Every corridor between the kitchen and the throne room was empty, and he didn’t need to stop and wonder at that. The frost grew dense on the walls and floors the farther he walked, laying thick as blossoming mould in the skirting boards and stairways, slowing his steps and thinning the air like spores of ice in his every breath.
His head was spinning by the time he reached the throne room, and it took him two tries to heave open the heavy side door and slip into the room. He was met, at once, with a wall of backs—courtiers, and staff, and gards alike, all pressed as close asthey could to the wall yet straining to lean in, to peer over one another’s heads, their whispers barely louder than the shuffle of their feet. Chest tightened to the point of pain, Ger crushed it further, squeezing himself between the packed bodies and shoving his way to the front. Even when he reached that empty space, his breath did not recover. Because there, just as Jack had said, was the Merrow King.
Kai stood in the centre of the hall and faced the empty throne. He didn’t fight the grasp of the Queen’s Gards who held him. His wrists were twisted behind his back, caught in one of Benan’s giant paws with the point of Doran’s sword poised between his shoulder blades. The sight of him, standing right where Silas stood, was such a vicious, vivid reminder that Ger found the frame of his vision contracted and blurred in protest, as though his brain very briefly considered blacking out.
Breathe.
He reached for the hilt of his sword, the habit that had slowly become his anchor through each of these lung-shredding moments. It was a trick his mother had taught him, so long ago now.Focus on something else,she had told him through her own tears.Focus on something real. Something he could feel, or see, or hear. Touch had always worked best. Through all these months, the smooth metal beneath his palm had reminded him that he was here, that he was surviving, and that one day, he might even find the courage to draw that sword. But today would not be that day.
Because he didn’t fucking have it.
Ger’s fingers scrabbled over thin air, and his gaze dropped at once to his side, lungs shrinking to the size of raisins.Oh fuck. Oh bollocking Daughters cursed fuck, no.He’d left the kitchens without his sword, without his armour, and without a bloodythought. He’dswornto himself that Adeline would not lose another loved one, and now—
His eyes snapped to Kai, head swimming not only with the lack of air but the force behind his movement. The king, by comparison, looked remarkably calm. Unkempt, but unmoved. He was bearded, his hair longer than when he’d left, dark tufts of it curling beneath the collar of a too-small shirt with cuffs that barely hit the middle of each forearm. His trousers were borrowed too, short at the ankle, his feet bare. But despite it all, he stood with his eyes closed, brow furrowed with something that seemed a lot closer to focus than fear.
Could he have some sort of plan?
At the thought, Ger’s lungs allowed him one repairing breath; just enough to breathe sense into his brain.
Alright.The king was clearly a prisoner here. He had not come racing back to the arms of his first love, and that was good. He'd come alone, too. That waspromising,Ger told himself even as something in his chest bleated like a cornered animal. As long as Adeline was safe,not herewas better thanhere, by far. And as for the Merrow King … Well. Sword or no, Gerard would do what he could.
The inner door opened, and Imogen appeared in a cloud of pale-pink chiffon, guiding a blank-faced Mareda into the room by the small of her back. They were followed by two members of the Queen’s Gard who had clearly been off duty tonight, on the same shift as Ger. Like him, they wore no armour, though they had at least stopped for their cloaks and swords. He thought, briefly, how cold it must be when they stood to either side of the throne and each took a knee, no plating or leathers between themselves and the icy floor. It could only have been colderwhen Avette swept past them in a glittering swirl of ice-studded skirts and finally seated herself on the throne.
She wasn't wearing the dark tear tracks that had become her favoured look, and her hair was not slicked to her head in that shining river of black. It bounced, instead, around her slim white shoulders, wispy tendrils curling around her face, softening the pointed angle of her chin. Ger wondered if she'd been preparing for bed and simply washed away the day's costume. Or …
Had she not wanted to come to Kai dressed asthe Sorceress?
He couldn’t help but notice that behind her throne, the twin statues of Silas and Johanna had been covered in thick, white drapings, as if to hide them from the Merrow King’s sight. So maybe … maybe she’d wanted him to see her like this; barefaced and soft. Gentle as the smile that tilted her pink lips.
Less of a raving fucking lunatic.
But maybe the king didn’t care to see her at all; he still stood there with his eyes closed, brows twitching together with some unseen effort, until Doran finally poked him in the back with the tip of his blade, and his eyes flew open, jaw squared. He stared ahead wordlessly, not a flicker of change in his taut, focused expression.
But Avette’s smile broadened, her long lashes fluttering.
“Welcome home, my heart.”
She extended a pale hand, fingers unfurling like the petals of a frostbitten rose.
Doran lowered his sword after just a beat of hesitation; Benan hesitated a moment longer. And for as little esteem that he held for either man, Ger had to admit that they had solid instincts.
Because the moment Kai Cumhaill was free, that focused frown broke—and he was swallowed in a flare of green light.
Someone screamed in Ger’s ear, and he flinched away, still blinded and blinking.
What followed was a blur of chaos that overwhelmed every sense. Warring blue and green glares that blinded half the room, a cacophony of earth-shuddering groans and elemental roars, a ground that was quickly giving way, and a frightened surge of bodies that knocked Ger to his knees. His joints shuddered at the impact, ears ringing, colours popping behind his eyes—but in the split second that he was down, the roaring died, and the unearthly storm of light drew in like water in an unplugged tub. The pivot from chaos to calm was a blanket thrown over Ger’s senses, and his head spun as he stared uncomprehendingly at his own hands splayed on the ground. Red with the biting cold, and half buried in wet, frosty slush.
Ger dragged his gaze up, tremors running through his tensed shoulders, ears ringing.
Avette stood at the foot of her own throne, soaking wet and utterly thunderous; only the whip of the winds around her gave away the rage behind her impassive mask. That, and the slight heave to her slim shoulders, breath moving through her like the storm that encased her. Her hand was thrown up before her, and from it spilt a long stream of solid ice that arched toward the daggered ceiling. Ger’s eyes traced the shape of it, a gleaming woven surface like running water caught midstream, that ended in Kai’s cupped hands.
Or began there.
Unlike Avette, the king was far from calm. He stood alone in a ferocious windstorm, hair blowing wildly around his snarlingface, the collar of his shirt snapping in the breeze. His hands were trapped in the arch of ice, no matter how hard he strained and yanked and thrashed, and a small green stone hung suspended in the air before his nose. It took Ger several confused blinks to realise that it was a pendant, the chain dancing in the same breeze that blew like a small hurricane, confined to the spot where the Merrow King stood and struggled.
Not a word was spoken throughout the cold hall, barely a sound above a breath save for the distant grunts and curses that slipped from Kai’s hurricane prison.
Slowly, Avette lowered her hands; the arch and the windstorm remained. Her pendant pulsed erratically, casting a menacing shine to her cold beauty as she took a step down the dais, wet skirts turned grey with the damp as she gathered them in her hands. Her slippers left slushy footprints on the half-melted frost with every slow step she took toward the Merrow King. Nobody dared breathe. Ger’s chest was moments from caving. She stopped just short of Kai’s wild wind prison and blinked those long eyelashes at him.
