“Help,” Charming shouts. “I think it’s breaking.”
“Whose fault is that?” Gwyneth snaps. “Also, it’s not breaking. Get off me.”
Charming struggles to his feet and offers her his hand. She slaps it away with a growl as she pulls herself up. “I apologize. I panicked,” he says as they walk. “Open bodies of water are terrifying.”
Ah, I see. “You can’t swim?”
His cheeks pinked. “It was never a priority,” he confirms.
“I can teach you,” Gwyneth says. She’s an amazing teacher. Anyone who can get a skill to stick in my head is awesome.
“That would be wonderful,” he agrees quickly.
I scowl. “Don’t get any bright ideas, Charming. My sister’s floof is still not yours to claim unless she says so.”
“I am all about consent,” he says with a glare aimed my way. “I would never take advantage.” I roll my eyes. This coming fromthe man who forcibly woos maidens because the damn slipper fits at his will.
We fall into silence as we follow Mr. Yak over the never-ending ice slab. Well, they follow. I’m being carried.
We are in the middle of the darn lake when a faint jingle touches my ears. I tilt my head, trying to decide if it’s real, or a made up tune in my head. Sometimes, when I’m bored, I hear music. Mr. Yak freezes, and he wobbles his head as if trying to detect the direction of the music in my head.It’s over here, idiot.
“Do you hear that?” Theo mumbles.
“The jingling?” I check. Because that might still be in my mind, and the rest of them could be hearing something different.
“Oh, no,” Mr. Yak shouts as he clutches his hair. “No, no, no.”
I take it the jingling isn’t good.
“Do we run?” Charming demands.
“It’s too late.” Mr. Yak turns to face our group. “Listen to me. There’s a specific yet simple rule when entering the queen’s kingdom.”
Good. I can do singular and simple. I glance around at the knights. Okay, I can do quads and complicated too, but only when it comes to my knights. For everything else, simple is the way to go.
“What’s the rule?” Nash asks.
“Don’t eat anything she offers, no matter how tempting. If you do, she will bewitch you.”
I groan. Anything but food. That is impossible. “Bewitch how?” I check. Even though he isn’t spelling it out, he has to know the specifics.
Mr. Yak blinks. “Does it matter?”
The jingling draws closer. “Well, if it’s a charm to make us believe she’s pretty, then I can live with that. But if it’s a spell to make me forget my knights, that’s more problematic.”
Mr. Yak opens his mouth and snaps it shut.
“We’ll make sure she doesn’t eat anything,” Theo says.
Good luck, buddy. Nobody has succeeded in that in all my annuses.
A sleigh appears through the thick snow, hurtling toward us, drawn by a gang of white wolves. It slides to a stop with an eerie precision, the wolves snapping at the air as they pant cold mist into the frozen world around us. A deathly silence follows, the kind that presses against your skin like the weight of an impending storm.
Tall as a nightmare and twice as cruel, the Snow Queen steps from the sleigh, her gown a sweeping cascade of ice and silver frost threading through the sheer fabric as if the cold itself is woven into her being. Her hair, white as fallen snow, cascades in perfect waves down her back, catching the light in a way that makes it look more like frozen silk than anything human. Her skin, pale and flawless, could belong to a marble statue, a beauty carved with such precision it leaves you uncertain if she was ever meant to move at all.
But her eyes? Those are bright with an unnatural glow, an arctic blue so piercing they could slice through stone. When they land on us, my entire body seizes like prey caught in the gaze of something that does not believe in mercy.
The queen smiles then, slow and deliberate, like she’s savoring a private joke only she understands. “What a delightful surprise. Travelers, so far from home.” Her voice is honey dipped in frost, beautiful but carrying the promise of something sharp hidden beneath the sweetness. She steps forward, the hem of her gown gliding over the ice like it isn’t even touching the ground. “I must insist you join me for dinner at my palace,” she continues, and though her tone is light, there is nothing gentle about the way her gaze lingers.
