Page 64 of Not Another Happily Ever After

My face falls at the sight of the same pink wings I danced with earlier now struggling against the glass. “You’re not going to hurt it are you?”

“No! Never.” Myrrdin reels back, shaking his head. “I study them, you see. Take note of all that’s changed from the research of old. But mostly, I admire them.”

Relieved, I lean in to admire the sharp edge of its glowing wings, too.

“Why are they pink? The wings?” I ask, studying their subtle movements. “Why aren’t they blue?”

“They used to be. They used to be soft too, their wings as delicate and thin as paper.” Myrrdin sighs, turning the jar in his hand. “But like everything else in the forest, they had to adapt.”

I lean back in understanding. “To survive the curse.”

“To surviveus.”

Silence. I meet Myrrdin’s solemn gaze, a quiet desire to understand sitting on the tip of my tongue where denial once lived.

“That’s a heartbreaking thought for humanity.” I mutter.

“What is humanity if not heartbreak personified,” Frog whispers, and when I look up, I find his gaze already waiting for me across the fire.

“Back before the curse,” Myrrdin starts, drawing my attention back to the butterfly, “the Enchanted Forest was anything but,” he adds, setting the jar between us. “The Kings used to host thesehunts.”

“The Hunt of Horns and Fangs,” Wolfe clips.

Myrrdin nods toward the amber-eyed knight. “Precisely. And this hunt would be open to all royalty and their noblemen. We’re talking dozens, if not a hundred or so men. All running through the forest with their bows and nets. They went after everything. But none more so than the horses with horns of ivory.”

“Unicorns…” My shoulders fall as I picture what might have happened to the foal we found trapped in the hunter’s snare.

“The men revered their beauty. They tried to tame them at one time. But the temptation to sell the ivory was one not a lot ofmen could fight. And without its horn…it’s left to die,” Myrrdin replies solemnly.

“To waste.” Wolfe’s nostrils flare, but for once, I understand his anger.

I pick at my bread, no longer hungry.

“And what of the butterflies? Why did they change?” I’m afraid to know, but even more afraid to remain in the darkness.

Myrrdin lifts the jar, holding it between us.

“They would capture them,” he answers, unscrewing the jar’s top. “Then they’d rip off their wings and crush them into a healing salve.”

The backs of my eyes burn as he sets the small creature free.

“I had no idea. Father, he?—”

“Was the one who ordered them to do it.” Wolfe meets my teary gaze, and suddenly I see it. The returning flicker of what I couldn’t place before.

Resentment.

“Magic and men don’t mix, princess. This curse is proof of that.”

I ponder Wolfe’s words. Take a moment to sit with the anger he so desperately tries to hide.

Then, as if by habit, I steal a look in Frog’s direction. To see if his eyes have anything to add. Only he doesn’t appear to be paying the conversation any attention.

His gaze is again fixed on me, its warmth enough to make the dancing flames between us insignificant.

And the cold in their absence much more chilling,I think as he abandons my gaze for the safety of the ground. Something inside me quietly deflates. I thought after today, things might be different. But perhaps I lost more than my mind out there.

The thought sours my stomach, more than I can bear.