Chapter 3
Dreams are dangerous things. Not because they may never come true, but because they might.
And if they do, you’ll look around, knowing you finally have everything you’ve ever hoped for, and realise it has fixed precisely nothing.
I realise now that chasing dreams is the way to an empty life. All you ever really have is the moment you are in.
When we were stripped of magic, I daydreamed constantly.
I fantasised about the four of us returning home together.
The more scared and hungry I was, the harder I imagined us here with warm fingers, full bellies, and an endless parade of choices stretching before us.
What to eat, what to wear, and even how we lived our lives.
Now those choices are as useful as smoke in the air. What choice do I have now?
Even as the gifted, I can’t claim William as my brother. Not when the king ordered him dead. This time, Korvane would carry out the order himself. He would kill William without a second thought and likely punish anyone who ever knew of my brother’s ongoing existence.
Without Kyor to defend my mother’s lack of wrongdoing at the queen’s labour, my brother is safer not knowing who he is. Yet the thought of not speaking to William, not knowing him as I should … it crushes me.
And Kay. What should I tell her?
If I don’t tell her, I will be complicit in the same cover-up that I screamed at Jonas for. I would be guilty of the same sin.
Yet if I do tell her, could she hide her knowledge of his heritage from William? From Artur? I am not so sure of her ability to hide anything from anyone.
I’m not even sure who she is anymore.
I shielded her from as much as I could growing up, and now that stupidly trusting nature I nurtured has her carrying Hew’s child. And it’s not like she’s learned her lesson. Not if she genuinely believes this marriage to Artur is a good idea.
No, I can’t trust her judgement right now, and that means she cannot know. Not when it puts Florian – William, I correct myself – at risk.
It’s a whole fucking mess.
I am tired, wearier than I ever thought possible, and tonight I have the opportunity to have a bed of my own.
The bed I dreamed of for years, with its soft mattress and enough pillows that we could build forts with them.
I don’t know what kind of state it will be in now, but even covered in dust, it will be a thousand times better than what we had in the slums, and that thought is enough to pull me to my feet.
I creak up the stairs, not caring about the darkness.
When I come to my childhood bedroom door, still painted with red roses, a sliver of light shines out from under it.
Summer, I think. It may be my house and my room, but I knock once all the same before I enter.
‘M’lady,’ she greets me as she finishes tucking some bedsheets around the bed. ‘I’ve done my best for now. More will need to be done in the morning, but you can rest here tonight. I trust I’ve made up the right room? The flowers on the door …’
‘Yes, thank you.’ Apparently, I have a maid with initiative and insight. I am grateful to Etta for that at least.
‘There’s some soup for you, just on the table there. I’m sorry I didn’t have time for bread. I wanted to find the sheets and make up the bed here. I’ll ensure I’m more ready for breakfast.’ She wrings her hands apologetically. ‘Shall I help you with your dress?’
With Jonas’s interruption, I didn’t change out of the dress as I’d intended, and I am still in the bloody ballgown that Thea laced me into.
Thea. I don’t know whether I should hate her or hug her. After all, she tried to warn me. Tried to tell me that Kyor was incapable of love. But I didn’t listen.
I had to learn it from him instead.
I nod my head to Summer. ‘Yes, please. I don’t think I can get out of this dress alone.’ Not without ripping it off, at any rate. And I’m honestly tempted to do just that, but in my mind’s eye Llin is wagging a finger at me, so I don’t.
Summer moves behind me, her nimble fingers quickly loosening the dress so I can finally breathe. I gratefully step out of the voluminous ballgown and into the nightgown that she holds out for me.
It’s one of Mother’s, one I remember well, and there’s a lump in my throat as I pull it on.
Mother has been gone for far too long for her scent to linger, yet somehow I swear that it does as notes of lavender and hibiscus flood my senses and warm my soul. Real or recalled, it does not matter.
Tears swell in my throat, but I swallow them down. Instead, I take a breath and try to be grateful for what I have. The room is warm, lit by candle and firelight, and there is food waiting for me.
It isn’t hard to recall the hard wooden pallet that passed for my bed in the slums, nor the way in which my breath plumed in the air as Kay and I desperately snuggled together for warmth. I also remember all too well the hollow of my stomach as I tried to sleep while my body begged for sustenance.
For a moment, I can almost hear the shrieks of slum life rattling outside our thin, makeshift door.
