Chapter 14
Fourteen
Thorne
My friends were their most violent, capable selves in defense of my sisters. I loved them for that. It did not take long for them to find where Alys and Coril were held and how we might get to them. The commander of their prison, Vareth, was going to a ball tonight.
And so were Hanna and I.
The weight of my sisters’ lives pressed against my ribs with every breath.
Hanna’s hand found mine in the shadows outside the castle gates.
I didn’t look at her. If I met her eyes, she’d see everything I was trying to keep contained: the guilt, the rage, the bone-deep terror that we were already too late.
“Thorne.” She tugged me to face her, and when she wanted my attention, I couldn’t resist her. She wore a gown of deep purple, with her hair swept up to expose the line of her throat. She looked like someone who belonged here, in this world of silk and lies.
But her eyes were always the same. Blue and steady and seeing straight through me. “We’re going to get them out.”
I wanted to believe her. Needed to. So I nodded and squeezed her hand once before letting go. “Ready?”
“With you at my side? Always.”
We moved forward.
The ballroom blazed with enough candlelight to banish every shadow. Crystal chandeliers threw fractured light across marble floors, across the swirl of dancers, across faces I recognized with a jolt that felt like taking a blade between the ribs.
Men I’d fought beside. Men I’d trusted with my life on the front lines, when I’d believed in duty and honor and all the lies that kept soldiers marching.
They wore dress uniforms now instead of battle gear, but I knew their faces. The way Garrett favored his left side after an arrow had nearly killed him in the eastern campaign. The scar along Simeon’s jaw from a skirmish we’d barely survived.
They’d been recalled. Pulled from the front to fight against Kaelan. Against us.
The betrayal cut deeper than I’d expected, even though I knew—knew—it wasn’t their choice. Edric commanded. They obeyed. The same way I had once. .
“Thorne.” Hanna’s voice pulled me back. She’d moved closer, her hand settling on my arm with deliberate pressure.
I wasn’t staring. I’d been trained better than that. But my jaw had tightened, my shoulders had gone rigid, and anyone who knew me would recognize the tells.
Hanna stepped into my space before I could correct my expression.
Her hand slid up to my neck, fingers threading into my hair, and then she was kissing me.
Her mouth demanded attention, and the world narrowed to her mouth on mine, her body pressed close, the faint catch of her breath. There was no more room for my rage and betrayal and fear
When she pulled back, her lips were flushed and her eyes were bright with something that looked almost like mischief.
“Better,” she whispered against my mouth. “Now you look like a man here for pleasure, not war.”
My heart was hammering, but the tension in my chest had loosened. The guilt hadn’t disappeared, but it had shifted, made room for something else. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet.” She smiled, wicked and warm. “We still have to find Vareth.”
We moved through the crowd like lovers who couldn’t keep their hands off each other.
It wasn’t entirely an act.
Every time someone’s gaze lingered too long, Hanna would lean into me, her laughter bright and breathless as I whispered something meaningless against her temple.
Every time we passed too close to someone who might have served under my command, she’d turn and kiss me again—slow, deliberate, the kind of distraction that made men look away out of courtesy or envy.
And every time, the pretense felt less like strategy and more like truth. The storm of emotions I’d felt had bled away now that I was acting.
We reached the edge of the ballroom, and Hanna paused, her fingers tracing the line of my jaw.
“Vareth’s not here yet,” she said softly. “We should blend in.”
“Blend in,” I repeated.
She arched an eyebrow. “Dance with me.”
I knew how to dance. But when I led Hanna onto the floor, it felt as if I’d forgotten all the steps.
The music swelled, strings and wind instruments weaving together in something almost mournful. Hanna’s hand settled against my shoulder, mine found the curve of her waist, and we moved. She followed my lead without hesitation, but there was nothing passive in the way she moved.
“You’re tense again,” she murmured into my throat.
“I’m always tense.”
“Not always.” Her lips curved.
I pulled her closer, just slightly. Close enough that I could feel the warmth of her through silk and lace.
“You’re trying to distract me,” I said.
“Is it working?”
“Yes.”
We turned, and the crowd shifted around us, but I barely noticed. My attention had narrowed to her—the way she fit against me, the way her breath quickened when my lips brushed her cheek. We had each other—we could always have each other—and yet it never felt as if it were familiar.
“You kissed me for the first time because you thought I was Kaelan,” I said.
Her eyes widened slightly. Then she smiled, slow and devastating. “And I’ve kissed you every time since then because you’re not.”
The music rose. We moved through the steps without thinking, and for the first time since we’d arrived back in the Ice Kingdom, I felt something other than dread.
Hanna spotted him first.
“There,” she breathed against my ear. “North corner. Near the terrace doors.”
I followed her gaze and found Vareth. Middle-aged, soft, puffed with pride; the kind of man who’d built a career on cruelty disguised as competence.
He was speaking with someone I didn’t recognize, their conversation brief and tense before Vareth turned and slipped through a door half-hidden behind a tapestry.
“Stay close,” I said.
Hanna’s hand tightened on mine. “Always.”
We left the ballroom floor and moved through the crowd with purpose, trading kisses and smiles as if we were just stumbling through the ball, drunk on each other as much as the wine. No one stopped us. No one looked twice at a couple stealing away to a more private location.
The hallway beyond the tapestry was narrow and dimly lit, lined with portraits. Vareth’s footsteps echoed ahead of us, steady and unhurried.
He turned into a library, the door clicking shut behind him.
Hanna and I stopped just short of it, tucked into an alcove barely wide enough for both of us.
“How long do we wait?” she whispered.
“Until whoever he’s meeting leaves.”
“And if someone comes this way?”
I looked down at her. “Then we give them a reason to keep walking.”
Her eyes sparked with understanding. With heat.
