“Then don’t,” she said. “They remember voices. And sometimes they speak back.”
“That’s comforting.”
“You didn’t come here for comfort.”
“No,” I said softly. “I suppose not.”
Maeryn gave a small, knowing smile. “Then stop expecting it.”
Before she left, she hesitated by the door. “If the frost hums again, don’t hum with it. Promise me.”
I nodded, though I wasn’t sure why the promise felt heavy.
After she’d gone, I sat by the window and stared out at the snow beyond the glass. The faintest shimmer of gold glowed beneath the frost in the courtyard below—small, defiant, almost hidden.
Kael had left warmth. Kaelith left cold.
And somewhere between them, Winter was starting to listen.
Chapter seventeen
Katria
Sleep claimed me in pieces that night.
Maeryn’s tea still sat untouched beside the bed, its surface thinly iced over. I remember lying back, watching the faint glitter on the ceiling, telling myself I wouldn’t dream again.
That promise lasted minutes.
When the world folded, it did so gently, the way breath leaves lungs. One blink, and I was somewhere else.
The twilight field had returned. The same violet sky. The same faint hum beneath my feet. The air rippled gold, and the light bent toward me like a living thing.
“You hear it now,” the voice murmured.
The Dreamkeeper stood ahead again, clearer this time, though the face still flickered like a reflection on moving water.
“The frost listens to you. The stone remembers you.”
“What stone?” I asked. My voice came out smaller than I wanted.
“The one that binds what should not wake.”
He stepped forward, and the field trembled. Frost spread through the gold at my feet like veins of ice through glass.
“The Dreamstone stirs.”
The words weren’t shouted; they vibrated through the air, the ground, throughme.
The light fractured. The hum rose into a low chord that resonated in my chest until I thought I’d split apart.
Then—nothing.
I woke gasping. My room was cold again. Too cold. The frostlight along the walls flickered violently, then steadied. For a heartbeat, everything seemed normal.
Until I saw the mirror.
Across its surface, the frost had formed words—clean, precise, and glowing faintly gold:
