Chapter 28 #2
She meets my eyes, unflinching. “True. I saved your mate, which makes us even.”
I nod once, and respond in my head. “Thank you.”
Runa almost smiles, which is about as much excitement as she’s ever shown about anything. She and I are similar in that way—probably too similar, now that I think about it.
I know I should let the subject drop now. Walk away. Keep moving. But something burns in my chest, demanding acknowledgment. “I killed Viktor,” I say flatly, the words hanging in the frigid air between us.
Runa scoffs. “Is that your way of reminding me to call you alpha?”
“Fuck no,” I say, appalled. “I thought you were with him, so how are we even?”
Again, Runa scowls. “I don’t share tents with wolves I like anymore.” Her eyes narrow. “I thought you of all people would understand that.”
I nod tightly. Right, of course. She’s doing exactly what I tried to do—choosing a partner she was attracted to, but didn’t think she could ever have feelings for.
I glance sideways at Aurelia. Clearly, that plan hasn’t worked out for me as it did for Runa, and I’m honestly not sure which of us is worse off.
Iwalk at the front of our group for several hours, my shoulders hunched against the biting wind. The cold grows sharper the farther north we travel, until each breath feels like swallowing glass.
I catch myself glancing back at Aurelia every few minutes, watching how she tucks her chin against the wind. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I recognize this obsessive checking is less about her safety and more about my own unraveling.
The cold claws at my skin, dragging me back to Dyaspora with each gust of wind. I remember lying awake on those stone floors, wondering if this would be the night the cold finally took me, even though logically I knew that Fae can’t freeze to death.
Now I keep reminding myself that Aurelia can’t freeze either, but my eyes still track her hunched shoulders, her reddening cheeks. Logic doesn’t stop the visions that flash behind my eyes: her lips turning blue, her body growing still. I can’t stop seeing it.
“Fuck,” Jett swears loudly, over the sound of the wind.
I glance back and my eyes widen. Fuck, is right.
The Fae might not be able to freeze to death, but humans can, and Connell is in serious danger of doing so.
He seems on the verge of passing out, his skin red in some places, and so pale it’s almost translucent in others.
Jett is gripping both the pirates arms, as if to keep him from slumping over in the snow.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” I demand, striding back to stand beside Jett.
“He didn’t say anything,” Jett growls back, almost defensively. “I didn’t realize humans were so fragile.”
I give him an incredulous look. How could he not realize that?
Then again, maybe Jett doesn’t know many humans. He’s younger than me by several decades, and spent most of his life in Dyaspora. It’s possible the only humans he’s ever met are Alix and Connell, who until recently literally could not die.
“It’s too cold for him. He’ll die,” I say flatly.
Jett looks more alarmed than I would have expected. I thought he didn’t like the pirate.
Aurelia's eyes dart nervously between Kai and the other wolves before she rushes to Connell's side. "I can keep him warm.”
Kai's face tightens, and I can see him wrestling with his instinctive aversion to magic. "Go ahead," he finally tells Aurelia.
“I was going to anyway,” she says, already waving her arms in the air as if weaving some kind of invisible web.
He turns to me, voice dropping. "She'll have to stop when we reach the capital. It's outlawed, remember? We're not the only enforcers of that law."
I shift my weight, anxiety riding me as I watch Aurelia work.
My gut twists with a strange mix of emotions—I don't particularly care if the human lives or dies, but Jett's face is tight with concern. His fingers keep twitching toward Connell's arm. I wonder if there’s more to it. Maybe Daemon ordered him to keep the human alive at all costs, and he’s afraid of failing because he forgot humans can’t survive in temperatures this far below freezing.
“Alpha!” Kai’s voice calls inside my head.
I turn away from Jett, Connell and Aurelia to glare at Kai. “Don’t fucking call me that.”
He cocks his head. “Is that an order?”
“Fuck off. You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
He tries to look serious, but he’s clearly hiding a smile. He shrugs. “Yeah, a bit. That’s not what I needed to tell you, though. We're moving too slowly. We should be there by now.”
“What do you want me to do? They can’t shift and run.”
“I know, but we’re still moving slower than I thought we would. We’ve never been late to report to the queen before, I don’t know what will happen if we miss it.”
“When are you supposed to get there?”
“Dawn.” He glances nervously at the horizon. The sky is still dark and dancing with color, but it does look a tiny bit lighter near the tops of the mountains in the distance.
“Send Runa ahead,” I order.
Kai nods, looking relieved to have a plan. Clearly listening, Runa immediately begins stripping off her armor, handing it to Ilona before shifting into her wolf.
“What’s going on?” Jett asks, sounding distracted. I reiterate the conversation as quickly as possible, and Jett nods, getting to his feet. "I'll go with her. James needs to get inside, or Aurelia is going to exhaust herself trying to keep him warm.”
