Heart of Stone (Rock Star Fairy Tales #1)

Epilogue

Selling Your Soul

Afternoon, Monday, M arch 16 th at the Estate of Lord Kristoff in Beauraton , Lorellon

T obin met his mother’s gaze across the table, the tea implements laid out between them as if this was a civilized di scussion.

“Son,” his mother began, snapping the napkin across her lap and protecting the white lace decorating her silver dress, “you want to tell me why you’ve gone and lost y our mind?”

“Mother,” Tobin began, settling his napkin the way she had taught him, “I have not—”

“Years of planning,” she interrupted, hand gesturing in magical motions to encase them in a spell of secrecy. “Years of tedious and excruciating details, carefully moving all the pieces into place, and you go and ruin it all within a f ew weeks.”

“It’s not ruined,” Tobin insisted. “Plans have simply been re arranged.”

His mother frowned, lifting the teapot and filling one of the delicate cups on the table. Tobin helped himself to a sugar cube, watching it dissolve in the hot water as his mother continued to exude anger from across the table. “I see,” she said finally, “and Lord Rebinus’s new engagement is a part of t his plan?”

“Margot is … useful,” Tobin argued, knowing this would be a hard argument to win. His mother was as stubborn as he was sometimes. She wouldn’t like the addition of a new person to their plans, not when it had been the two of them for so long. Before Margot, she had been the only one who knew he was Rebinus. “Her Claim on Ash gives us insight into the dragons.”

“And his Claim on her? How does a new wife who has been Claimed by another further our aim?” Her voice was tart, his words cutting, as usual. “You were supposed to let Ash Claim her, then Claim him. That was the p lan, son.”

“I think,” Tobin began, “their bond may also be an asset.”

“How?” his mother demanded.

Tobin took a sip, enjoying the flavor of the fine tea, a drink only found on Lord Kristoff’s estate, the Lord who ultimately owned his mother. “It remains to be seen,” he admitted, “but it will be seen. I believe she will be the key to everything—to all of o ur plans.”

Lady Sylvia scowled. “Spoken like another idiot in love,” she dismissed. “Trying desperately to convince me this woman has value beyond the obvious. Don’t be a fool , Tobin.”

“Mother,” he said, knowing it was probably useless to argue but unable to let the insult slide, “you haven’t met Margot. I think you’ll like her.”

“I think I’ll like her powers,” Lady Sylvia commented, taking a small sip of her tea and dabbing her mouth with a delicate napkin. “Much like you, I imagine.”

“Mother,” Tobin argued, setting down the teacup to stare at her, “I like Margot. For herself. If you give her a chance—”

“I am not giving chances to anyone Claimed by a Stonewall,” his mother declared, and Tobin frowned.

“Now who is being foolish?” he cajoled. “Don’t let your prejudices blind you. Margot is an asset, Claimed or not, and I fully intend to m arry her.”

His mother took another sip and set her cup down, the glass clinking against the saucer. “Oh, Tobin,” she sighed, giving her son a sad look, “you’ve never been in lov e before.”

Tobin rolled his eyes. “Not this again,” he insisted.

“You don’t understand, but you will,” she told him. “She’s Claimed now. She’s in love with Ash. You’ll see it in her eyes all the time, just beneath everything she says.” She held out a hand to pat his wrist where it rested beside his half-drained cup. “It will eat y ou alive.”

“I am not you, Mother,” Tobin told her.

“You are my son,” she reminded him. “I know how you are.”

“So you say,” Tobin muttered, immediately regretting the comment as his mother’s gentle hand darted up to smack his arm, a reminder not to dismiss h er words.

“You think I don’t know what you’re about to encounter?” his mother asked. “You think I don’t know what it is to watch the one you love pine over another?”

“I think your life and mine are very different,” Tobin observed, finishing his tea with a long swallow.

“I don’t think they will be so different when you find yourself wondering what your precious Margot is like when she is with the one she tru ly loves.”

Tobin’s eyes snapped to hers, not misunderstanding her intention. He had always wondered if his mother used her shapeshifting ability to impersonate Lady Abigail before she was sent away. Her own experience with the ability was one of the reasons why she had immediately known he was not Lord Rebinus. She had told him later, much later, that the other reason she knew Rebinus was gone was in the truly polite way he treated her. The real Lord Rebinus had propositioned her when she was living as Novus’s wife and again when she was newly exiled. Tobin hadn’t asked whether she had taken him up on his offer, not wanting to know that much about his mother’s sex life.

He put the cup down, pushing the chair away from the table. “Margot loves me,” Tobin declared.

“Maybe,” he mother agreed, “but not the same way you love her. Someday you will wonder what it is to be held by someone who really l oves you.”

Tobin shook his head, lifting the napkin from his lap and standing, annoyed, as he often was when he left a visit with his mother. “It’s lovely to see you, Mother, a s always.”

“Don’t let your lust get in the way of our plans,” she scolded him. “Don’t forget who you are—Wh o we are.”

“Of course, Mother,” he said, bowing briefly in her direction. “How could I ever?”

“Women have a way of changing things,” Lady Sylvia commented. “I’d hate for all this to be for nothing.”

“I wouldn’t have sold my soul to undo Lord Novus if I didn’t intend on following through,” he assured her. “Having a wife won’t cha nge that.”

Without another word, he left her room, fingers forming the symbols for the portal spell that would bring him back to Margot and her bus. He tried not to think of it, but his mother’s words lingered as he stepped through the mirror and into the small space of Margot’s kitchen.

His fiancée sat cross-legged in her swivel chair, a glowing ball of electrical power hovering above her palm. She gave him a broad smile, closing her hand and releasing the magical energy in a display of light a nd power.

Tobin returned the smile, part of him wondering just how powerful Margot would be—and if fae society would survive when she figure d it out.