Yet I cannot let fear stand in my way. I’ve never faced a battlefield I could not conquer, so why should this be any different? If fighting and dancing have so much in common, so too might war and romance.
It’s hours before I’m able to track Ingrid down, following the chain of staff and guards who saw her going one way or another. I’ve been directed to the stables, but at first all I see is an ifrak being groomed—with the long winter, it’s too much of a risk to fully shear them, but left untended, the wool will grow into heavy mats that are hazardous for the animal’s health.
“Looking for Her Highness?” asks one of the grooms. It takes me a moment to place him, since the last time I saw him he was fraught with worry, but I’m fairly sure he’s the soulbond to the ifrak that gave birth. And upon closer inspection, the ifrak being groomed is one and the same.
“She’s in the stall, keeping baby happy,” he adds with a nod of his head. “She’s been a big help with feeding when mom here needs a break.” The ifrak munches a handful of grain from his outstretched palm, completely unbothered by the team working on her or that her calf rests out of sight just around the corner.
When I round the bend and come to the correct stall, I’m struck by the peaceful scene I find: both Ingrid and the calf fast asleep together in the hay, Ingrid clutching the calf’s fluffy wool with one hand. She looks so…at ease. Even the duskthorn didn’t have such a profound effect. It’s more serene and relaxed than I’ve ever seen her.
There’s one obvious reason for that—I’mthe one preventing it.
Thatis why she didn’t want to have dinner with me.
Me.
I was fooling myself to come down here thinking otherwise. Thinking I had any hope at all. In all likelihood, the Dealmaker set me up for failure, his own motives as mysterious to me as the ways of courting a woman.
Knowledge that I realize now wouldn’t help me. If my ability to win Ingrid is the answer to the reach’s woes, we may already be out of hope.
“There you are,” Valenar says, sprinting across the stable, sliding to a stop at my side and panting to catch his breath. “You’re needed in—” He stops, looks into the stall, frowns atIngrid’s sleeping form, then looks back to me. “Am I interrupting something?”
Forcing myself to turn away from the bride I’ll never be worthy of, I slip effortlessly back into the role of ruthless general.
“No. What is it?”
“There’s a problem at the border. We’re waiting to deliver a full report in the war room.”
I’ve lost count of how many hours we’ve spent circling the same problem. I haven’t even a clue how many days those hours total. And still we’ve come to no real answer. No amount of meeting with advisors, generals, landholders, and anyone else who might have any insight has helped me come to a decision.
So much for being the decisive leader the reach needs.
But how am I to know which choice is the right one when all points made are salient? When all factors considered cancel out? There is so much to lose, and the longer I postpone giving firm orders, the worse the problem grows.
I’ve dismissed everyone yet again, left alone with my thoughts in the war room—a place I keep finding myself, despite my best efforts. And yet again, I’m left wondering how I let Valenar—how I letmyself—convince me I am suited for this role. Leadership experience means little when you’ve led only soldiers who obey your every command. Being decisive has no roots if all your decisions came from higher orders.
I’m not sure I ever truly appreciated the constant conflict the Crown faces. Navigating the needs of every faction in the reach while balancing our survival, our future, and our history is more than I can manage. And no matter how long I stare at this map, I can’t bring myself any closer to giving the orders that will relinquish our lands. There may be no other way to victory, but I cannot bear to surrender.
The door opens while I envision Emerald’s borders contracting, Iron claiming the terraced hillsides, razing the land in the name of protecting it. Heat scorches deep in my chest, and I growl a dismissal over my shoulder without looking up from the gouges my claws have left in the tabletop.
“Whatever it is, Val, it will have to wait.” My anger has nothing to do with him, and he’s suffered through more than his fair share of it without warrant. This is the best chance I can give him to back out before the rage overflows.
Losing land is a failure.
Surrendering it even moreso.
Handing it over to Iron is bordering on betrayal.
“Not Val, and it sounds like dinner shouldn’t wait.” Ingrid’s gentle teasing surprises me enough to cool my flames. So much of the tension instantly leaves my body as it recognizes her nearness.
Heart in my throat, I turn to find Ingrid accompanied by a cook who’s pushing an overburdened serving cart. And Ingrid hasn’t just shown up with dinner, she’s also dressed for the occasion, wearing a long-sleeved gown of dark green velvet, the sleeves and bodice enhanced with sparkling gems, her golden hair arranged atop her head, glittering ornaments glinting within the plaits. She would look at home among the frost-tipped evergreens in the mountains, a goddess for the forest to worship.
“What…” I begin to ask why she’s here, then stop myself.
“Do you no longer wish to dine with me?” Ingrid asks, one eyebrow arched in a way that says she knows the answer already.
Human or no, she looks every bit the queen she’s destined to be. Breathtaking. Beautiful in a way that I can’t put into words, but also in a way that robs me of words entirely.
“You…said no,” I mutter, half-convinced she’s an exhaustion-induced hallucination.
