn’t help but feel that he was still lost to her. They’d never again pass secret notes to each other, never share the latest Goblin gossip over a bowl of praline cream, never sneak into the townhouse courtyard to watch the midnight roses bloom under a full moon. But the roses and the townhouse were gone anyway. There was no going back for any of them.

Luc cupped her face and pressed their foreheads together. “Anouk, don’t give up hope. Do you know how stories come to be? There’s magic to stories, but not the kind made with tricks and whispers. Stories begin with one person and one idea. Fairy tales don’t need spells to bring them into existence; they only need a dreamer with a good tale about people who fight for what they love and a world that hinges on their actions. Dust Bunny, you don’t need any more of my fairy tales, do you understand? All they ever were was words and wishes. I made them up. You’re living your own story now. The story of a beastie who became a princess. A maid who saved a city. There’s a place for you in this world. Find it. Write your own story. I promise you, it’ll be told for ages to come by Pretties gathered around campfires, by Goblins over tea, even by Royals. You’re magic, Anouk.”

She thought of Cricket stealing the artifacts from Castle Ides and the British Museum, the clues that she thought led to the existence of other beasties. Haven’t you ever wondered what our place in the world is? What it could be? Cricket had asked. They weren’t maids and chauffeurs and gardeners anymore. They didn’t answer to witches or Royals. The Haute ran through their veins. They were bound to it and it to them. Ages ago, Prince Rennar had created the beastie spell for a reason.

“Oh, Luc.” She threw her arms around him. “I’m going to miss you.”

“Whenever you need me,” he said in her ear, “summon the snow and I’ll be there.”