Enthralled: Paranormal Diversions (Wicked Lovely 5.50)

Donia could feel the weight of Winter inside her skin; the blissful pressure tangled with worry over the now-very-human love of her life.

“Trust yourself. Trust me. Trust us.” He spoke quietly as they walked through the lobby, and she realized with a smile that there was something oddly freeing in being invisible to the humans they passed, but not to Keenan.

She’d never shared the joy of the first snow with anyone. It was a heady feeling, this first. She leaned in and whispered in his ear, “No one but you can see me, but they can all see you.”

He couldn’t answer just then, as they were passing the front desk.

The Winter Queen flashed him a wicked smile before nip-ping his earlobe.

Keenan startled visibly enough that the desk attendant gave him a puzzled look.

“They can’t hear me either,” she said in a level voice, and then she told him how she wanted to celebrate the first snowfall.

Keenan laughed and said, “There are days I feel like the luckiest person alive.”

“That’s nice,” the desk clerk said tiredly. “Have a nice night.”

“I will,” Keenan answered with a look at Donia, who understood now the sort of joy that made Summer faeries dance and spin.

She blew him a kiss and raced outside.

By the time Keenan caught up with her, she was standing at the edge of the parking lot. He took her hand and led her farther from the light. Once they were hidden from any passing humans, he kissed her soundly.

When he pulled away to catch his breath, snowflakes were falling like a thick curtain all around them.

“Where to?”

She pointed at the ski slopes in the far distance. “There.”

“That’s miles away. Let me get the keys,” he started.

“No.” Donia shook her head. “No cars. I am the Winter Queen, Keenan. I’m not going to start my season with a car. We go on foot. Anyhow, the slopes aren’t open yet, so we’d attract attention.” She paused and frowned. “You’d attract attention with the whole visibility problem.”

Keenan thought yet again that he’d be too much of an encumbrance to her if he didn’t shake his mortality. He didn’t bring it up, not tonight. He wasn’t going to risk the change back to fey without her agreement. They’d spent too many years at odds for him to want to start his second stretch of eternity with discord between them.

“If you hold my hand, I can be invisible with you.”

“Exactly . . . and we can still run as if you were fey. Hold on to me,” she invited him.

“Always.”

Without another word, they ran.

It felt but a few moments until they reached the very top of the mountain, despite their having gone miles. Donia closed her eyes and exhaled. Keenan stayed beside her, but he released her hand—becoming visible as he did so.

Reflexively, Donia became visible as well. He had faery sight, but they were alone on the mountain. She wanted to be as he was; she wanted him to watch her with his mortal eyes. Never had she scattered snow on the earth when she was visible to any other than faeries. Here, in front of her newly mortal beloved, she would be truly visible. She knew that faeries had seen her create snowfalls, but she’d never noticed their presence. With Keenan, she was as aware of him as she was of the snow and ice.

Neither spoke as she cloaked the world in white. It could have been moments or hours as she walked through the night and covered the earth; all that Donia knew was that everything in her world was perfect.

With Keenan.

In the cold.

Where we both belong.

Finally, she stopped walking and turned to look at him. He lowered himself to the ground as they stared at each other. She stood barefoot and barely clad in the snowy air; he sat in his bulky layers of warm clothing, a mortal in the midst of a thick fall of snow. Her eyes were frost filled, and her skin glistened with the same icy rime that coated the trees. His eyes were damp from the sting of wind, and his exposed skin was red from the cold.

He couldn’t have been here when he was the Summer King.