ALL MY LOVE (Lovemark #5)

1. Dori-2

“With magic, of course,” Naveen said simply, her haughty tone letting me know how ignorant she thought I was.

Ora sniffed and sent me a degrading glance. “You’ve heard of magic, I reckon?”

I met her gaze and unconsciously tugged at the long sleeve of the dress I wore to make sure my wrists remained covered. The cloth successfully hid the cursed mark I had embedded on the inner part of my forearm, proclaiming that I was a member of the most magically evil family on this planet.

“Yeah,” I muttered in a low voice. “Magic, I’ve heard of.”

And it was still hard for me to wrap my head around that. But magic was real in the Outer Realms. Like openly and (mostly) accepted by everyone as just another part of life.

A month ago, everything had been right and normal with me. I’d been living with my roommate in our cozy, walk-up apartment within strolling distance from the French Quarter and trying to keep my terrace tomato plants alive while I saved up enough money from my waitressing gig to buy myself a car. I’d even been staying healthy enough through the pandemic, when I got mixed up in one little protest that went south, caught a brick to the head, and boom, instead of outright dying, I was spat out onto the ground in some foreign land that resembled a Renaissance fair gone wrong.

Olivander, the guy that found me and helped me deal with my new surroundings, was not only a prince of a guy, but he was a literal prince who had since become the King of High Cliff. He and his wife, Unity, had been so awesome about helping me try to find a way back home and keeping me safe while I was here. But in doing that, the three of us had discovered that my mom might have also been born here before she was shipped off to Earth when she was an infant, hence the reason a tattooed mark had appeared on my arm when I landed that said I came from House Graykey—aka, the cursed family.

And because my blood belonged here, that’s why I’d been taken from Earth and tossed back to the Outer Realms instead of dying on that fateful day I arrived.

We think.

Or maybe I really was dead, and this was my afterlife. Except I didn’t feel dead. And I absolutely refused to buy that scenario. So…

In any case, no one could be positive why I was here, but strangely enough, I ranked among the minority that did indeed bear their own magical abilities. I could suddenly talk to animals when I most certainly hadn’t been able to Dr. Doolittle anything on Earth.

Sometimes, I wondered if I was simply laid up in a hospital somewhere in New Orleans, stuck in a coma, and all I had to do was wake up to get home again.

Trust me, I’d tried the Dorothy approach and clicked my heels three times; it hadn’t worked.

Ergo, dream coma or not, this was my new reality for the time being, and I decided to roll with it until I somehow made my way through. I mean, it appeared pretty freaking real, especially with the motion sickness going on. And that’s why I played the game and continued to keep my earthly status as well as my evil Graykey family ties a secret from a majority of the population for my own safety.

Which meant this was probably a good moment to pause and confess that I actually had found a way back to Earth. It might not have been a permanent way—apparently, I needed some kind of super special amulet with me to stay home for good when I returned—but saying a couple of voodoo-sounding phrases would’ve taken me back for at least a while—a year, tops—before I would’ve gotten sucked back to the Outer Realms again.

And yet…

Yeah, I hadn’t returned to Earth. I had even left the words I needed to chant to get me there back at the library in Elaina, which was now hours behind me.

Strange, I know. Why was I still here, one may ask.

Well, funny story, that.

You see, I’d been in the middle of the ritual to take myself home—I swear, my foot had been lifted to step back into the star tunnel I’d just created—when a tingling had started in my temple, right where my High Cliff love mark tattoo was located.

It didn’t seem to matter that I’d only gotten the stupid tattoo so I could merely look like a High Clifter and fit in. The magic in it had taken hold, regardless, and just when I was about to leave this world in the rearview mirror—bam—my mark alerted me to the presence of my true love in the general vicinity because that’s what the High Cliff tattoos did—they let you know when your true love was near.

And sue me, but I was curious, okay? I’d never had much luck in the man department before, and it’d been a full year since Alcée and I had split up. I just wanted to know what this guy who was supposed to be “just for me” was like. And maybe make sure he wasn’t all that and a bag of potato chips.

That was all.

I was a romantic at heart.

Not to mention the mark wouldn’t stop bothering me until I did go check things out. It was an annoying little bugger, let me tell you.

We’d had a couple of one-on-one conversations about its irritatingly persistent tingling. I kept telling the mark to chill a bit on the go this way, go that way, keep following him, don’t let him get away insistence that it kept pushing into my head, and it basically ignored me completely, screaming, move your ass, woman; don’t let him get away!

And so… I’d followed the unceasing prickling from my supernatural tattoo until we came across a cavalcade of people riding wagons and carriages and horses out of town.

After a quick inquiry, I learned the caravan belonged to the King of Lowden. He was Olivander’s cousin and had been visiting High Cliff to settle some kind of land ownership deal or whatever, but now he was on his way back home.

