20. Isla
20
ISLA
“ I cannot believe he’s your mate, yet now that I think of it, it was so obvious from day one,” Ilya proclaims through curled lips, having swooped past Lev to take my arm when Dádhi went to see my “mate.”
The air puffing from the brass instruments flutters my voluminous sleeves, while his conviction that his brother and I share a magical connection flutters my erratic pulse. “What gave it away? His bleeding lip? His bruised ears?”
Ilya grins. “Though I’ve no doubt that contributed to catching his attention—after all, it’s not every day Kostya gets his ass handed to him—what made it obvious to me was how his eyes were glued to you at the Lodge.”
I pat his hand. “You misconstrue irritation with fascination. Your brother was probably trying to devise a diplomatic way of expulsing me from Glace without enraging my father.”
Ilya pats my hand right back. “It’s difficult to be both pretty and discerning. Very few of us achieve this, so I wouldn’t beat yourself up about your shortcomings.”
I laugh. “Between you and Izolda, I sense my stay in Glace will be much more enjoyable than I anticipated.”
It’s only when his eyebrows bend that I realize my faux pas. I’m supposed to have found my true mate yet don’t even list Konstantin?
“I’m a little anxious about moving away from home. Especially since your brother is king, so it isn’t as though he can ever relocate.”
That smooths Ilya’s brow. “I didn’t even think of what an adjustment it will be.”
“Naeva promised to stay for a while. That should help with the homesickness.”
He draws me to a stop beside the band, then turns to face me. “I swear to be the best brother-in-law in the history of brothers-in-law. I will deliver anything you need or want to your doorstep. Save for sexual favors…I will leave those to Kostya.” He ferries a wicked grin his brother’s way.
One which goes unnoticed by the recipient, who is deeply concentrated on my father. Thank the Cauldron.
Ilya threads his arm through mine once more. “Gods, I cannot wait for the two of you to consummate your relationship. Two plus decades of abstinence has made my brother so fucking tetchy.”
I choke on my swallow, then cough, which only intensifies Ilya’s glee. No wonder the Ice King so easily agreed not to engage in any flirtations. And insisted Mestyla wasn’t his daughter.
“…just cannot wait,” Ilya repeats while I tap my chest, trying to quiet my hacking. “How crazy these magical connections are.” He leans over to whisper, “In all my years, I’ve never seen him so intent on spooning out eyeballs and shoving them up his constituents’ asses.”
That rids me of my cough. “What imagery.”
“Poetic, isn’t it? Do you think I could find success as a bard?”
My smile returns.
“I’ll compose an ode for your nuptials.”
How easily he’s accepted me into his family. Izolda as well. Guilt froths in my belly anew.
Ilya nods to the palm I’ve parked over my stomach. “Butterflies?”
“More like wasps. Or tiny, iron-taloned Crows.”
He chuckles just as we round the glass podium upon which stand the musicians. “That’s going straight into my wedding ode.”
“A wedding ode?” Ksenia is suddenly standing right there, stroking the pointed shell of her bejeweled ear. “Who’s getting married?”
My gaze trails the slow roll of the ivory bangles on her arm, the ones I’ve no doubt she wore as a display of odium for shifters. I bet that if iron weren’t so noxious to her, she’d fashion a choker out of Crow talons.
“Our brother.”
Ksenia’s fingers freeze. “Konstantin?”
“Aodhan’s taken.”
“Aodhan isn’t our brother.” Her answer claws the delight right off Ilya’s face.
How deep does her hatred for my kind run? Deeper than her affection for Konstantin? Deep enough to conspire against his regime? To lead the antimorphs?
“I’m getting really tired of your bigotry, Ksen.” Ilya’s arm feels like pure bone beneath mine.
“To each their own, right?” she says in a tone that’s so mocking, I want to do terrible things to her with my talons. Terrible .
The blistering tension must reach Konstantin because he’s suddenly clipping through the crowd, shouldering past onlookers who hiss at him, before realizing who they’re heckling.
Everything all right, mo khráach?
I meet my father’s stare, then flick my gaze toward Ksenia.
Ah, yes… It has dawned on you that you’ll be in her company if you stay here?
This time, I roll my eyes.
I’m serious. Lucins may have passably accepted us, but the majority of Glacins haven’t even started trying.
Instead of deterring me, it only strengthens my desire to stay, if for no other reason than to bring about this vital change.
As Konstantin nears, Jaytair edges closer to my father, wearing the expression of a man mentally drafting a list of people in need of iron-culling. I have a feeling Ksenia made his list. Did I? Did Konstantin?
