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Luka was tuning his lute when his mother stuck her head into his bedroom. She sighed.
“Don’t tell me you’re riding out into the forest today.”
Luka set the instrument aside. “Yes,” he said, blinking at her with what he hoped was an innocent expression. “Just as I do every day, Mother. Would you like me to pick you some berries while I’m there?”
Queen Anarka took a seat at the end of Luka’s bed. She frowned. “Boris told me where you go,” she said.
Luka retrieved his lute case from under the bed and carefully tucked it inside. He should have known better than to tell Boris the truth, but the stablehand had been persistent in asking. Besides, it was easier for Luka to come and go as he pleased if he maintained his friendships in the stable.
“I know Boris doesn’t believe me,” he said carefully. “But that doesn’t mean—”
“He told me you tried to take him to this tower you claim to visit and came out in an empty clearing instead,” said the queen.
Luka scowled. He still wasn’t sure how to explain that little incident. They had retraced his usual route perfectly. “Adrien is real, Mother,” he said. “And he lives out there all alone. He told me once that our duets give him the strength to endure his imprisonment.”
“Oh! He’s a prisoner, then?” Queen Anarka’s eyebrows raised so high that they practically disappeared into her hair. “Look at your father and me. How often do you think falling for an attractive prisoner works out?”
Now it was Luka’s turn to sigh. When King Mikhail of the Stone kingdom returned from his time kidnapped by pirates with the pirate king’s daughter in tow, it had been the talk of the kingdom. As unhappy as his parents’ marriage seemed to be, he didn’t understand why he shouldn’t be allowed to take just as many risks with his own love life.
“Do you trust me?” he asked.
Anarka rolled a corner of Luka’s bedspread between her hands. “There’s trust, and there’s letting my son be kidnapped by fairies or what-have-you. I want you to have an easier time in love than I did, my boy. Is that so wrong?”
“No,” said Luka. “Of course not.”
It took him nearly fifteen minutes to sneak out of the castle, counting the time it took to bribe one of the other stableboys into letting him leave with his sister’s horse. Luka knew Juleka would understand. With his lute case bouncing against his back at every jolt, Luka rode into the forest.
Adrien rose with the sun, just the way he always did. He set out a bowl of food for his cat, Plagg, who was his only regular companion inside his tower home. Once a month, Adrien’s father visited to deliver food, clothes, and anything else he needed. Other than that, he was totally alone.
Adrien cleaned his already-tidy room, caught up on his studies, read two books, and made lunch. Only then did he allow himself to look out the window in search of an approaching rider.
“I wonder what instrument he’ll have today,” Adrien said to Plagg, scratching the special place between his ears. “A concertina? A flute?” He chuckled. “Surely he’s nearly run out of instruments that can be carried on horseback.”
These days, Prince Luka was the brightest part of Adrien’s life. Once, his days in the tower had been monotonous, blurring together in a featureless mass. Adrien had begun to wonder if his father would ever find a way to lift his curse, or if he would spend the rest of his life watching the world through a window with only a cat for company. Now he didn’t have to wonder. Luka was always telling Adrien that he would take him away whenever Adrien was ready.
Hoofbeats sounded in the distance, and Luka appeared. He was riding an unfamiliar horse today, Adrien noticed. When it came to Luka, he tried to notice everything he could.
“You’re later than usual,” Adrien called.
Luka frowned at this. “Yes, and I humbly apologize. Trouble at home.”
Adrien tried to imagine Luka’s home, but his imagination failed. All he could picture was the castle on the cover of his favorite book of fairytales. “It was about me, wasn’t it?” he asked. “I’m bad luck.”
Luka’s eyes flashed the way they always did when Adrien referenced his curse. “No you aren’t. I refuse to accept that.” He got to his knees. “I refuse to give up on you, Adrien. No matter how long it takes, I will take you away from this place and find you a cure.”
Adrien couldn’t hide his smile. Luka’s passion tugged at the frayed end of the thread of hope he’d abandoned long ago. Perhaps that thread was to blame for the spare bed linens he had cannibalized to make the climbing rope that was now coiled beneath the window.
He wanted to leave. He’d visualized it in a thousand dreams.
First, he would lower Plagg in a basket. Then, much less carefully, he’d lower a bag of his most precious books. The bag and the basket, like the climbing rope, had been sitting ready for more than a month.
“I believe you,” said Adrien softly, gripping the windowsill. He wasn’t sure if Luka could hear him.
Adrien closed his eyes, trying to keep the tears from falling. He couldn’t leave, and his fears weren’t really due to the bad-luck curse that followed him everywhere he went. It would mean giving up the only home he could fully remember. More than that, it would mean losing his father. Adrien’s father wasn’t a good parent or even a loving one, but he was his only family. That made it hard to let go.
A long, sweet lute chord broke Adrien out of his dismal thoughts. Luka had begun to play. Adrien hurried to take a seat at his piano. It took him a while to orient himself and find his place in Luka’s song, but Luka never seemed to mind that.
In no time, their twin songs twined around each other. Adrien caressed Luka with his music the way he longed to caress him in real life. He let the tears fall at last.
When the last notes of their song died away at last, Adrien returned to the window. Luka was on his knees again.
“Come away with me,” he said, clasping his hands. “Please.”
Adrien took a deep breath and gave Luka his answer.