Page 20 of Bound to the Shadow Queen (Frostbound Court #2)

Everly

My suites were exactly the same.

Still sparkling with the rays of frosted sun that filtered in the windows, still utterly devoid of color. Only, there was no tray of food left conspicuously by the bed, no fire roaring in the hearth.

Did Mirelda know that I had returned? Did she know what I was? Did she hate me for it?

I shook the thought away, slowly picking my way through the space that had been mine for just a few short months. The gilded cage I hadn’t known how to escape, before wondering if I even wanted to.

But now… Now I knew my mother was alive. Now, I’d had a small taste of something close to freedom and had flown after a decade of hiding my wings…

I pushed open the door to my study, my gaze flicking from the empty hearth, to the frosted windows. I wasn’t even sure why I tried to open them when I knew they’d be sealed just like the others.

Batty gave a sad chirp, her claws scraping my wrist as she tried to slide free of my sleeve.

I pulled her from my wrist, holding her up to study her.

“At least you can use your wings whenever you want,” I said, running a finger over her tiny fuzzy head.

I set her on one of the higher bookshelves in case she wanted to do just that while I moved to my desk. It was still mostly covered in books and spare parchment, but organized in a way that told me Mirelda had been here at least once since I left.

My fingers trailed the length of the phoenix feather in the quill. Was there a way to get word to my mother that I was alive. Not safe, necessarily. But alive.

And what would happen then? Would she come for me? Risk her life to take me back?

Did I want that? To leave this prison for one that was slightly larger? If this Dragon could break my bond with Draven, it would be one less shackle. One less chain, weighing me down.

No. Something sharp and visceral lashed out at the thought. I clenched my fist, ignoring the pull of the bond flaring through my ring.

I might never get my mana back, might never be able to help Winter like Draven so desperately wanted me to. But could I do some good for the Wilds at least? Kaelen’s vision for the future could be more than a fantasy.

Warm golden eyes and an easy smile flashed through my mind before they morphed into a colder, more sadistic version. Would I even be able to look at Kaelen again without seeing his twin?

I swallowed the thought, grabbing one of the books from my desk and walking wordlessly into the lavatory.

The bathroom was unchanged, the tub nothing like the natural baths in the Wilds.

These were still inaccessible without mana.

I had woken up cleansed of all the blood and grime that had fixed themselves to my skin in that cave.

I didn’t need a bath, not really, but I was aching to wash off the phantom memory of my torture.

I met my eyes in the mirror, the face that looked far too rested for my weary soul.

It was like taking seven steps backward, back into the person who first arrived at the Winter Palace. Once again, I had no mana and no way to help the kingdom, no answers, and a husband who hated me.

Maybe I hated him too. Maybe we were always headed here.

Still, I saw the shadow of him sinking to his knees, felt the ghost of his fingers scrubbing the trauma from my skin, and the echo of grief returned, even though it didn’t make sense to mourn something you had never had.

He had never been mine, and I had sure as hells never been his.

I pushed away from the sink, grabbing my book and tucking myself into the chair by the barren fireplace in my rooms. I stacked up blankets as high as they would go, nestling Batty against my wrist and trying to soak up the comfort in her familiar presence.

But I couldn’t manage to chase away the cold.

My husband came before Amias could return.

This time, I was expecting him. The power emanating off him grew steadily closer until the door between our rooms swept open on an icy gust of wind. Glaring, I pulled my blankets around me tighter in my chair.

He froze when he caught sight of me. Was he, too, struck by an intense feeling of deja vu? How many times had he crashed in here in the days after our ill-fated wedding while I was in this very chair, freezing my ass off in the palace that reflected his tempestuous moods?

Just like then, I refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing me shiver. Of course, back then, I had still had something to hide.

“Unless you’re here to unlock my shards-damned windows, feel free to leave.”

Draven stood like an icy statue in the threshold, his green eyes carefully assessing me.

“No,” he said flatly. “I haven’t come to aid in the escape of my own captive, though it’s a comforting look at your sanity to know how desperate you are to return to the people who have tortured you twice over now.”

I let out a slow, deliberate breath in order to calm my temper.

It didn’t work.

“How very like you to judge an entire race by the actions of a few sociopaths, when you tortured my friend, forced me into marriage, and put me in a cage ,” I said through a bitter laugh.

“I’ll admit that none of my options are particularly promising, what with being a Hollow-ish half-breed bastard, but it’s bold of you to assume that this one is preferable. ”

A muscle feathered in his jaw. The corner of his full lips quirking slightly as he took a step forward.

“Yes, you were so enamored with them that they had to take you away in chains. Tell me, if the Wilds are so preferable to the palace, why were you hiding from them to begin with?”