She kissed me first this time. Slow. Deliberate. Her hands slid up my chest, fingers curling into the fabric of my jacket as she pressed me back against the wall. I let her, my own hands finding her waist, her hips, pulling her closer until there was no space left between us.
The desire I felt for her always seemed consuming.
It had been building since the first time I’d glimpsed her through Kaelan’s eyes, had grown even worse when I met her--fierce and unafraid and utterly undeterred by my walls, which she stole behind like the clever thief she was—and that I feared sometimes my need for her would never stop growing.
Her mouth moved against mine, the two of us desperate for each other no matter where we were. She made small, desperate sounds when I bit gently at her lower lip that might’ve been acted for an audience, just in case, but they drove me mad anyway.
Footsteps.
Hanna’s hands were in my hair, and I was lifting her slightly, pinning her against the wall as we deepened the kiss, every line of our bodies pressed together in a tableau of infatuation that would make anyone uncomfortable enough to look away.
The footsteps passed without slowing.
When they faded, Hanna pulled back just enough to speak, her breathing unsteady.
“That was—”
“Convincing,” I finished.
“Very.”
The library door opened. The man who stepped out glanced our way, his expression tightening with mild disgust, then hurried past without a word.
We waited until his footsteps faded completely. Then Hanna and I sauntered inside, her hand still in mine.
Vareth was alone in the library, standing near a window with his back to the door.
When Hanna shut it softly behind us, he stiffened at the sound.
“You have terrible timing,” he said without turning.
“We have questions,” I replied.
He turned slowly, his expression shifting from irritation to recognition to something close to fear when he saw my face.
“Lord Thorne.” His voice was carefully neutral. “I thought you were dead.”
“Disappointing, I’m sure.”
Vareth’s attention snapped to Hanna. “Edric’s looking for you. He’ll be delighted—”
Anger rushed through my chest. He wasn’t going to threaten her.
Three steps, and I had him by the collar, slamming him back against the bookshelf hard enough to rattle the spines. His breath left him in a rush, and when he tried to speak, I tightened my grip.
“My sisters,” I said quietly. “Coril and Alys. You’re going to help us get them out.”
“I can’t.”
Hanna’s hand landed on the desk beside us, her fingers drumming once against the wood.
“You can,” she said pleasantly. “Or we can make sure Edric knows exactly how helpful you’ve been to his enemies. Dare kept very detailed records.”
Vareth’s face went pale.
“You wouldn’t.”
“Try me,” Hanna said, and there was nothing pleasant in her smile now.
I released him, stepping back just enough to let him breathe.
“We’re not asking,” I said. “We’re telling you. You help us, or you hang. Your choice.”
Vareth straightened his collar, his hands shaking slightly. When he spoke again, his voice was steadier.
“If I help you, Edric will kill me.”
“If you don’t help us, we’ll kill you first,” Hanna replied cheerfully.
He looked between us, weighing his odds. Then, resignedly, he asked,“What do you need?”
“Access to the prison.”
“Impossible. The security—”
“You’re the commander. Make it possible.”
He exhaled slowly, his shoulders sagging.
“You disappear afterward,” I told him. “I can’t help you until Kaelan takes the throne. You’re a traitor to Edric either way.”
Vareth believed me. I could see it in the way his jaw tightened, the way his gaze dropped.
“I’ll get them out,” he said finally.
“When?” Hanna asked.
“That’s the problem.” Vareth drew a thin ledger from inside his tunic and looked through the pages, frowning. “They’re scheduled to be moved. Tomorrow night. Transferred to the capital for interrogation. King Edric wants to interrogate them personally.”
My stomach dropped. Interrogating a ten-year-old.
Edric was expecting us. Setting a trap. And Vareth might pretend to help us, all while setting a trap of his own to curry Edric’s favor.
“Can you delay it?” Hanna pressed.
“Not without drawing attention. If I push back on a direct order from the capital—”
“Then we move now,” I said. Vareth would have less time to double cross us anyway, which I imagined he would try.
“The safest option would be to disrupt the transfer,” Vareth said. “I’ll arrange a distraction that will allow me to order the guards away.”
“Where?”
“East gate. Midnight tomorrow. We always move prisoners at night.”
“Thank you,” Hanna said.
Vareth turned to look at her, his expression unreadable.
“Don’t thank me. If this fails, I’ll be the first one they hang. And I’ll do everything I can to ensure I have company.”
We stood. Vareth stayed by the window, his silhouette dark against the firelight.
“One more thing,” he said as we reached the door. “The woman’s been asking for writing materials. I denied the request, of course.”
“And?” I asked, my mind too busy with my plans to map my sister’s machinations.
“Because yesterday she stopped asking.” Vareth met my eyes. “She’s planning something. I don’t know what. But if you’re going to get her out, you should know she’s not waiting passively.”
The information settled like ice in my chest.
Alys was brilliant. Resourceful. And if she was planning something while imprisoned, she might only ruin our plans.
But there was nothing I could do. I had no way to reach her.
I nodded once. “We’ll be ready.”
We left the castle the same way we’d entered, wrapped in each other like lovers who couldn’t bear to part.
It wasn’t until we were clear of the gates, until the noise and light had faded behind us, that Hanna looked up at me, her expression serious now. “We’re walking into a trap.”
“I won’t ask you all to—”
“Shut up, Thorne. Obviously, we’re doing it anyway. Is it truly a trap if we know they’re setting it?” She smiled, fierce and utterly unafraid. “Coril will hug you and Alys will slap you before the next dawn.”
I caught her hand, pulling her close one more time. Just because I needed to feel her against me. Kaelan called her sunshine, he called her summer, but most of all, she was hope.
“You’re right,” I said against her hair. “Everything will be okay.”
And for the first time all night, I almost believed it.