“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 my mate .”
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 but two children to shifters. Especially his perfect, precious son.”
“Mind your tongue, sister.” Konstantin’s tone isn’t cold; it’s glacial .
“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 body appear 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 examine his expression. 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 perhaps delayed ?
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.”
His throat contracts with annoyance. I suppose making him wait on my answer wasn’t great optics. A bead of perspiration collapses down my neck as he pinches the octagonal blue diamond and slides it onto my finger.
The band’s fit is impossibly perfect, as though Konstantin memorized the circumference of my finger during our handholding yesterday and commissioned a jeweler to resize the ring accordingly.
Unless I have the same size finger as Konstantina? Unlikely.
There is also a third probability, one that was emitted by Izolda mere hours ago…that the Cauldron is behind its fit.
Why am I expending any energy on this matter? Because it’s helping me process the condition of becoming its keeper?
After lifting my hand for all to see, Konstantin folds his fingers around mine. The room erupts with applause. Even the Crows clap. Granted, the meeting of their palms lacks enthusiasm, but at least they’re trying.
“And now, let the party truly begin. The dining room is open!” Izolda swings her arm toward a twinkling curtain that’s being drawn apart.
As guests begin filing into the next stone chamber, she twirls toward us.
“That was perfect!” she says, while I stare past her shoulder at her mate.
His eyebrows are slightly bent, and he doesn’t smile, not even when he notices me watching. Of course, he doesn’t buy the fact that Konstantin and I suddenly became true mates. After all, he was privy to the ring prophecy. How long will he be able to keep it a secret from Izolda, though?
“Only because of the backdrop you created, Iz.” Konstantin’s hand firms around my clammy fingers, probably to choke their tremble before anyone takes note of it.
“Yes, the décor is stunning,” I concur. “You outdid yourself.”
She beams.
Many guests attempt to congratulate their king, but they’re cordoned off by a loose fence of servers pointing them toward the supping area.
“What a surprise,” Milana says, bustling up to us, her sister in tow. “Here I thought I was attending a celebration for your reign, not a marital proposal.” The former queen’s features are so level that I cannot get a read on her thoughts.
“It’s truly wonderful.” Sofiya’s desolation is so palpable it wobbles each one of her words. “Wonderful,” she repeats, as though trying to convince herself that it is.
Empathy bubbles behind my breastbone. How relieved she’ll be once I part with the ring. As my fake fiancé thanks her, I glance up into his face, hunting it for a sign of possible interest. After all, not only is the redheaded Faerie stunning, but she’s also a highbred Glacin—perfect queen material.
A smiling Ilya kisses me on both cheeks, then turns toward his aunt. “You will find the one, Sofiya. Maybe even in this room. Maybe he’ll be a shifter.”
The alarm that widens her eyes might have been comical if it hadn’t been accompanied by a grimace. Glacins really don’t like us.
“Vizosh, a moment of your time, please?” Borat has returned.
Konstantin’s fingers ghost out of mine, leaving behind a streak of warmth that fades too rapidly.
“Can I see the ring? I’ve never had a chance to behold it in person.” Milana sidesteps Ilya, who’s itching to trail after his brother.
So am I.
Does it have to do with Ksenia? Will Konstantin confide in me later, or will he keep matters not pertaining to Mestyla from me?
“Isla?” Milana’s voice snaps my attention off the Glacin ruler.
I hold out my left hand, tossing tinsel into her wide blue eyes. Though her oval diamond is twice as large as mine, she seems covetous, as though she wished that it could’ve graced her finger…that she could’ve been the king’s true mother. Unless her covetousness has everything to do with her wishing it shone on Sofiya’s hand instead.
“Matsi, could you and Sofiya find your seats, so it motivates the stragglers to head inside?” Izolda gestures toward the cavernous sprawl blazing with white blooms and pale candlelight before threading her arm through mine.
Most follow Milana and Sofiya, but some tenaciously wait for their king. As I sweep past them on Izolda’s arm, they decree their well-wishes for such an auspicious union with rumpled brows and flat tones.
“They’ll come around to loving you,” Izolda murmurs as we traverse under the heavy curtain.
They won’t have to, since I won’t be around long enough for it to matter.
“Can I ask you something?”
My stomach drops, expecting her question to have to do with the mating link.
“Whose idea was the ring?”
“Your brother’s. He thought it would help his courtiers understand that I’m here to stay.” I twirl the end of my low ponytail around my fingers. “When you erupted into his rooms earlier, I was still trying to talk him out of doing it so precipitously.”