I blink, and the moment is gone.
I am, unbelievably, back in the High Hold, back in our home, and I will not let what I have lost define me. Not now.
‘Thank you for tidying the room and for the soup,’ I say, offering Summer a smile. ‘It’s much appreciated. Make sure you eat plenty too. And I assume you’ve found a room for yourself?’
She nods easily. ‘Yes, m’lady. I found the servants’ quarters.’
‘The servants’ quarters?’ As much as Kay and I loved to wander the house, the rooms at the top of the building were out of bounds to us.
Everybody deserved their privacy, according to my parents, including those who worked for us, and it was a rule they enforced.
As such, I have no idea about the condition, size, or comfort of the servants’ quarters.
‘There are plenty of guest rooms on the third floor. Please take one of those, if you prefer,’ I tell her.
Summer smiles gently. ‘Thank you, but the room I have chosen is more than adequate. More than I am used to.’
‘You’re sure?’
‘I am.’ She nods.
I don’t want to press the matter now, but I make a mental note to check in with her in the morning to ensure she slept okay. ‘In that case, you should eat and rest.’
A frown creases her brow. ‘Should I not wait up for Lady Acacia?’ she asks.
I sigh. Kay was spitting nails at me hours ago. If she were going to return home, I suspect she would have done so by now. No doubt she has instead returned to her fiancé’s house.
The thought makes me shudder.
‘I don’t think that will be necessary,’ I reply.
‘I’ll fix her room up all the same,’ Summer says decisively. ‘That way it will be ready when she returns.’
Somehow, I have managed to land myself the hardest-working maid in all of Wrohelm. As she moves towards the door, I find myself filled with gratitude not to be rattling around in this massive house alone, even if I have to pay for the privilege.
‘Thank you, Summer.’
She turns back and curtseys. ‘M’lady.’
‘You don’t need to do that,’ I say. ‘You don’t need to curtsey to me. Don’t need to call me “m’lady”. A few moons ago I lived in the slums. I was no one. Nothing.’
She looks at me fiercely. ‘No one is ever nothing.’ She curtseys again and leaves, shutting the door behind her.
Well, that’s me told.
I crawl under the covers. The soft, oversized mattress is little comfort in comparison to the loneliness that permeates every part of my being, but it is soft and warm.
Finally alone, I let myself feel.
As tears clog my eyes, my fingers stretch out onto the cold, empty side of the bed. In the safety of the darkness, I allow myself to imagine Kyor there beside me, the soft skin of his lips brushing against me as he whispers in my ear.
It’s so real that I can almost smell his vanilla scent sweeping through the room.
But it’s not real. Won’t ever be real again.
I close my eyes and surrender to tears as I remember how wonderful it was when I believed he loved me. When I believed that the gifting would solve all my problems and that the future would be easy.
When I wake, it is with a cramp across my stomach and dryness in my throat.
As I lie there, memories of the day before surface, but not the good ones.
Not my powers being restored to me. Not stepping across the threshold of my home after years spent living in the slums. No, the memories that arise are the ones that cause my chest to tighten, as if crushing my heart might ease the pain. If only it were that simple.
I know it’s weak, allowing myself to be claimed as a victim of my grief, and yet I feel it happening.
Feel the anger surging through me. I shift my position, only for my eyes to fall on the mantlepiece, onto a small carving of a dire wolf.
I don’t know who it belonged to, whether it was mine or Kay’s or William’s, but it doesn’t matter.
All I can think of now is my siblings. My pregnant, betrothed sister who will never live the life I fought for with blood, sweat, and friends’ lives to get for her, and my brother who can never know his true family.
A primal howl rips from my lungs, consumed with such magic that it tears through the wall in front of me. Literally. The crack is sharp but resonant as the brick splits and shifts.
Fuck!
‘No … no!’ I jump up, trying to stop the motion, but it’s too late.
The crack fills with ice and extends downwards towards the window.
My breath hitches, seizing inside me as I pray to the Gods it doesn’t bring the entire wall down, but it continues, though it is slowing and decreasing in force until, thankfully, it stops a few inches from the glass.
I drop down onto the bed, trembling. ‘What the fuck did I just do?’ From nearly killing Jonas to now this? My unwanted ice magic is far from gone, and these wild flare-ups are a whole different level of dangerous.