“I know, my lady.” Her voice cracks. “I know you’re tired.” Her feet stamp out a furious rhythm in the snow. She has begun to pace, muttering words under her breath. “… don’t know what to do. We’re so far…” Then she begins to cry.
Don’t cry. Don’t worry about me.But my grasp on consciousness slips, and I’m free-falling.
“My lord, please! Lady Wren needs your help!” Her breath hitches, pacing and pacing and pacing. “Please help her. Please—”
Air, brushing the length of my arms, sweeping across my damp hairline, like the gentle prodding of curious fingers. Then the ground trembles. My ears ring at the sound of hooves, bright and vivid on the frozen earth.
The hoofbeats cease. Someone dismounts. Panic spikes through the dark place into which I sink. I can neither move nor defend myself; each breath feels like a jagged piece of metal gouging my chest.
“What happened?” That cold, emotionless tone can only belong to the Frost King.
“She was attacked, my lord!” Orla exclaims, near hysteria. “The townspeople learned of who she was and they… they…” The sound of her weeping drifts in and out.
“Why was she there? I gave an order. One order: she is not to leave the citadel.”
“I’m so sorry. It’s my fault. She wanted to go and I couldn’t say no and… Punish me as you see fit, but please don’t let her die.”
Footsteps. The bright, crisp scent of cedar nudges me closer to awareness. My eyes are so swollen I cannot see the Frost King’s expression, though I sense his fury, so palpable is the emotion. I tense in anticipation of his scorn.
Instead, there is this: gentleness.
Fingertips alight on my temple. They trace the bruising so carefully, mapping out each hurt. A profound, numbing cold radiates from his touch, and the throbbing alleviates. A soft sound of relief slips from my bruised throat.
“Come, wife,” he says, and gathers me into his arms.
The ground falls away, and I whimper as the movement sends another wave of crushing agony through my body. My fist lashes out against something solid. My struggles begin anew.
Strong arms tighten around me, and the king’s voice, when he speaks, reminds me of my mother. “Shh,” he says. “You are safe now.”
Impossibly, I believe him. I’m lifted up and placed on a horse, I think. Moments later, the Frost King settles behind me. He tugs me against the front of his body where it is blessedly warm. My head lolls against his shoulder, my face tipped toward his neck. Then I remember no more.
12
ILIE IN THE DARKNESSof my bedroom, the curtains drawn, shadows draped like fabric across my eyes. My thoughts drift. They are dust, catching the light and fading. Yet slowly, slowly I remember.
It’s dark in my memories. Wet, packed earth against my back. The town noises clang to a high, discordant pitch as pain shatters through my skull. Through it all, there is Orla’s voice—a thread leading me to salvation.
Distancing myself from the memories, I focus on what is present. Namely: pain, however muted. It feels as though my skin has been stripped, my bones scoured, all their innards picked clean. My face is a tender, swollen mess, but I am alive.
I am alive.
Despite the discomfort, I manage to doze, albeit fitfully. With the arrival of chill air, my eyes swing toward the door. Someone enters without knocking. A lamp flares, illuminating a face of punishing angles, a stiff, unsmiling mouth.
A liquid gait brings the Frost King deeper into the room, the door shutting soundlessly at his back. Shadows trail the edge of the long robe he’s thrown over his sleepwear. The king may have the emotional capacity of a twig, but I can’t deny the grace of his movements.
He kneels before the fire, stirring the coals until they catch, adding logs atop the flame. Hair the color of deep night falls in unruly clumpsagainst his shoulders, as though he’s been running his fingers through it. I’ve never seen it free of its binding.
A log splits with a startling crack. Again, he stokes the fire, then moves to the window, peering out. He could be a pillar given how lifelessly he stands.
Eventually, he leaves, yet returns to set something on my bedside table: a glass of water. So small a thing, really.
Something must alert him to my conscious state, because his eyes find mine. The breath stills in my lungs, for there is a crack in the stone of his countenance, revealing glimpses of what lies beneath. Rage, bright and smoldering at the edges. Agitation in the flaring of his pupils. It makes him uncomfortable, being here. So why has he come?
We stare at one another. Husband and wife, yet strangers. Eventually, someone has to give.
Clearing my throat, I say, “I’d like a glass of wine, please.”
His eyebrows snap together above his nose. “I brought you water.” He gestures to the glass on the bedside table, fingers wrapped in black leather. Why he believes it necessary to wear gloves indoors, I have no idea.
