A lopsided smile of mischief. “A kiss, dear Yzabel. The curse is broken with a kiss.”
A kiss? Kisses were supposed to be between husband and wife—and she’d barely kissed her own betrothed. The few times she’d subjected herself to the experience had left her so underwhelmed, she hadn’t had the courage to try again recently. To do it with someone else in the meantime seemed…dishonest. “Is that the only way?”
“It is,” Fatyan said simply.
Thinking about kissing her flustered Yzabel more than thinking of the marriage bed. “I couldn’t have been the only woman to find you.”
“You weren’t, but the others weren’t like you. They came with wishes of marriage and riches, and the curse shaped me into whatever their hearts desired—always a man.” She bit the corner of her lower lip. “You were the perfect loophole—someone who came to ask for peace. I believe that’s why I retained my original shape.”
She wasn’t ready for this; it was one thing to seek the help of the uncanny, but to kiss a woman? Surely the Lord would strike them where they stood. “But the Bible says a woman cannot kiss another woman.”
A sudden gust of wind rose to freeze the air, chilly fingers sinking into her ankles to seize bone and muscle. Darkness swept in, coating the mist in shadow, and Fatyan, so warm a moment ago, stood as rigid as a statue.
“I didn’t take you for one of their puppets,” she said, the low notes of her voice tolling like bells, echoing in the emptiness around them. “I didn’t think you’d be so opposed to the idea of a simple kiss shared to help someone and yourself.”
The wind spun harder, lifting Yzabel’s mantle, her skirts, her heels—the balls of her feet were all that tethered her to the ground, as tenuous and as fragile as spider’s silk. The refusal to kiss Fatyan was driving her out of the stone, away from the one person who could help her.
She fought the force pushing her up. “I’m not a puppet.”
“No?” Fatyan’s glare didn’t wane.
The air stole one of Yzabel’s legs out from under her, left her poised on the tip of a toe.
“I don’t believe you.”
A whip of air slammed into her stomach, knocking her off balance and the mantle off her shoulders. For a split second, she hovered in the dark, one arm blindly reaching for Fatyan, whose icy facade had broken into a visage of terrible sorrow and despair. Loneliness dripped from her in waves, the solitude of more than a century burrowing in Yzabel’s thoughts.
Fatyan had been so alone, for so long. If a kiss was the price to pay for someone’s freedom, should a princess not give it willingly, and gladly? And perhaps kissing a woman was the lesser of two evils and would lead to less complicated entanglements. If she had to bring someone new to the castle to teach her magic, it was far easier with another woman—no one would find it amiss if they spent too long together, or if they slept together, even. Should they succeed, Portugal’s citizens would be better off.
What was a sacrilegious kiss in the face of all that?
“I’ll do it!” As soon as the shout left her lips, her feet met solid ground, and her outstretched hand met Fatyan’s shoulder.
The warmth returned, as did the light. The Moura took a small step forward, the space between them a hair’s breadth. “First, an exchange of vows.” She brushed the hair away from Yzabel’s face, a gesture so tender that she fought the sudden urge to lean into it. “I promise to help you learn the sahar and will not leave your side until you are its master.”
It took Yzabel a moment to realize it was her turn to speak. “I promise to grant you freedom once I control the magic inside me. Should that prove impossible, I’ll free you nonetheless.”
Fatyan’s eyes widened as though she hadn’t expected that last part. Little dimples appeared in the corner of her mouth, and her fingers grasped Yzabel’s chin. “And so it shall be.”
The breathy words teased her lips in a way she did not understand. She wanted to inhale them, roll them around in her tongue and swallow them whole. Her eyelids closed, casting her into a darkness that heightened every other sense. The tender heat from the hand holding her chin firm, and the one snaking around her waist. The hectic beat of her heart when their chests touched, the aching of her lips in anticipation until, finally, they met Fatyan’s.
It was just a soft brush at first, barely there at all. She didn’t know what to do, and although she repeatedly told herself to stay still and let it be over with, another instinct—something buried deep inside, a part of herself she’d never met—made her lean forward.
The flavor of cinnamon danced on the tip of her tongue, the scent of almonds on her nostrils, but before she could get a better taste, the heat of magic enveloped them both. Fatyan pulled away, and Yzabel opened her eyes to see her smiling as sunlight soaked the two of them.
The same invisible current that had swept Yzabel into the stone lifted their feet from the ground, and like two stars, they shot upward into the mist. Fatyan clung to her, and Yzabel wrapped her arms around the shaking Moura. Vibrations hummed around them as the stone’s realm crumbled, the magic pieces a river flowing into Fatyan, condensing the timeless prison into its inhabitant’s flesh.
Fatyan groaned through gritted teeth. Yzabel’s ears popped, her eyes blind against the bright light, and then—
Solid ground. Damp air, the scent of earth heavy upon it.
In a small voice, Fatyan asked, “Did we…?”
Yzabel ran a comforting hand across the other girl’s back. “Yes.”
Slowly, Fatyan opened her eyes to the cave, a slow laugh building low in her throat. She giggled as she kissed Yzabel’s alarmed cheek, hugged her tight, and said, “Thank you.”
Strange as it was, Fatyan’s warmth wasn’t an unwelcome feeling. As Yzabel let herself bask in it a second longer, she wondered if it was even possible to grow used to this.
Chapter Six
A Thread of Hope
As soon as Fatyan took her first glimpse of the orange sunset, she launched into a run, leaving Yzabel behind in the dark.
A lick of her tingling lips brought back the cinnamon, and with it, the twisted rumbling of hunger. She gathered her breath and composure, the familiar exhaustion waking up inside her, but as she started to follow the giggling melody outside, her toe met something hard and sent it spinning forward.
Amid the roots and earth, sat a stone. The stone. Back aching and knees groaning, she bent to pick it up, inspecting it with a frown. A trace of magic hummed against the flesh of her hand in an ominous warning, the terms of their deal whirling in her head.
Her last shred of hope lay with someone she barely knew, her faith in a single promise that could be broken at any time. Her practical side, asleep inside Fatyan’s cursed realm, erupted with berating thoughts about the precariousness of her situation, of what she’d have to do just to keep Fatyan nearby. It hadn’t even occurred to her that freeing a Moura from her prison would bring its share of lies and trouble.