Fair Peril by Nancy Springer Page A

talking. “I can’t believe it.” He could hear the delight and terror in her voice. “I mean, I believe it, but I can’t believe it. You’re real.”
    Did she mean he had a soul now? Could this be? Possibly—because the potency of her kiss was like lightning and larksong, like nothing he could have expected, like nothing he had ever experienced before. The transformation from hostage child to faerie prince did not rival it. The branding fire of the kiss that had made him a servant of the Queen of Fair Peril, that was only a bad dream by comparison. Even the rigors of becoming a frog did not compare with the shock of this metamorphosis. Even the helplessness of falling to death was as nothing compared with this helplessness, this—this naked falling, this becoming a—a hostage to her. This falling in love.
    Her kiss had made him her captive.
    Not free.
    The realization put a keen and painful edge on his joy, but joy remained. He adored her. His terror and unhappiness ran through him like wine. He whispered again, “Princess Emily.”
    â€œShhhh. I can’t look at you. We have to find you some clothes before the cops stop us.”
    He said, “I love you.”
    â€œHush. Please.” Her voice trembled. He saw a shivering smile. He saw her rosebud chest heave.
    She must not have meant, Adamus decided, that he had a soul, because a soul was a constant, was it not? It did not seem possible that he could have a soul when everything about him could be transformed so quickly and completely. When he had been a frog, his thoughts had been green and watery, his dreams informed with algae and the flitting of winged insects, his lusts founded upon the laying of eggs. But now that he was a prince, his thoughts had transformed as much as his body. Just the thought of her small, round breasts under the thin cloth made his—made him cover a salient part of himself with his hands. And his thoughts had a new texture. Blue velvet in them, and smooth bedsheets, and the whisper of silk on skin. And that wine-red heat in his heart, his blood. And the color of gold, her hair. The weight of gold in his thoughts. Crown. Circlet. Wedding ring.
    He loved her. He loved her. Heady joy. Yet—how could he say he loved her? He knew he did not yet have a soul.
    Only one thing seemed constant: he was still in thrall.
    â€œNine-one-one.”
    â€œYes, my daughter just ran away with a naked fetch.”
    â€œA naked what, ma’am?”
    â€œFetch. Frog, fairy-tale prince, stud muffin, crotchthrob frog fairy—”
    â€œName-calling won’t help us, ma’am. You say his name is Tayell Prinz?”
    â€œNo, his name is Prince Adamus d’Aurca, and he just took off in the altogether with my daughter!”
    â€œAnd your daughter is how old, ma’am?”
    â€œSixteen.”
    â€œAnd how long has she been gone?”
    â€œAbout a minute and a half now.”
    The dispatcher’s tone of professional boredom never varied. “Call us if she hasn’t come back in twenty-four hours, ma’am.”
    â€œBut she’s likely to do anything! She broke my window, stole my frog—”
    â€œShe broke a window? I’ll send an officer to take a report, ma’am. Your name and address?”
    Buffy hung up without answering, her thoughts reserving a hot spot in hell for people who considered that a broken window was more important than a missing child, Emily, who had already been gone for two minutes. God damn it that time had been wasted. Buffy grabbed her car keys and headed for the door. Her slippers slowed her down; broken glass be damned, she kicked them off and ran out barefoot into the night. The Escort, with the nearly supernatural perversity routinely demonstrated by inanimate objects in times of stress, stalled the first three times she tried to start it, then bucked as she backed down the driveway and shimmied like a belly dancer