“It would take me too long to get to the Summerlands without you,” I tell her. “I’m better off staying and hoping Thamaos still requires my presence, even if the prince wants me nowhere around.”
She leans a shoulder against the bars too, facing me, those amber-brown eyes studying me as he sips from her mug of wine. “Is he… Is he in.. love with you?”
She so often speaks like that. Broken. As though unsure if her voice will let her release the words.
“He would have to understand the concept of love first, and he does not.”
She nods, slowly. “It seems like he does,” she says. “I see it sometimes when he’s here. The way he looks at you.”
I take a deep breath and sigh it out. “I’m fairly certain that if he loved me, I would not be on the floor of this cell right now, eating leftover lamb and stale wine. Sort of like if your father loved you, he wouldn’t have been cruel. Control and desire are often disguised as love. One just has to be able to tell the difference between the fraud and the truth. Besides. The prince and I don’t know one another well enough for all that.”
Not a lie, though I don’t tell her I’ve had thirty years filled with a longing to know what might’ve been.
“You’re wise for a king.” She tucks her deep red hair behind her ear. “Except for the part about accepting Neri’s help. That cannot be good. I cannot believe he’s here.”
“Neri was a bad decision waiting to happen in this situation,” I say. “And what, have you never met a wise king?”
I think about the kings in her day, and when she meets my gaze with a sarcastic face, we both laugh.
“Never,” she says. “All fools.”
“Well. For what it’s worth, I plan to use this wisdom to help my friends, and that means you too. When we get to Mount Ulra, if I can prevent the prince from binding my hands in iron, I’ll do my best to make it impossible for him to resurrect anybody. Surely he cannot exhume bones from frozen earth.”
She looks pensive, chewing her lip. After a few moments, she touches her throat, and again, it’s as though she isn’t sure her voice will work. “What if… What if I told you… I-I know much of what’s going to happen? And that we can’t stop any of it?”
Now she has me curious.
“What do you know is going to happen?”
This time, when she tries to speak, no words come. Only tears that finally build her in eyes. She clutches her slender throat and lets the tears fall.
I cock my head, really looking at her, and wipe away a tear from her cheek. “You can’t speak certain things. For a reason.”
She doesn’t nod, almost as though she can’t, but relief shines bright as starlight in her eyes.
“Was it your father? Did he curse you?”
More relief. In the form of a shuddering sigh this time.
“You know things he doesn’t want anyone else to know.”
Again, no obvious outward reply but my guess is clearly the issue. I don’t know how she can know the future of this moment in time, though. But if she does, she’s been bearing that alone for so long.
Before we can say anything else, the dungeon door opens. I expect the prince to saunter through the door, but it’s Bronwyn. She hurries down the worn stone steps to my cell door.
“What is it, Bron?” I push to my feet and hurry to her. “What’s wrong?”
Her pale face is pink with the exertion of her sprint here, her eyes clear and focused. “If you have any manner of escape, my king, I urge you to use it now. The prince and the Brotherhood have been with the Dread Viper all day. He’s now being siphoned. Everything is in place. You leave for Mount Ulra within the hour.”
68
RAINA
After checking the waters for the hundredth time on this journey to no avail, I walk down the steps that line the terraced courtyards looking for Alexus. Colden and Fleurie had been having dinner, talking easy. Yaz is a saddened mess, missing Zahira, in tears every time I check on her. Vexx is at Min-Thuret now. I saw him walking toward the entry with a tall walking stick in hand, the head from the bowsprit now impaled on that instead, held in place from sliding away by two pieces of metal fitted around the wood. And then I looked for Finn but never saw him, as if he’s hiding from me.
Oh, Finn. Where are you?
The night smells like a forest of flowers filled with the most delectable food. It’s chilly out at first, but Fia has enormous golden braziers burning like bonfires on every courtyard landing and perfectly placed on the courtyards themselves. I also think there’s a bit of magick hanging in the air, because the warmth from the flames seems to radiate everywhere, chasing away the cold.