Well, to think that someone who was supposed to be my soul mate was riding in the Lowden King’s entourage and could be so close, yet was getting away, was more than I could take. And I’d chased after the whole party before finding myself a ride on this wagon with these fine women, hoping I could track my true love down as soon as the caravan paused for a break, so I could—I don’t know—meet the man, at least.

I could always go home again after that, once I saw what he was like and I’d convinced myself that love marks were silly notions and they couldn’t really make you aware of the presence of your fated life partner nearby. It was just a ruse. That was all.

But, you know, I had to be sure first. Right?

Yes, I did.

Ergo…

Glancing around at the group sitting with me in the wagon, I heaved out a sigh.

Here I was, still following the sensation that was tickling my temple, even through the motion sickness.

There were ten of us in this wagon, including me and the driver—Uvall, as they had called him. The other eight women were concubines, who’d been living in the castle at Elaina and servicing Olivander’s father while he’d been king. But once he had died and Vander had gotten the crown, he had disbanded his father’s old harem, effectively putting all these ladies straight out of work.

When they’d heard that the new King of Lowden was returning home, they had banded together, rented a wagon, and followed behind at the end of his entourage in the hopes of joining his harem in Lowden.

Once I’d caught up to their caboose, I’d gotten a ride with them.

“I wish I had some nice glamouring magic powder on me right now,” the oldest concubine—Ursuline, I think her name was—announced with a heavy sigh. “That way, I could change the look of this weathered old face and become whatever the king most desired.”

“I hope he’s handsome,” Erinn demurred, her voice dreamy and wistful. “I’ve never been with a handsome man before.”

One of the others snorted. “He’s from House Kole. Of course, he’ll be pleasing to look upon. I swear, all of them Koles are too gorgeous for their own good. His sisters were the reigning beauties of all Lowden before they died.”

Wait. Had she just said this Lowden King guy was from House Kole? Seriously?

The dude was named King Kole? Why had I never heard Vander mention that before?

With a snort, I said under my breath, “He’ll definitely be a merry old soul.”

And a merry old soul was he, my brain went on to chant, remembering the old nursery rhyme my mother used to tell me when I was little.

“What was that, Rowena?”

It took me a moment to realize she was talking to me because, crap, I’d forgotten I’d told them my name was Rowena.

It had seemed safer to go incognito under an alias, so when Naveen—who was a petite redhead who looked too much like Crowley’s mom off the show Supernatural—had asked, Rowena had been the first name to pop into my head.

Straightening, I cleared my throat and answered, “Nothing, sorry.”

Naveen didn’t pursue the topic; she merely shrugged off my strangeness and went back to discussing the most effective ways to win them all a place in old King Kole’s merry harem once they reached Lowden.

They’d just decided to have their youngest and prettiest girl, Althea, be the first to seduce him so they could put their best foot forward and really sell themselves when Uvall gave a sharp whistle and jerked on the reins, causing the wagon to shudder to a halt.

“Whoa! What’s going on?” I asked, gripping the sideboards and looking around. I immediately went on high alert.

Tucking my arm protectively closer to my side, even though I was hiding my cursed mark under a glamour spell and long sleeves, I watched the other conveyances in our cavalcade in front of us also slowing to a stop.

At first, I wondered if Vander and Unity had realized what I’d done and had chased me down to fetch me back to Elaina. But when I looked for soldiers bearing High Cliff colors, there were none around. Just Lowden colors and banners, Lowden guards, and Lowden people.

Whew. What a Lowden relief!

My shoulders relaxed fractionally. There was no way Vander or Unity would know I was still in the Outer Realms, anyway. No one had seen me sneak onto the king’s wagon train.

Besides, the letter I’d left behind said I’d been going back to Earth. They’d never suspect that I’d stuck around to participate in this extremely risky detour first.

Which was nice in the fact that they wouldn’t try to stop me or even warn me how dangerous and unwise my mission could be—you know, because I still had a curse on me that could send me into a mad fit of bloodlust that caused me to kill everyone on this trail—but also meant they couldn’t come to my rescue if things went awry. I was one hundred percent on my own for this one.

It was as scary as it was thrilling.

“Taking a break,” Uvall announced, his voice gruff from lack of talking as he followed everyone ahead of him to pull off into a wide clearing where the king’s entire entourage could rest for a spell before starting off again. The scraggly, thorny bushes even gave way to a small forest that surrounded the rocky overlook, where I could already see some people darting into the trees for some much-needed respite.

Sucking in a breath, I realized this meant one thing to me.

My love mark gave a twinge of excitement, letting me know the man connected to the other end of it was still within its parameters.

It was time to find out who my mark was leading me to.