Chapter 11
CHAPTER 11
Ezryn
I thought I’d miss it more. The helm.
Throughout the centuries of my life, it was a constant reminder of who I was, what I valued. My realm. My honor. No matter where I went, people knew who I was. First, son of Isidora and Thalionor, heir to the Spring throne. Then, the High Prince of Spring himself.
Now, I’m grateful for my anonymity. No one knows my face. With my hair grown long enough to cover my one identifiable feature—the ragged ears, points cut off by my brother’s blade—I could be anyone. A pauper, a merchant.
A member of Kairyn’s army.
I shift in my stolen armor. My brother’s forces consist of goblins gifted from the Below, the deserters from the Queen’s Army, and the Spring soldiers he’s rallied to his side. I’m in a platoon of ex-Queen’s Army soldiers aboard a ship bound for the prison barge. A nameless face, unknown to everyone.
Except her.
I know you.
Even before I removed my helm, it was as if she could see right through me, to the blood and bone and soul beneath. It had felt like we’d known each other our whole lives and were just waiting for the chance to meet. She had loved me in the darkness—and I returned her love with more darkness.
If I am not worthy of basking in her radiance, then I will walk behind her as a shadow. As her shadow, I will engulf any who would dim her light. If darkness is all I have, then I will use it to serve her.
I’d executed my plan over the course of a few days. First, I’d stolen the armor and identification from a soldier undeserving of title or breath. Getting into Hadria was easier than I thought; my brother and I had both served my father in times of battle. Every procedure, security measure, and tactic Kairyn has implemented could have been taken straight from my father’s own war strategies. For anyone else, these would have proved formidable, but I knew each step, each phrase, to get within the city and secure myself a place on a relief ship sailing out to the prison barge. My father would be proud.
Father. I keep my face expressionless, although the thought of who my father once was compared to who he’d been at the end of his life causes my ribs to ache. I could have saved him. I could have made him better—
But the traitor had taken that away from me. That spawn of the Below robbed me of my father and helped destroy my rule. I always knew Caspian was incapable of honor.
I thought Kel had finally learned it, too.
Turquoise water splashes up against the porthole. My fellow soldiers and I stand quietly below decks. Long hours have passed. Based on the increased sound of footsteps and shouting above, I surmise we must be getting close to our destination.
I touch the roughly drawn map tucked into the vambrace on my wrist. Yesterday, after I’d found out which ship would be sent to the barge, I snuck into the captain’s quarters and found a map of the prison, the manifest, and a list of ships due in and out. Though there was no mention of Rosalina by name, I’ll be able to find my way to the cell blocks.
If she’s still here , the dark part of my mind whispers.
An hour ago, I’d felt the light in my breast erupt , springing back to life like a desert suddenly awash in a rainstorm. My mate bond.
Whatever they’d been doing to Rosalina, it had stopped. I can feel her again, distantly, but she’s there beside my heart. Where she belongs.
Are you out there, Rose? I’m coming for you.
Can she hear me? Probably not. Too far away.
Or perhaps my mate bond is damaged. I would not be surprised if I ruined it as I ruined everything else. My mind drifts back to the time at Sylvanita Lake when it had felt like every broken and jagged piece of me was softening. Because of her.
Because she loved me.
The curse laid upon me by the Enchantress had begun to break. With the breaking came a rush of magic I hadn’t felt since my mother passed the Blessing of Spring to me. Magic I have always been too weak to wield. For decades, I dismissed my brother as nothing more than a wild, frenzied child. But I am no better.
Shame rushes over me as I remember what I did to Rosalina. What I did to Spring’s sacred place. I can only imagine what other destruction I would have caused if I had allowed my curse to break.
The wolf controls me. I need him.
“All hands on deck!” a voice calls from above.
We’ve arrived.
Briny wind and bright sunlight bombard my face as I walk up to the top deck. A circular structure bobs in the waves, a hulking, hideous thing that is part ship, part Summer arena, and part fortress.
I try listening to the bond within my chest, but it feels distant, echoey. Is she here but still under some magic-inhibitor or did that scum in the desert lead me astray? Regardless, this place will have the answers I seek.
Our ship is tied up in an external docking port on the edge of the floating fortress, and the soldiers line up for security checks before entering. Several smaller skiffs are tied up beside it, and I note their location for mine and Rosalina’s escape.
I slip to the back of the ship, rid myself of the clunky stolen armor, keeping only the scabbard that houses my mother’s sword, then leap across the gap between the ship and the barge, quiet as a cat.
Staying on the outside, I use the broken pillars reinforced with Spring steel to climb away from the soldiers and up the side of the barge. When I find an opening, I check for guards, then duck inside, feet whispering over the metal floor.
Stooping down in a shadow, I consult my map, counting the floors I climbed up. The highest-security cells are below the surface of the water. So back down I go.
I weave through the labyrinthine passages of the barge, trying my best to stay in the outside ring. Guards patrol in pairs, but I avoid each one, hiding among the shadows or holding on to the outside of the ship. Finally, I weave my way down to the main floor, where I see part of the structure is cut open to allow an internal dock.
A mauled schooner is moored, the front half nothing but tattered timber and streaks of gunpowder. I creep closer, hiding behind barrels and other cargo strewn around the dock.
The hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. The ghost of a feeling washes over me. It has no scent, yet I know it’s rotten. It has no sound, but my ears ring with screams. It does not touch me, yet I feel it in every fiber of my body.
He’s here. The thing he stole is calling out for me.
“We’ll send all the fleet after them, sire, promise! They won’t get far!” a voice urges.
Another sniveling voice says, “It was the runaway princess, sire, and the High Prince of Summer. But we’ll hunt them down—”
There’s a clatter, then gagging. “There is no High Prince of Summer. I have taken his realm. He is a threat to the peace and sanctity of the Vale. I will end him as I did the last High Prince of Spring.”
Breath comes ragged from my throat. I’d know that voice anywhere. It haunted my mind for years. I peek out from the barrels and see my younger brother, Kairyn, holding up one of his minions by the throat. His armor is both soaking wet and charred.
I fling myself back behind the barrels. Dayton was here. Does that mean—
“Now, I want every bloody ship we have scouring the Byzantar Isles for those rebels. Bring me back the Golden Rose or this whole prison will be torn down to the depths of the Below,” Kairyn roars.
She’s escaped. I can’t catch my breath. Rosalina has escaped and she’s with Dayton. My brother, not of blood but of fellowship.
Kairyn had set a trap for me in the Spring Realm, and I walked straight into it, giving him my magic, my realm, and my honor. Now, I am void of all three. My mother’s sword sits heavy on my back. Slowly, I reach behind to grab the hilt.
My fingers tremble on the metal. His face looms in my mind’s eye. Not the feathered owl brow of his helm, but my brother’s true face, the one I’d gazed upon as he squeezed the last ounces of breath from my lungs.
Every life I’ve claimed in the last three months has led me here. I thought I was coming for Rosalina, but it was my brother I found. Our fates tied together, always to lead back to one another until one of us strikes the final blow. I tighten my fingers on the hilt of the sword.
Ezryn! Stop! The memory of Rosalina’s scream roars in my head. She hadn’t wanted me to fight Kairyn in the Hall of Vernalion. But didn’t she understand? There was no other way. He had wronged me, wronged our people. There were so many reasons I had to fight, that I have to fight now—
But I cannot draw it. My chest heaves too quickly. I cannot draw my mother’s sword.
My next thought strikes me like an arrow: I have to get out of here.
The last time I took up arms against my brother, I only hurt Rosalina. I had the chance to save her, and I chose vengeance instead. I won’t lose her again for the benefit of my long-forsaken honor. Finding her is all that matters.
Cursing, I look back around the barrel. My brother and his two accomplices are gone. So is my chance to kill him.
I look down at my shaking hands. If Kairyn has disappeared and Rosalina has escaped, there’s nothing for me here. I need to get out before I’m discovered.
Quickly as I can, I make my way back from the internal dock to the edge of the barge. I’ll commandeer one of the skiffs and slip out to the Byzantar Isles. Perhaps there, I can get word of Rosie and the runaway princess’s ship she has escaped upon.
I round the last corner to the external dock and count the rotation of the guards. When there’s a gap, I dart forward and leap upon the nearest skiff. I’m no sailor like Dayton, but I can catch the wind. I bend down to unravel the rope when a shadow casts over me.
“Did you really think I would let you escape, brother?”
Ice runs up and down my spine. Slowly, I drop the rope and stand, meeting the metallic gaze of Kairyn.
“I knew you were here,” he says softly and touches his chest. “It feels you, you know. Sometimes, at night, the magic seems to cry out. It still grieves for my disappointing predecessor.”
I can’t speak. A suffocating storm of fury and fear rages within my chest. He nearly killed me. He has an entire army at his disposal. He’s got the damned Blessing of Spring.
He took my mate.
“What did you do to her?” I growl. “What did you do to my mate?”
Kairyn laughs, the sound reverberating between us. “My men talk about you. The Prince of Blood, that’s your new name. Too stately for the ragged vagabond you’ve become. You’ve left a wake of corpses across the realm.”
A low growl ebbs from my throat. “Where is my mate?”
“When will you realize that you’re not the hero?” Sunlight glints off his mask. “Rosalina didn’t need you. The lives you took were for nothing. How does it feel, brother?” His voice grows breathier, more frantic. “How does it feel to be the villain?”
“No!” I draw my sword, but I’m too late.
Kairyn heaves his arms up. Great strings of seaweed erupt from the deck, wrapping around my arms, my legs, my torso.
“Fool!” Kairyn cries. “When will you learn? You cannot overpower me. I am stronger than you ever were. You have nothing ! ”
Nothing but thousands of reasons to kill him. I tear against the binds, but as soon as one breaks, another takes its place. It can’t all have been useless. All the deaths, the blood I spilled, the men I broke.
“Stop fighting,” Kairyn growls.
“Never.”
The seaweed tightens around my wrists and ankles and pulls, tearing me in four different directions. I wince against the pain. “Then I will end this for both of us,” Kairyn says.
Heat explodes in my joints. I lash against the bindings, but nothing breaks.
A cold breeze caresses my skin. A breeze far too cold for the Summer Realm.
Kairyn and I both turn to the open sea.
Waves freeze into floats of ice before cracking again. But there’s someone leaping from ice floe to ice floe. Even from this distance, I can see the wrath held in his body, the piercing blue gaze.
“I would run if I were you,” I say to Kairyn.
The High Prince of Winter is here.