A soft, watery smile touches her lips. “Incredible. So incredible.”
As people swoop into chairs as translucent as the tables, I say, “I hope Ksenia will come around to accepting me.”
Her pale neck bobs with a swallow that shivers her fur collar. “Don’t worry about her.”
“You do realize that when someone tells you not to worry, it just heightens their worry?”
The corners of her mouth press deep. “Now that her beloved brother has a mate, she just might come around to accepting shifters.”
Except, isn’t her twin sister more beloved? “What about your mother?”
“She’s totally fine with shifters. I hear she even slept with a Serpent last night. It’s not something I cared to know, mind you.” Her nose rumples.
“Sofiya looked heartbroken.”
“Sofiya never stood a chance with Kostya. No one did. He convinced himself that marriage wasn’t for him and shunned all talk of it. From what I know—and I know far too much, given that my mate cannot guard his mind for his life—Kostya has embraced celibacy since the start of his reign.”
Since Ilya forewarned me, I’m more intrigued than anything else. “Was he afraid to love?”
“No.” She snorts. “He was afraid of being desired only for his crown. You must know a thing or two about that.”
“Not really.”
“What? How’s that possible? Not only are you the Princess of Luce, but you’re also supremely powerful. Not to mention unfairly gorgeous.”
“Believe it or not, I intimidate most men. And that’s without factoring in who I’m related to.”
“You truly are just perfect for Konstantin. Totally meant to be. Written in the Cauldron.”
The ponytail I’ve been wringing slips from my fingers.
“Ilya and I were secretly hoping for this to happen.”
“ This ?”
“For the Cauldron to matchmake him. You can’t doubt the person’s intentions when that person is your fated mate.”
My teeth press into my lower lip. Before Izolda can sense my distress, I ask, “Why does your Throne Room resemble a theater?”
“Because all audiences given here are public.”
I tilt my head, taking in the three stories of open balconies that rise on either side of the room before the cold gleam of the platinum throne on the dais recalls my attention. “Anyone can come? Even humans?”
“Of course. Unlike what Ksenia says, they have the same rights as Faeries, and now, shifters. I don’t know if you have public audiences in Luce, but here they’re endless and horribly tedious. My father used to force me and my siblings to sit through them. Ksenia and I took to smuggling in books, which we would read cover to cover, though more often than not, she would set hers down and observe the hearings. Her heart’s in a good place, but her mind is… She cannot seem to allow the existence of goodness in our world. All she sees is the bad. She wasn’t always like this.” Talk of her sister blunts her brightness. “I hope she’ll find her way back to us.”
I don’t reassure her that Ksenia probably will, because I loathe vapid promises and don’t know her twin well enough to understand how lost she’s gotten.
“This dress.” Izolda suddenly thumbs my neckline trim, clearly done speaking about her sister. “You should’ve seen the stares you garnered when you appeared. My brother looked about ready to murder some of his guests.”
Who knew Konstantin Korol would turn out to be such a brilliant thespian? “The dress is a work of art.”
“It certainly is. Fit for a queen.” She winks, but then her eye spasms and she murmurs, “Shit. I placed you between Lev and Antoni.”
“And that’s a problem, why?”
She slants me a look. “You really think Kostya will be pleased I seated you between two single men?”
“Right.” As we thread ourselves through guests still hunting down their seats, I ask, “Who did you sit next to him?”
“Zendaya on one side, and Naeva on the other.”
“Naeva?” Weird heat builds inside my chest, around my heart.
Izolda smirks. “No need to be jealous. He hasn’t once looked at her like he’s looked at you. As for Lev, I thought you two were friends, since you spent so much time at the carnival together yesterday,” she murmurs just as we reach his side. Izolda snatches my name card. “Levyusha, I promise to find you a lovely replacement.”
As she starts tugging me away, Lev touches my wrist. “I didn’t have time to congratulate you on such a momentous union.”
“Thank you. Konstantin and I appreciate your support.”
Feeling like I owe Lev an apology for standing him up, I slide my arm out of Izolda’s grasp. “I’ll catch up. Just tell me where to go.”
Her lips twist, but a glance over my shoulder has them leveling. “You’ll figure it out.”
Her answer and behavior are so odd that I frown but then refocus on Lev. “I’m sorry about last night. I didn’t mean to ghost you.”
“At least, now I understand why you did.” He runs a hand through the brown curls that just barely graze his shoulders. He’s one of the few Glacin High Fae who wears his hair short, and I admire him for it. “I thought that, maybe, I was being too pushy.”
