Chapter 13
Thirteen
Kaelan
I’d slept the rest of the night untroubled, knocking on Thorne’s door on our way back down the hall because I knew what Hanna wanted.
He had stumbled out of his room, bare chested and with eyes lidded with sleep, and wrapped his arms around her, and she had smiled over her shoulder at me on the way to our shared bedroom.
And the night had been good.
But the next morning dawned with new danger. The Ice Kingdom coastline emerged from the fog sharply, like a troublesome thought that jolts one out of dreaming.
Black cliffs. White beaches crusted with ice. Jagged peaks of mountain. The dragon in me stirred at the sight, territorial, furious, and longing. This land was mine. But was my mind? Had Edric been prowling around its edges?
The conversation on deck had died. Thorne stood at the railing beside me, his dark eyes scanning the coastline.
“Well,” Dare leaned against the railing. “This looks like a particularly welcoming spot.”
“It would be a lie if it felt welcoming,” I said. “We’re coming home to a war.”
“Fits well with the massive cliffs of doom and the general aura of ’abandon hope.’“
Hanna leaned against my shoulder as if she could feel my need, her arm sliding around my waist. I put my arm around her, feeling the sense of peace that came with her presence.
Morick shouted orders, adjusting our course to avoid the naval patrols I knew would be circling these waters. Edric’s ships moved in predictable patterns—except for when he didn’t. My father had never been stupid enough to be entirely consistent.
“Are you guys going to track Azora and Jaia now or wait until we see the safe house?” Hanna asked.
The question I’d been dreading.
I had a tracking spell I’d placed years ago, when we’d all been at the front together and I’d needed to know the people closest to me were safe. It would let me find them anywhere in the kingdom.
All I had to do was reach for it.
Let my magic flow.
And maybe let my father closer into my mind. If the nightmares were what I feared…
We needed to wait until the last possible moment—if we did it at all. My voice came out harsher than I intended. “We’ll check the safe house first.”
I wanted to reach for the land’s magic. Wanted to feel the ice respond to me, to prove I was still its prince, still powerful, still in control.
But that was pride, and I was no longer the arrogant prince I’d once been. I’d humble myself for the sake of my kingdom.
My hands curled into fists on the railing.
That didn’t mean humble came easily.
“Kaelan.” Hanna’s hand covered mine, warm against my cool skin. “Breathe.”
I tried to ease the tension in my shoulders. It turned out forcing relaxation was not all that helpful.
But Thorne’s steady presence at my shoulder helped. Dare’s voice cutting in with a comment about the captain’s dubious navigational skills helped more.
There was a terrible sound that seemed to echo through the ship, a scraping that seemed to go on forever, and we all winced.
“We’re trusting a pirate with our lives,” Dare noted.
“I thought you saw a kindred spirit,” Thorne said. “He seems to like you.”
“That’s exactly why I don’t trust him.”
“He’s Morick.” Hanna frowned at me. “His best friend was Bryden’s namesake.”
How did I argue with that? I didn’t understand any of it.
The ship lurched as we changed course. Morik’s voice rang out above, shouting orders that sounded more like threats.
The coastline seemed to fly steadily closer.
Thorne pulled a small bag from his pack with gifts from Branok and Lynx, illusions that would blur our faces. Not invisibility, but misdirection. Enough to keep us from being recognized.
Hanna hesitated before putting it on.
The charm activated with a whisper of magic. Hanna’s features blurred slightly, her aura dimming to something forgettable. She looked like herself, but also like no one in particular. Perfect for moving unnoticed.
I put mine on last, felt the magic settle over me like a shroud.
The ship shuddered as we entered the reef channel. Rock scraped against the hull. The captain was threading us through gaps barely wider than the ship itself.
I could’ve flown us all back home. Instead I gripped the rail and tried to endure trusting someone else’s competence, and one of Honor’s folk at that.
We ground to a halt against the ice with a jolt that sent everyone grabbing for support.
But there was no challenge from the shore. There was no one on the shore at all, a lonely stretch of white beyond the treacherous ice.
My father knew we were here. I was certain of it.
But maybe I was being irrational, maybe that was my childhood fear finding form.
We disembarked into a small boat to row to the shore in freezing wind and darkness. The inlet was exactly as I remembered: rocky, inhospitable, and far from any settlement. Perfect for sneaking into the kingdom.
My kingdom. Which I entered like a thief. After leaving here in haste because Hanna had screamed into my mind.
