Summer Bound: A Wicked Lovely Story Read online

  If she was shorted on what he owed, there was always wash she could help one of her neighbors do. They took on a little more if she offered to help, and it let Tam make ends meet when there were no other options.

  “Courage, love,” the faery whispered again.

  “What about an apprenticeship?” Tam asked the jeweler hurriedly before he walked away, sounding a bit desperate now.

  “For a woman?” he sounded thoroughly shocked.

  “I could learn and then carry the information to home. My father’s not well enough to leave the house, you see. It would be as if you were teaching him, but—”

  The jeweler reached over the glass display case and patted her hand. “Women are gifted in many ways, but in learning such a skill? I think not. I’ll take the three pieces, and you tell your father I’ll need him to come himself next time—or I’ll come to him.”

  “I’ll tell him,” she said. She would speak it into the air. There wasn’t any more likely way to reach him—if he was even alive.

  Money in her possession, Tam stepped out of the shop, the third one this week. There would be no fourth one. She’d sold the only thing she had to use to convince a jeweler to work with her. The sale was good enough, better than nothing, but it also meant she had to begin again and hope that in a few weeks or months she’d have better luck.

  Someday, her luck would change. It had to.

  She swiped at the tears on her cheeks, not quite able to stop them from falling today but not letting them run free either. The faery glared at the shop as if he was as affronted as she was.

  “Fool,” Irial, who had followed her into the street, said.

  Tam didn’t reply—although she agreed with him.

  COLD IRON HEART Chapter 2 Irial

  Irial watched her leave. Tear tracks were still fresh on her skin, and every impulse in him said he needed to follow, to comfort, to touch her. There were good reasons not to, but Irial rarely felt compelled to follow reason. That was the prerogative of the High Court. The Dark Court had the opposite motivation. Passion drove those that aligned with shadows. The Dark King would rather lose himself in pleasure and impulse than logic and restraint.

  “How in the name of madness am I to keep you safe if you never are where you say you are?” Gabriel slid from his steed with a rumble that had mortals looking around to see why the ground shook.

  Irial gave his closest friend, guard, and all around most-trusted faery a look that would’ve sent most creatures to their knees.

  The muscular Hound snorted. “Don’t give me that look. One of these days you’re going to get stabbed or burned alive or—”

  “And unless it’s a regent, I’d be fine.” Irial shook his head. “Most of those bold enough to stab me aren’t kings or queens, are they?”

  “Both Beira and Keenan would gladly stab you.” Gabriel folded his arms.

  “But the kingling is weak, and Beira isn’t here.” Irial started to walk, stepping around the passing humans. He trailed his hand over the cheek of a woman who startled as he passed. She wasn’t Sighted, not like lovely Thelma, but she had an ancestor somewhere in her past who had been. Those who were sensitive to the fey were alluring enough that Irial made note of her. Sometimes a man had needs.

  Of course, seducing the forbidden was even better. The Summer King’s faeries were not to so much as glance his way, and the Sighted . . . oh, the Sighted mortals were a particular treat.

  Irial was born to tempt, and he was not one to refuse that nature.

  “What are you pouting about?” Gabriel asked in a tone that said he’d really rather not know the answer.

  “No one ever says no.”

  “No.” Gabriel grinned. “There. Now—"

  “To relations, Gabe.”

  “Oh hell, no.” The Hound made a face of distaste. “Scrawny thing like you . . .”

  Irial laughed. He was quite certain that scrawny was an inaccurate word—in all ways—but to a creature that shook the ground with every step, the word was quite relative. He had no interest in his best mate, of course. Who else would stand at his side and lure him from his many moods? Or toss bodies to the side when Irial’s temper led to brawls?

  “She’s mortal,” Irial said quietly. He didn’t mention that she was the mortal. The one human in all the world who could change the shift of power between the faery courts. If he said that, Gabriel would want to be reasonable, and that sounded positively dreary.

  “Do you have a sudden aversion to mortals?” Gabriel shoved a man in a tall hat into the street, causing traffic to erupt into chaos.

  Irial raised his brows.

  “He was too near you.”