I blink, confused for a moment, before I remember that Connell is the pirate's surname. “Fine, but the problem is you can’t run as fast as we can, you won’t be able to keep up with Runa.”
In answer, Jett's back ripples as massive black wings unfold from his shoulder blades. Without a word, he hauls the half-conscious pirate against his chest and kicks off from the ground, powerful wings beating the air as they rise skyward.
I watch them shrink against the sky, my brow furrowed with questions.
Aurelia staggers to her feet and immediately my attention shifts back to her. “Are you alright?” I ask, striding over in case she needs to lean on my arm. “You didn’t overextend yourself?”
“I’m fine,” she waves me off. "Did you notice Jett's wings, though? He's using them freely now, not just when threatened."
I open my mouth, then close it. She's right, and now that I think about it, I’ve seen him do that before. I shake my head. “I don’t know what that’s about.”
“Neither do I,” she muses, staring curiously toward the speck on the horizon that is Jett. “But now I'm wondering if Daemon knew all along. Maybe that's why he made Jett his spymaster."
“Mmm. Maybe.”
Dawn breaks just as the capital's silhouette appears on the horizon.
I haven't seen the capital city of Thermia since I was a very young child, but it’s different from what I remember. Was it always this small and desolate? I don’t think it was, and I grow more certain of that as we walk through the center of the seemingly abandoned town.
There are crumbling buildings everywhere, their stone facades worn to rubble.
It appears that there were once more houses, perhaps longer streets, and even a town square.
Now, there's only one main street left. Up ahead, looking alarmingly out of place among the dilapidated buildings, looms an enormous white stone castle.
I certainly remember the castle, but in my mind it wasn’t quite so overwhelming. It looks as if it were carved from ice, with sharp towers jutting up like massive icicles. It’s completely surrounded by thick mist, which doesn’t seem as if it should be possible in the freezing, windy climate.
“Do you think Jett and Runa are already inside?” Aurelia asks, also glancing up at the castle. “For Connell’s sake I hope so, but it doesn’t look very friendly…”
I stop walking in the middle of the road and Aurelia almost walks into me. I barely notice, turning around to face her. “Let’s leave.”
She furrows her brow. “What?”
“Let’s go. I don’t like this.”
She bites her lip. “But we came all this way. Jett and the others are probably already in there.”
“Jett can take care of himself, and I don’t really care what happens to anyone but you.”
I’m semi-aware of Kai and the others around us. They probably don’t appreciate hearing that I don’t care about them at this moment, or that I have no problem walking away without even trying to help free them, but I don’t care about that either.
The only thing I want is for Aurelia to be safe, and I’m sure that if we go into that castle, that’s the last thing she’ll be.
“You’re the one whose gut feelings are always right,” I hiss, desperately.
“Not always,” she argues. “I’m not a seer.”
“Still, you can’t tell me you think it’s a good idea to go in there. I’m sure it’s not.”
Aurelia looks conflicted, and for a second I think I might have convinced her to at least pause and think about this. Only then, her gaze catches on something over my shoulder and she frowns. “It looks like someone's waiting for us. They must already know we’re here.”
I whip my head around to look. Where a second ago there was no one, now a man is waiting at the end of the snowy road, just at the edge of the wall of mist obscuring the pathway up to the castle.
At least, I think it’s a man. It’s hard to tell at this distance, when the figure is wrapped head-to-toe in a long cloak, with a scarf and hood obscuring most of their face.
"Who is that?" I ask Kai in my head.
Aurelia answers as if she heard me. “No idea.”
I look over at her sharply, but she isn’t looking at me. My brow furrows. Maybe she was just thinking the same thing I was.
“No one has ever been waiting when we arrived before.” Kai says aloud for Aurelia to hear. “Maybe Runa already spoke to them.”
“How do you usually make your reports?” I ask.
“To someone like that.” Kai nods to the hooded man. “I just mean, we’re usually here first. They’ve never been waiting for us before.”
“Well, that’s promising.” Aurelia dances between her feet, looking at me, then at the hooded servant. “They’re already expecting us. We probably shouldn’t leave them waiting.”
I grind my teeth. I fucking hate this. I’ve hated it from the beginning, and now that we’re here, I wish I’d thrown Aurelia over my shoulder and dragged her back to Vernallis weeks ago.
I remember her pointing out that carrying her was probably the only way I could have stopped her. I should have done it.
“What are you thinking?” Aurelia asks, scanning my face.
“Why do I feel like I’m always trying to stop you from wandering into dangerous places?”
She flashes a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes, her answer carrying back to me on the wind as she turns on her heel and strides toward the palace, her red cloak billowing around her. “I don’t know. Maybe ask yourself why you keep following me.”
I don’t need to ask myself anything; we both already know why.
I shake my head, sighing, and trudge after her. “Fucking witches.”