As my bond with her grew stronger, was my bond with my father growing stronger too—the pathways of connection one even though they were to two opposites?
The thought came with a surge of possessive fury that I immediately suppressed.
As the sailor in the boat rowed back toward the ship, I pulled my cloak tighter and led us inland, away from the shore, toward the forest that would give us cover.
We crossed into the tree line, then through it, and the kingdom opened before us. Distant lights marked an ice city, cruel and beautiful. Smaller settlements dotted the landscape, civilians moving through their lives unaware that their exiled prince had just returned.
The weight of my kingdom settled on my shoulders like ropes of golden chains.
Then I felt it.
Just the faintest pull on my mind, like someone turning their head because they felt eyes on them.
I said nothing. Kept walking. Kept my expression neutral and my magic locked down tight.
But inside, I felt the certainty settle like ice in my veins.
Edric was waiting.
And he had some new, final misery prepared, in the series of miseries he had visited upon me since I was a boy. His cruelties would end only with his life.
Or with mine.
Thorne
The safe house looked like it had been abandoned for years, and my heart dropped as I studied the small, bare front room.
Then I heard Jaia’s voice from the back room.
“If you’re one of Edric’s bootlickers, you’re about to have a very bad day.”
Relief hit harder than I expected.
“It’s us,” I said.
Jaia appeared in the doorway, a blade in each hand. She looked thinner. More tired. Alert in the way people got when they’d been hunted too long.
Her eyes swept over me, Kaelan, Dare, Hanna. “You’re alive.”
“So are you.”
She crossed the room and pulled me into a brief, fierce embrace. “Where the hell have you been?”
“It’s a long story.”
Azora emerged behind her. “Which you owe us.”
“Do you know what it was like to lose the crown prince?” Jaia demanded, backing her up. “We have all those lords who were allying with you acting as if we stuffed you down a well or something.”
A blur of orange and white streaked across the room. Finnias launched himself at Kaelan’s shoulder, claws digging in through the cloak. The cat settled there like he’d never left, amber eyes blinking once before he started purring.
Kaelan’s hand came up automatically to steady him. “Hello, you ridiculous creature.”
Finnias bit his finger. Not hard. Just enough to make a point.
“I missed you too,” Kaelan said dryly.
We moved into the back room. Jaia brought out what food they had, admitting theyd been reluctant to go get more until they had to with so many soldiers out on the streets.
The safe house felt barely safe.
But they were alive.
“We need to talk strategy,” Kaelan said. “What’s the situation?”
Jaia leaned back in her chair. “Complicated. Edric’s consolidated power, but not completely. Three more northern lords sent word they’d rally under your banner if you returned.”
“If,” Kaelan echoed.
“They needed proof you were alive first.” She met his eyes. “And proof you weren’t corrupted like some rumors claim.”
“Corrupted?” Kaelan demanded.
“Nonsense stories about why you’ve disappeared,” Jaia dismissed them.
“The allies will be with you once they see you.” Azora paused. “But Edric has been busy. Claiming you’ve lost your mind, you can’t be trusted.”
Kaelan’s expression didn’t change, but his perfect posture drew even more straight. “He’s trying to get in my head. He might be trying to make sure those claims come true.”
He sounded so much more certain about it than he had just the night before, and Hanna and I exchanged a worried look. What had changed?
“I thought you were telling us everything,” Hanna said hotly.
“I am.” Kaelan looked at each of us. “But I’ve been troubled. The mental link we share. I’ve always been able to keep him out when he wasn’t physically near me. But what if that was a lie? What if he’s been able to reach me all along and I just didn’t know?”
“If that’s true, then you are compromised,” Azora said. Not cruel. Just factual.
“Yes.”
“But you still have to lead,” Jaia said. “No one else can lead the lords and the peasants against Edric.”
“Yes.”
Silence fell again, heavier this time.
“We need Alys,” I said. “As our first priority.”
Jaia and Azora shared a troubled glance, and it sent a prickle of defensiveness through me.
“She’s not just a powerful alchemist. She and Ekardo toyed with mental magic.
As much as we studied the subject, if anyone else can help protect Kaelan’s mind, it’s her.
” I was fine with admitting my sister was far smarter than I was.
She’d taken far fewer blows to the head.
“And while she’s at it, she can work on understanding the Shadow Weaver. ”
Hanna shifted beside me.
I dared a glance at her, expecting an argument. But she said, “That would be wise.”
Why did she agree to this now when she’d been against it before?