  “He couldn’t see me, Gabe.” Irial grinned though. His friend’s protective impulses were endearing, even when they resulted in screams and blood—perhaps more so when they did, in truth.

  They stood in the French Quarter watching the mortals who’d nearly been trampled, women on the sidewalk clutching their parasol handles, and Irial couldn’t help inhaling the madness of it all. Mortal feelings weren’t sustaining as fey ones were, but he still appreciated them.

  “I may want her watched,” Irial said lightly.

  Gabriel hesitated. “By the Hunt?”

  If not for Thelma having the Sight, Irial might say yes, but the Hunt carried terror in their wake, spilling fears and nightmares where they rode. As a Sighted mortal, Thelma would either be susceptible or immune to them.

  “Maybe.” Irial looked in the direction she’d gone. “For now, send a few of the Scrimshaw Sisters her way.”

  Then before the Hound could ask questions Irial was afraid to answer, Irial ordered, “Do not follow me today. Check on the arrival of Winter and Summer.”

  The order spelled itself in ink on the arm of his most trusted.

  “Are we expecting them?”

  “Maybe.” Irial lifted the cane he liked to carry of late, carved head and jeweled eyes. It looked a lot like Lady War, and Irial carried it to spite her.

  “You’re hiding things.”

  “Wise man,” Irial murmured, and then he slid between the fascinating new carriages that the mortals had made. Horseless carriages. Automobiles. If not for the stink of them and the sluggish speeds, he’d own one already. Some day. The joy of eternity was that he had so many centuries to live, to learn, to fuck, and to brawl. It was good to be the Dark King.

  When Irial set off in pursuit of Thelma, he knew she’d see him, blessed or cursed as she was. She saw every faery in the city—but she didn’t look at them with that pulsing in her throat. She didn’t look at them and think wicked thoughts that made a tinge of pink tint her cheeks.

  She watched Irial that way, though, as if he was a delicacy she wanted to sample. Such temptation was always glorious, but it was more so with Thelma. As a Sighted mortal, she was immune to the allure that Irial had for most faeries and most mortals. She had the beautiful, irresistible ability to refuse him. That made her a challenge. A treat. He hummed happily to himself as he went to stalk his quarry.

  He wouldn’t ever force a woman, but he’d dust off old skills he hadn’t needed to use in a few centuries. She was forbidden in so many ways, and she was immune to the very thing that made him alluring to fey and mortal alike. The perfect quarry. The exact enticement to lure the king of temptation.

  Until the Summer and Winter courts arrived in his fair city, Thelma Foy was all his, and he intended to make the most of it.

  The Dark King whistled a cheery tune as he approached the edge of the Mississippi River. Thelma came here, pulled to water as if she was part-fey. She wasn’t. She was simply an artist.

  “Irial?”

  He turned, caught off-guard in a way that would make Gabriel gnash his teeth.

  His solicitor was there. Saunders. For reasons of practicality, he had been given a salve that allowed the man to see the unseen. The Dark King didn’t go around passing out the Sight carelessly, but he needed the occasional human assistant. Saunders handled
legal and business matters, and that meant that to protect him, Irial had given him the Sight. It was that or the poor man would end up crouched in a corner cowering from unseen attacks.

  “Sire,” Saunders started.

  Irial smiled at the man’s tentativeness. What was the correct term for a king when you were not of his court—or species? There weren’t guidebooks for such things.

  “Did you sort out the details on the house?”

  “I did, sir.” Saunders cleared his throat. “They were eager to sell once I offered the sum you authorized.”

  Irial nodded. He’s made the somewhat unplanned decision to purchase the house he’d been renting in the Garden District. Even if he hadn’t admitted it to anyone outright, he liked the idea of staying here for as long as they could. He still planned to exit before things were unpleasant with the Summer Court and Winter Court, but a house purchase wouldn’t change that.

  “A jeweler.”

  “Sir?”

  “I want to purchase a jewelry shop.” Irial pictured the moment, telling Thelma. What woman wouldn’t be charmed by such a gesture? He gave Saunders the instructions and sent him to the shop in question.

