I’m almost certain one of them even bows before fluttering into the driver’s seat and snapping the reins.
How odd.
This time I don’t fall asleep on the ride back to Castle Frostwyn. Instead, I watch the snow as it drifts from the iron-gray sky, delicate, endless, mesmerizing. Even knowing the suffering it causes, knowing what it has taken from my home, my people, I can’t deny its beauty anymore as it blankets Brunemar in shimmering silence.
When the carriage rolls to a stop, I straighten myself before stepping out. I don’t know why I do it. Fix my hair, flatten my coat, adjust the fur collar, but I do. As if preparing to be seen.
As if preparing forhim.
But when I step inside the castle, darkness greets me. Deeper than usual. The halls are silent, the air still. No soft rumble of Luceran pacing somewhere. No clink of silverware. No whirling frost.
Has he retired for the night?
A small, traitorous ache pulses in my chest. Disappointment.
I didn’t even realize I had been… looking forward to seeing him.
I clear my throat sharply, annoyed with myself, and draw a steadying breath. I need to stop whatever foolish thoughts are creeping into my head. He has treated me with nothing but contempt. I must be some kind of masochistic fool to find anything about that compelling.
I shrug off any lingering, ridiculous fondness for my captor and climb the stairs to my room.
I hang my coat, dress, and scarves, then slip into the nightgown that almost feels like wearing nothing at all. The room is already comfortably warm. A fire always burns in the hearth, though I have never lit it myself, and when I slide beneath the blankets, they welcome me, soft and cozy, as though they’ve been waiting just for me.
I’m too tired to question the strangeness of it.
I close my eyes and sleep takes me quickly.
I wake to the sound of my name.
Soft. Far away. A breath carried on the wind.
My eyes flutter open, lids heavy with sleep, and for a long, hazy moment I cannot tell if I am still dreaming. My head tips to the side on the pillow, staring blankly into the dark. Pale moonlight spills across the marble floor in broken shards, flickering with the slow dance of drifting snow beyond the open balcony doors.
The fire in the hearth has burned low, embers glowing faintly beneath brittle, ashen wood. They crackle softly, a dying heartbeat of warmth in a room that feels suddenly colder.
Neve…
My heart stutters.
I sit upright, every muscle taut, listening.
Neve… Come to me. Neve…
My chest tightens, my breath stumbling out in sharp, shaking bursts. That voice, soft, familiar, impossibly gentle.
Father…?
I tear the blankets away and stumble out of bed, my feet hitting the floor before I even realize I’m moving. I rush to the balcony, throw the curtains aside, and press forward until the cold air stings my cheeks.
Neve… Neve…
“Father?” The word leaves me in a trembling whisper. “Is that you?”
A shadow shifts in the rose garden, slipping along the edges of the moonlight like it belongs to every dark corner it finds. Too small to be Luceran.
Hope blooms so fiercely it hurts.
Just the right size to be my father.