I froze.

“No?” he pressed. “Then perhaps you’d like to tell me what this is.”

He pulled a familiar necklace from his pocket. An amethyst pendant hanging from a brown leather necklace. I didn’t need him to turn it over to know there was a Drakmor rune engraved on the other side. One that I had traced the pattern of for as long as I could remember.

Veyr. To rise.

The blood drained from my face. I had never asked him how he got me out of Unseelie territory. How he got past the wards of my village. How many people had to die in the process…

“Where did you get that?” I asked carefully.

My mother’s necklace. Surely he didn’t… Couldn’t…

“Why were you hiding from them?” His message was clear. He wouldn’t answer my questions unless I answered his.

My breath stalled in my lungs, and I found it almost impossible to keep my nails from turning into talons. Batty nestled against my wrist where she was concealed under the blankets, and I used the motion to ground myself.

“I was hiding from my uncle,” I bit out. “He’s the one who gave me to the mages. I thought that my mother was dead.” My voice threatened to break, and I stopped, squeezing my eyes shut to stop the tears that were threatening to stab at the back of my eyes, furious and panicked.

“Your mother isn’t dead.”

I opened my eyes, staring first at Draven’s carefully carved features, then at my unmoving ring. There was no vibration. He was telling the truth.

My attention snapped back up to him. “Then how did you get that?”

Instead of responding, he fired back with more questions of his own.

“Why was he looking for you? Why go to so much trouble to track down a child they believed to be Hollow?”

I gritted my teeth at his games. “I don’t think he ever believed that. That’s why he was so relentless with the mages. That, and he was desperate.”

“Why?” he pushed.

“Because he can’t sire children of his own. And my mother almost died during childbirth; she cannot carry another child to term.”

Draven’s expression turned incredulous.

“He cared enough about his familial line continuing, to torture you?”

“Yes.”

His teal eyes narrowed. “Why?”

But he asked the question like he already knew the answer. I wasn’t sure why I was holding onto it anyway, this final piece of myself that he would hate me for.

“Because he is the Thane,” I spat out the words. “And I am the heir to the Shadow Clan.”

A low, bitter laugh echoed through the room.

Draven reached a pale hand up to run through his silver-blond hair. He shook his head slowly, before his aurora gaze landed back on me.

“Of course you are.”

I clenched the fist of my free hand, bracing myself against the oppressive crash of his power, the sweeping gust of frost that cycloned through the room. I didn’t pretend to not know why he was so upset.

I had seen his nightmares, had read the history books, and his reaction now only confirmed it.

The Shadow Clan had killed the King and Queen of Winter at the Frostgrave Battle. But I wouldn’t take the blame for a war I hadn’t fought in, so I kept my chin high.

“Where did you get the amulet?” I demanded, my navy hair whipping back against the chair.

“She gave it to me,” he said irritably.

Why would she do that?

I must have spoken the words aloud because he shook his head. “I don’t know. Nor do I know why she brought down the wards or allowed me to take you without a fight.”

Had she known it was a fight she couldn’t win? Not been willing to risk both the Shadow and Stormbreak clans at the other end of the Frostgrave King’s wrath, or risk that her daughter would be caught in the crossfire?

Or was there more danger in the Wilds than I understood?

“So you aren’t aware of what’s inside this necklace?” His low, dangerous tone pulled me from my spiraling questions.

“What?”

A muscle worked in his jaw. He crossed the room in four long strides. He held out the amulet, running his thumb over its edge, along a tiny, invisible hinge.

Violet light burst free from the necklace, nearly blinding with its intensity. I reared back before forcing myself to look again. Beyond the light, there was something darker. Much darker.

Now that my eyes adjusted, I could see another crystal… No. This was different. A prismatic shard with jagged edges rested in the center. Smoke curled out around it, reaching, stretching toward me, like fingers beckoning me closer.

My breath stalled in my chest. Power poured from the shard, not mana in any form that I knew it. But raw, undiluted, chaotic power that pulsed with an ancient energy. Not quite malevolent, but entirely absent of the Shard Mother’s warmth.

And it called to me.

I stretched out my hand, transfixed by the way it seemed to be…waiting for me. Pulling me in. Demanding my presence, even.

The room around me flickered in and out of existence, the light fading just as surely as the sound of Draven’s voice. But I didn’t care. I needed?—

Then the locket snapped shut, and I blinked several times. The room around me came back into focus, along with Draven’s furious features.

More than angry, something urgent and…alarmed coursed through his mana.

“What in the shards-forsaken hells was that?”

“I…don’t know.”

He returned the necklace to his pocket. And now that I was no longer under its spell, I couldn’t help but think that was for the best.