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The queen nodded once, then looked at the ground, lips pursed. When her eyes rose, her voice lowered, deepened with warning. “Then I suggest you figure out how you did it, and do it again.” I blinked, eyes stinging with an onslaught of tears that would never arrive. “A great many times, and should you prove yourself worthy”—she tilted a bony shoulder—“then we will discuss marriage.”
She turned for the door, and I raced after her, pleading, “No, please. Wait.”
It closed in my face, numerous locks turning on the other side before I could rattle the handle. “No trying to escape. You’ll be captured before you even reach the castle walls.”
I slumped against the door, terror a stake tearing slowly through my heart.
“Oh, and none of that faerie magic. Unless, of course”—she laughed softly, the sound more of a tinkling threat—“it involves providing us with gold.”
Her steps downstairs were drowned by each stampeding breath burning past my lips. Swallowing thickly, I turned back to my new room. To my new home.
To my cell.