  A warning voice in Irial’s mind suggested caution, but caution was tedious. Why waste time when mortals died so often and quickly?

  Praise for Melissa Marr’s books:

  Praise for the WICKED LOVELY series:

  “Marr offers readers a fully imagined faery world that runs alongside an everyday world, which even non-fantasy (or faerie) lovers will want to delve into” --Publisher’s Weekly (starred review)

  “This is a magical novel… the first book in a trilogy that will guarantee to have you itching for the next installment.” Bliss

  “Fans of the fey world will devour this sequel to Wicked Lovely. Marr has created a world both harsh and lush, at once urban and natural.” --School Library Journal

  “Complex and involving.” -New York Times Book Review

  Praise for GRAVEMINDER:

  “If anyone can put the goth in Southern Gothic, it’s Melissa Marr. . . . She’s also careful to ensure that the book’s wider themes —how and if we accept the roles life assigns us, and what happens to us when we refuse them—matter to us as much as the multiple cases of heebie-jeebies she doles out...” —NPR.org

  “Spooky enough to please but not too disturbing to read in bed.”—Washington Post

  “Dark and dreamy. . . . Rod Serling would have loved Graveminder. . . . Marr is not tapping into the latest horde of zombie novels, she’s created a new kind of undead creature. . . . A creatively creepy gothic tale for grown-ups.”—USA Today

  “Plan ahead to read this one, because you won’t be able to put it down! Haunting, captivating, brilliant!” —Library Journal (starred review)

  “Marr serves up a quirky dark fantasy fashioned around themes of fate, free will—and zombies. . . . Well-drawn characters and their dramatic interactions keep the tale loose and lively.” —Publishers Weekly

  “The emotional dance between Rebekkah and Byron will captivate female readers. . . . Fantasy-horror fans will demand more.” —Kirkus Reviews

  “No one builds worlds like Melissa Marr.” —Charlaine Harris, New York Times bestselling author of the Sookie Stackhouse series

  “Welcome to the return of the great American gothic.” —Del Howison, Bram Stoker Award-winning editor of Dark Delicacies

  Also by Melissa Marr

  Recent Work:

  Cold Iron Heart (2020)

  Pretty Broken Things (2020)

  Tales of Folk & Fey (2019)

  Dark Court Faery Tales (2019)

  The Faery Queen’s Daughter (2019)

  Bullets for the Dead (2019)

  This Fond Madness (2017)

  All Ages/Clean Fantasy:

  The Faery Queen’s Daughter (2019)

  Backlist

  Young Adult Novels with HarperTeen

  Wicked Lovely (2007)

  Ink Exchange (2008)

  Fragile Eternity (2009)

  Radiant Shadows (2010)

  Darkest Mercy (2011)

  Wicked Lovely: Desert Tales (2012)

  Carnival of Secrets (2012)

  Made For You (2013)

  Seven Black Diamonds (2015)

  One Blood Ruby (2016)

  Faery Tales & Nightmares (short story collection)

  Adult Fantasy for HarperCollins/Wm Morrow

  Graveminder (2011)

  The Arrivals (2012)

  Picturebooks for Penguin

  Bunny Roo, I Love You (2015)

  Baby Dragon, Baby Dragon! (2019)

  Bunny Roo and Duckling Too (2021)

  Coauthored with K. L. Armstrong(with Little, Brown)

  Loki’s Wolves (2012)

  Odin’s Ravens (2013)

  Thor’s Serpents (2014)

  Co-Edited with K. L. Armstrong (with HarperTeen)

  Enthralled

  Shards & Ashes

  Co-Edited with Tim Pratt (with Little, Brown)

  Rags & Bones

  About the Author

  Melissa Marr is a former university literature instructor who writes fiction for adults, teens, and children. Her books have been translated into twenty-eight languages and have been bestsellers internationally (Germany, France, Sweden, Australia, et. al.) as well as domestically. She is best known for the Wicked Lovely series for teens, Graveminder for adults, and her debut picture book Bunny Roo, I Love You.

  In her free time, she practices medieval swordfighting, kayaks, hikes, and raises kids in the Arizona desert.