“You weren’t. You were the perfect gentleman.” Konstantin’s revelation about Lev selling arms to the Crown’s known enemies makes me add, “Any woman would be lucky to become the object of your affection.”
If I establish a rapport with him, I could learn why he’s arming humans and who’s paying to do so. Unless he’s distributing weapons for free?
“Since I’m here to stay, perhaps I can make it up to you. We could have tea.”
His eyebrows writhe. “Konstantin would allow this?”
“I don’t know how things are done in Glace, but where I come from, women can choose their friends.”
“I’d prefer if you discussed it with him first. I wouldn’t want to end up in his bad graces.”
Oh, you already are. I’m hoping Lev has a good reason for doing what he’s doing—like ignorance. Ignorance isn’t a great trait, but it beats greed and insurgence.
An arm slips around my waist. My shoulders pinch when I glimpse the elegant, pale fingers crushing the blush chiffon.
Lev’s gaze settles on the male looming over me. “Congratulations, Vizosh.”
“Shall we find our seats?” Konstantin asks without acknowledging Lev’s blessing.
I surmise his question was rhetorical, since he’s piloting me away before I can give my assent.
He leans over and murmurs, “What part of, there will be no one else , wasn’t clear?”
“I wasn’t making a pass at him.”
“Funny. That wasn’t the impression I got.”
I slide my teeth together. “I suggested tea, not sex. If tea means sex in Glace, then you better tell me before I invite anyone else to sip a hot beverage.”
“How many more men are you planning on having tea with?”
I frown up at him, because why the underworld is he making this out to be something it isn’t?
I decide to drop the subject for now. “We should tell Izolda.”
“No.”
“Aodhan knows. I think.”
“He doesn’t know, but he might guess if he sees us susurrating into one another’s ear.”
I nibble on my lip. “You started it,” I childishly feel the need to point out.
Konstantin cocks up a brow, unamused. Actually, one corner of his mouth twitches, revealing that he might be a teensy bit amused.
My father appears out of thin air, bringing my escort and I to a stop. His golden gaze traces the fingers fastened to my hip. “I’m so sorry, khráach, but I must head back. Your grandparents will stay until the morning. Vance and Imogen, though, have expressed a desire to remain in Glace for the foreseeable future.”
I love how my father makes it sound like it was their choice. I doubt those two desire sticking around in the north. Imogen and Vance are two political beasts, whose passion is running Luce at Dádhi’s side.
“When will you be back?” I ask.
“Any time you need me.” His gaze cuts toward Konstantin. “I’m such a short flight away.” It’s no secret the reminder is aimed at my fake fiancé.
“Supper here next weekend?” I suggest.
“Yes.”
“With Mádhi?”
“If she feels better, then yes.”
My chest prickles as though the modiste had forgotten to line my gown and the stitching was digging into my skin. “Is there a possibility she won’t feel better?”
“No.” Dádhi’s pupils flicker. “Of course not.”
When he arrived without her earlier, I was disappointed, but now…now, I’m a bit alarmed. Is Mádhi staying away because she truly feels under the weather, or did she keep her distance because she’s disappointed by what I got myself into?
He must read my thoughts because he says, “ I made her stay in Luce. I preferred she rest after our harrowing flight home.”
He caresses my cheek like he used to do when I’d come home upset after uncovering a graffiti of a racist slur against Crows. For some reason, I had no trouble reading those.
“Can I get a hug before I depart, ínon?”
I throw my arms around his middle and press my cheek to his chest.
I know you’re staying because you think that’s what the Cauldron wants, but if at any point, you feel unsafe or unhappy, you come home, you hear me?
I nod, a lump forming inside my throat.
And if you need to talk to me, simply shift. I’m always listening.
He gives my cheek one last stroke, gives my body one last squeeze, gives the top of my head one last kiss, and then he fades, leaving me alone.
Well, not alone…with Konstantin Korol, my fated co-conspirator, whose gaze traces over the blue diamond he had to part with. How cruel that the Cauldron made him pluck it out of his drawer and stick it on some random woman’s finger.
“If it hurts too much to look at it, I could take it off. At least, until wint?—”
“No.” There’s no hesitation.
The same way there’s no hesitation when he scoops my hand and fits it into his.
The man is clearly determined to sell our bond, and for the most part, it seems to work. Even Aodhan stops watching us like a hawk…well, like a Crow.
I think we’ve successfully pulled the wool over everyone’s head, but I’m wrong.