“That’s right,” the Ice King replies to a question I must’ve missed. “I’m getting betrothed tonight.”
The blood drains from Ksenia’s face. “Glacins will never accept a shifter queen.”
His palm settles on the small of my back. “Good thing I do not need their approval to marry mymate.”
My heart bangs, its thuds so loud and chaotic that I think everyone must feel its rhythm, especially since the music has stopped and the chatter has dwindled. I hadn’t expected him to announce it quite so brazenly. Or quite so possessively.
“Well, that’s just…” Ksenia claps. “Just fucking grand.”
Her voice drips with such sarcasm that Konstantin’s fingers flex, sliding toward my hip and sinking into the gathered fabric, squeezing the bone beneath to steer me back a step.
Does he expect his sister to slap me with her water-magic, or is he worried I might grow my talons and slap her? Probably the latter, since saturating my lungs wouldn’t harm me.
“Not that I was Atsa’s greatest fan”—Ksenia doesn’t even attempt to wipe the disgust reshaping her face—“but he would roll over in his grave if he learned that he’d lost not one buttwochildren to shifters. Especially his perfect, precious son.”
“Mind your tongue, sister.” Konstantin’s tone isn’t cold; it’sglacial.
“What about Alyona?” I cannot help myself from asking. “Do you think she’s rolling over in her grave?”
Konstantin’s face jerks in my direction, but I don’t look away from Ksenia. I don’t want to miss a second of her reaction to my taunt.
Her eyes narrow, sparkling with spite. “What grave?”
Is she about to confess that she lives?
“Alyona was given a traitor’s burial. Dumped into the ocean to become serpent food.”
“Serpents don’t consume meat,” Naeva says, sidling close to me. “The same way they don’t ornament their bodies with parts from another being.”
Borat suddenly sinks in front of Ksenia’s face. “Forgive me for interrupting, but you have a caller, Princess.”
“Do I?” She flips her hair, making sure her bangles clink together for all to see and hear. “How convenient.”
When she steps past her twin and Aodhan, her chin rises. My heart breaks for Izolda. It’s one thing to hate my kind; it’s another to snub her sister. Especially one with whom she shared a womb.
Konstantin clamps down on my hip. I bet he’s dying to reprimand me for provoking his sister, but of course, he’s too decorous to do so in public.
“I was going to wait until we sat down for dinner, but since we have everyone’s attention…” His pulse leaks through the pads of his fingertips—strong, steady. The opposite of mine. “Isla and I have an announcement.”
As Konstantin explains that the most unexpected thing happened to him last night, I glance in my father’s direction. His features are rigid, as are the arms he keeps crossed over his chest. Even the wisps of smoke that are curling off his bodyappear solid. Jaytair, too, has his arms folded in front of his dark jacket, as do most of the shifters. Some are downright scowling.
I skim the crowd, my gaze landing first on Taytah, whose lax features unpick some of the tension coiled in my belly, then on her mother, dashing away a tear. Oddly enough, what arrests me isn’t Mimi’s weeping—after all, I’ve willingly locked myself inside a kingdom full of antimorphs—but the smile she harbors.
As she rests her cheek on Bisnonno’s shoulder, I examinehisexpression. Like Naeva, he doesn’t grin, but neither does he look like he’s attending a funeral—unlike the rest of my family and friends. Elio and Lachlano, who flank my cousin, are eerily still, as though someone had cursed both to stone. Not even their breathing seems to disturb the air.
Konstantin’s fingers fall away from my body. I whirl, half-expecting a Crow to have snatched him. But the Ice King hasn’t been airlifted; he’s simply let go in order to face me.
“Isla, I know you don’t require jewels to be certain of my intentions”—Konstantin produces the ring box and clicks it open—“but it would mean the world to me to see the symbol of my affection on your finger.”
Though I’ve lain eyes on the ring already, its blue shimmer sends a frisson up my spine, one that dots my nape with cold sweat.
“Isla?” Konstantin breathes out my name.
I gulp. To think all of this could’ve been avoided if I’d stayed away. Not avoided, but perhapsdelayed?
My name unspools from Konstantin’s tense lips again. Shit. How long was I lost in thought?
“Yes!” I jerk out my left hand. “Forgive me. I was so overwhelmed.”
