Chapter 30 #3
Astrid immediately took command of the guard and coordinated the envoy’s placement. Guards broke rank as they were led off to designated sections of the camp. Pages appeared like shadows, guiding our soldiers toward a series of tents set aside from the main court, though still within guarded reach.
I fell in step beside Jack as he handed Draumskelmir to one of our pages. I wondered why Jack hadn’t asked Ravin to join us, but then I remembered it was likely because he’d given the rake a different assignment, something less public and visible.
The scent of rich incense and sweet pipe smoke filled the king’s massive pavilion. Thick furs carpeted the ground. Large braziers flanked the chamber, their flames casting an eerie sheen across silk-hung walls and a throne forged of dark wood and bone.
Seated atop it, King Maelthar of Verrindor, Realm of the Unseelie Court, stared upon us with silver-rimmed obsidian eyes that seemed to swallow the world.
He did not rise to greet the Frostbound Prince—a slight I knew would not go unnoticed.
It was clear this king held himself in higher regard.
His presence bled into every corner of the pavilion like mist rolling off a lake.
Antlered pauldrons crowned his shoulders, his long silver hair braided down the center of his back.
His face was all angles, with skin pale as ice crusted over stone.
A crown of solid silver, carved with ancient runes, sat atop his head. No jewels, no embellishments.
And beside him, Princess Isolde Kaldvalíen.
She didn’t move when we entered—not a twitch, not a blink.
Still as a statue carved by divine hands.
Her skin was the same glacial hue as her great-grandfather’s, but smoother, like fine porcelain.
Her hair, too, bore that unmistakable unseelie silver, long and luminous, like icy streams cascading down a mountainside, braided with slivers of onyx and Bloodvine blossoms.
Her beauty wasn’t just breathtaking; it was cruel and deadly in the way predators often are. Too perfect. Eyes black as obsidian, rimmed in that same piercing silver light. When they landed on me, they didn’t just assess; they dug, searching.
That was when I understood.
This was why the queen had insisted that I come.
To see this. To feel this.
To stand beside her son and behold the goddess he was meant to wed. The queen hadn’t just wanted me to see Isolde’s grace; she’d wanted to reveal my inadequacy by contrast. Like a cracked blade held beside a newly forged sword.
And gods, it worked.
For the first time in my life, I felt ugly in my armor.
I’d worn these leathers countless times. They had become my second skin, my badge of honor. But now, standing before these unseelie royal fae, I felt blunt. Dull.
And what made it worse was how clearly Jack belonged to them.
His hair—that same silver-white, though always messier, less pristine—was a clear sign of his unseelie lineage. The sharp cut of his cheekbones, the high-angled jaw, the tall, lean elegance of his frame. He was one of them. Even if he fought against it with every breath.
But where the king and princess gleamed like death and frost and hollow skies, Jack’s beauty was something else entirely.
Their silver-rimmed eyes were voids edged in moonlight. His were winter skies, clear, crystalline, like sun striking snow. That blue, that impossible blue, was all his father. Soothing, where their gazes sliced like jagged blades.
And yet...
There was no denying it now. He was the unseelie heir, through and through. And the goddess-like princess beside the king, his bride.
The realization struck like a hammer.
Because while I stood there in the royal guard captain’s armor, bearing the emblem he’d given me in a moment of naked truth and tenderness, she sat beside a king, wearing a gown made of silk and diamonds, a silver circlet upon her head.
When Isolde’s eyes finally met mine, something sizzled over my exposed skin, like magic sparking to life. She flared her nostrils slightly, as though scenting the air. The corners of her lips twitched, not quite in a smile, but something close to disgust.
“Your Majesty,” Lord Thandoril said. “I present Prince Jokulsson Drakmyr of Skadgard, Realm of the Frostbound Court.”
“I know who my nephew is, Lord Thandoril.”
“Your Majesty. Princess,” Jack said with a bow. It was deep enough to be respectful, but not so deep as to grovel. “As per your request, I come to uphold the terms of our alliance and provide you a royal escort to Isenheim, as decreed by my mother, Queen Virelya of Skadgard.”
Maelthar leaned back on his throne, the antlered pauldrons creaking softly as he eyed me with curiosity. “And who might she be?” His tone was dipped in cold amusement.
“Captain Sylvanna Isenwulf,” Jack replied without hesitation. “She commands my company.”
Isolde’s head tilted slightly, her gaze dragging from Jack to me, her impossibly black eyes locked like an owl stalking prey. “Captain?” she echoed, her voice silken, dripping with venom disguised as civility. “Or do you mean…whore?”