Page 48 of A Frozen Pyre (Villains #2)

Zita clasped Ophir’s arm in return. She allowed centuries of emotion to come to the surface.

Pride and pain and desperate hope tore through her as she understood what it was she saw in Ophir’s gaze.

The glinting starbursts of yellows and golds that encircled her large, beautiful eyes were no crowns at all.

They were the monarchy that she’d been sent by the goddess to shatter.

“It is,” Zita said. “But it doesn’t have to be yours.”

“And so you want to come to my wedding and watch me raise an army of hellhounds?” The flicker of sarcasm was half-jest, half-sincere.

“Perhaps,” Zita said, returning the mild amusement. “Or perhaps I have a far better idea. Pray tell, my dear, have tales of my second power reached the gentle ears of Aubade?”

***

Zita cupped her hands, forcing warm breath between them as she reentered the castle.

The princess had stayed behind with only the churning river and snow-dipped mountains to keep her company.

A servant bowed his head politely as he opened the door for her.

She turned away from the path to her royal suite and hugged the innermost castle wall.

She followed the corridor as it wound up, up, up to a distant tower.

She raised a brow at the pile of empty birdcages that had been abandoned throughout the hall, scattered like the skeletal remains of slain enemies on a battlefield.

There were no attendants to see her in as she pulled open the first set of doors and saw a harp as tall as she was, but no harpist to be found.

Zita pushed open the door to the room just as Suley whipped around to see her enter.

“Zita,” Suley said, fighting to keep her voice level. “I heard you from the hall.”

“Oh?” Zita asked. She took one step inside and stopped. She scanned the room carefully, but there was only Suley. “It must be so much easier to hear now that you’ve done away with your birds. Will the musician return?”

“You know how much easier it is for me to sleep with music,” Suley said.

“Mmm.” Zita nodded. She took a single step to the side, keeping the door within arm’s reach.

The chambers appeared picked over, emptier somehow.

No one in her party had brought much from the palace as they’d traveled north through the door, but there was no evidence of Suley’s gowns, her scarves, or the furs she’d been allotted in the armoire that sat ajar.

The room was curiously absent from the chains and baubles Suley loved so well.

“Please, sit down.”

“I can’t stay long.”

Suley’s brows pinched. “Is there something you wanted to speak about?”

“Indeed, there was, though I suppose it’s moot, now.”

Suley’s forehead creased against the question. “What do you mean?”

Zita sighed. “I rarely see you without your jewels, Suley. Where are those pretty bangles?”

Suley’s fingers flew to her nose, then dropped. She looked to the vanity, where several bejeweled trinkets rested. “I’ve just taken them out to wash,” she said slowly.

Zita strummed her fingers atop her crossed arms as she leveled her stare. She allowed the winter day to seep through her as cold filled the room. “Did you harm her?”

“Who?”

Zita didn’t bat an eye. “Answer me. Did you hurt her?”

“Zita, I—”

Bitterness joined the arctic bite in her words as she said, “You’re a shapeshifting cockroach, Tempus. I knew it wouldn’t be long before you returned. I see the wisdom in stealing the form of the very person I’d fetched to hear you. Now tell me, did you hurt the girl?”

“You’ve gone mad, Zita. I don’t know what you—”

“She lost her noise, Tempus.”

Confusion flashed to concern. Worry and stress and anguish flickered across Suley’s face as she fought for words, struggling to string together a thought.

She stammered an excuse, a plea, an argument.

Then, at Zita’s frozen, emotionless stare, Suley’s shoulders slumped.

Her face calmed. Her facade evaporated, no thespianism in the world enough to defend hers.

She blew out a long, slow breath before getting to her feet.

She folded her arms over her chest, mirroring Zita’s hostile posture.

She smacked her lips in disappointment. “No noise, you say?”

“None.”

Suley held her stare for several moments longer. It was contempt tinged with disappointment that colored her word as at last she cursed. “Damn.”

“And one does not remove piercings to wash. I see your attempt. Perhaps it was wisest to take her place, you worm, but it was futile. Now answer my goddess-damned question. Have you harmed Suley?”

“Not physically.”

Zita’s eyebrows shot up.

Tempus, in Suley’s lovely shape, raised his hands. “I gave her permission to do something she desired. She wanted to live in the Raasay Forest. Now she shall.”

“She wanted to live there so it might be silent, you fool.” Zita’s eyes flared.

“You did this while wearing my face, didn’t you.

” The firm, angry weight of her sentence held no question.

She knew the answer. She wrinkled her nose in disgust at the filth in the room.

“We’ve spoken every day from the moment she returned from that goddess-awful cliffside village.

I’ve known for some time that she was without her noise, and our friendship has gone unchanged.

I struggle to believe that Suley could be so easily convinced of my dismissal. ”

A long, evaluating pause stretched between them before Tempus said, “Perhaps she always used her noise to verify thoughts. She was certain of your friendship because she knew your mind, Zita. Without it, she had only your words, and whatever insecurity accompanied them.”

“How long has she been gone?” Zita bit out the question.

“Not long. A few hours at the most.”

The queen turned to leave.

“Wait!”

She twisted the knob and took a step into the antechamber.

“Zita—”

It was an idea that stopped her mid-stride, not her name on Tempus’s lips. She slowly lowered her heel to the ground and turned to regard the man wearing Suley’s face.

“Tempus,” she said. His throat bobbed as he swallowed, desperate for forgiveness, for acceptance, for any reason she might allow him to stay.

She scanned him slowly, from the curls of Suley’s dark hair to the ink on her temple.

She took a step closer to scan Suley’s skin and found what she was looking for.

Tiny, perfect holes for jewels had shifted to him as he’d taken her form.

The only thing he lacked was her earthly possessions.

“Remarkable,” she breathed. He’d taken the shapes of so many animals.

He’d even attempted a tree once, though he had just ended up as a rather odd long-necked bird.

Not only had she never wanted him to take the shape of a person, but she’d outright forbidden it on the day he’d suggested he could let her see her late husband again through him.

“I may have a task for you,” she said.

“Anything,” he said, Suley’s wide, dark eyes eager as he scanned Zita’s face. “I’ll do anything to redeem myself in your eyes.”

“Pack what remains of Suley’s things. You and I have a wedding to attend.”