Chapter 20 - The Bitter Truth #2
My cheeks grew hot. What did he mean it would be easier? Because he didn’t want to care? Or because he cared too much and couldn’t touch me?
The muscles in his neck tightened, his brow furrowing, as he pulled his sleeve up to look at the laceration. From here, it looked like it had stopped bleeding at least.
“Are you warm enough?”
The question came out of nowhere as his eyes met mine again.
That he was concerned about me while he inspected his own injury jabbed into me like a razor-sharp blade.
How had I thought this man was cold and cruel?
He was broken and lost, perhaps, but he was far kinder than anyone gave him credit for.
“I’m...” I hated to lie to him, but I didn’t want him fretting over me. “I’ll be fine.”
He stood abruptly, and I shied away, the part of me conditioned to cruel elven masters still not used to this new prince.
I half expected him to remove my head with his sword or some other frozen weapon he had yet to summon with his icy magic.
Instead, he plopped down on the platform beside mine, his knees a few paces from my own.
I tried not to think about how the uncomfortable pull of the thread eased with his closeness.
“I should have been less hasty to leave the palace. I...should have let you change—”
“I’ll be fine,” I repeated, not knowing what else to say. My mind was a mush of truths I’d never thought could actually be true.
I tried not to look up at him, but I felt his eyes burning into me again.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice so gentle.
I gave in and looked up, my eyes going wide. Did he...apologize? To me? He must have noticed my shock, because he smirked before the curve of his lips straightened back out.
“Perhaps the rumors about me being a cruel, heartless prince who thinks only of himself are true.” He looked past me to the wisplight on the far wall that had slowly dimmed to a pale blue, making the entire shelter seem far more frigid.
“Though I assure you, in this case, I worried my father would get creative, and I couldn’t... ”
He blinked a few times, as if to clear away the fog of confusion, before he squeezed his eyes shut. Then he pulled his mask up over his face as if the conversation, the kindness—the world in which he existed as only a man and not a terrifying frost elf prince—could be hidden away so easily.
“We need to rest,” he said as he rolled so that he could lie back on the platform next to mine. He tucked his hands beneath his head, his eyes slipping closed.
I watched him for a moment. How was I going to sleep with all these questions? How was I going to rest when all I wanted was more information about him? The frozen prince, seemingly cold and ruthless, but truly just broken and hurting and lonely.
The ache to help him was so powerful. The need to reach across the few feet between our platforms and rest my hand on his chest, my fingers smoothing over the planes of his stomach. To feel his lips pressed to mine...
What in the actual Nine Hells was I thinking?
This was a prince. Not just any prince, an elven prince.
The man whose father single-handedly ordered the decimation of a third of the human population for trying and failing to invade their lands.
The man who had killed humans for spreading rumors.
The man who had killed countless people and would likely kill countless more.
But he was just a man.
I lay back on my platform, gazing over at him and letting my mind wander over all the atrocities he’d committed, forcing the fear and loathing I’d felt for him when I’d been brought to the Ice Fortress back into my heart.
But it was impossible, because the longer I spent with him—the more I learned—the more he was becoming a man instead of a monster.
––––––––
When I woke, it was still dark. Prince Callan was gone, the shelter completely empty. I sat up in a panic, glancing around to find him, but I was completely alone.
Had he left me behind? Had he been taken?
My heart was racing as I stood facing the seam in the ice that could only be opened by him. What was I going to do? I might be stuck in this ice if I couldn’t figure out how to open it. I took several deep breaths, squeezing my eyes closed as I tried to think.
He materialized through a widening crack, his gaze landing on me, lips gently parted. As if he remembered he wasn’t here alone, he pulled his mask over his face, glancing around the shelter as he took two more steps closer.
“I need to get us back to the Ice Fortress.” He didn’t move, as though these words should be enough to cue some sense of urgency in me, but I was still breathing hard, thinking I’d been left behind.
I shouldn’t have worried. He needed my magic—he’d said as much to his father. And now that I knew why he needed it, I should have known he wouldn’t leave me. He needed me alive and well.
“How’s your arm?” I finally asked, breaking the strange silence between us.
He looked down at his sleeve, still crusted with dried blood. “As good as it can be.”
“That’s not an answer.”
I could see the shape of his smile beneath his mask and wished he’d waited to pull it back up.
“Did you rest at all?” he finally asked.
“I did, but I’m no warmer.”
He nodded, his eyes falling to the frozen ground at our feet.
It wasn’t like there was anything in this place that could help warm me up.
I had his cloak, the pathetic excuse for a dress, satin slippers, and nothing more.
He relied entirely on his armor to keep him warm, though I assumed he didn’t need it.
He seemed perfectly immune to the temperature.
“The sooner I get you to the Ice Fortress, the sooner you can take a hot bath to warm up.”
I blinked hard a few times at this. A hot bath? Was that even possible in a castle made of ice? Again, he smiled, and again I wished he hadn’t pulled his mask up.
“A hot bath sounds...” I let my thoughts trail off.
“We should be back by dawn.” As he said the last word, his armor froze around him like an iridescent exoskeleton.
“...what with the armor to protect his flesh and the icy demeanor to protect his heart.”
He stepped closer to me, and I tensed as he lifted me from the ground and carried me out into the cold.