Page 32 of Bound to the Shadow Queen (Frostbound Court #2)

Draven

Frost shimmered along the invisible wards, tracing each of my steps like breath fogging glass.

I took my time circling the boundaries of the protective walls while my wolves hunted just beyond them.

This was the second time I had walked the perimeter, searching for holes or fractures, for any sign of a breach that might explain the warning bells that pulled at my mana at all hours of the day and night.

Just like last time, the wards held steady under my scrutiny. There was no visible weakness to account for the intensity of the alerts.

And yet?—

Shadows shifted just beyond the wards. Long, gleaming teeth flashed with the snapping of jaws while hungry eyes blinked against the darkness.

It had been this way since we returned. And Eryx insisted the disturbances had plagued the walls ever since the wards fell the first time.

A snarl ripped through the night as a Tharnok launched itself forward, claws raking against the invisible barrier with a sound like steel on glass.

My wards held, but a pricking sensation whispered along the side of my neck, like an insect waiting to be batted away. Nothing like the deep, bone-rattling alerts that had woken me before.

The monster shrieked as Eryx drove a spear of hardened ice through its skull. His spear shattered into a spray of frost as the body collapsed against the wards and slid into the snow.

The line flared once, then steadied.

“Persistent bastards,” Eryx muttered, summoning another length of glacial steel into his palm, its edges still steaming with cold.

I gave a single nod and stepped just beyond the wards to test from the other side. Everly’s dagger pulsed warm against my palm, thrumming with that strange, willful mana as I scraped it along the boundary.

The wards held strong. Not a single echo of the prickle that had needled my skin. I pressed harder, dragging the edge in a long, deliberate line down to where the corpse lay propped against the invisible wall.

Violet light emanated from the blackened steel, growing brighter the harder I pressed, like it wanted to break through.

Could a more powerful weapon do the trick? Something larger?

I thought back to my time in the Unseelie Wilds, the matching dagger the warrior had used to help me escape.

How many of these were there?

I stepped back behind the safety of the wards, turning the dagger over in my hand. It felt like her, like Everly. Jagged, and ethereal, and chaotic.

But not malevolent.

“Strong enough?” Eryx asked, his breath misting in the cold.

He scanned the treeline in the distance before meeting my gaze.

“For now,” I said bitterly.

He dipped his chin in a silent acknowledgment.

“Do you think it’s them?” he asked, emphasizing the final word in a way that set my teeth on edge.

Them.

The Unseelie.

My breath fogged the night air as I stared down at the weapon in my hand.

He didn’t know, not yet, that the queen he protected carried Unseelie blood in her veins.

“Keep the patrols doubled,” I said, instead of answering him. “And send out a patrol at first light to take care of whatever is left in the forest, tell them to burn it down if they have to.”

The hum of the dagger’s wild mana lingered against my palm, vibrating faintly, and refusing to be ignored. Like her.

Eryx inclined his head, though his gaze lingered on me with unspoken questions—ones he was wise enough not to voice.

We parted ways in the courtyard, his boots ringing against the frost-hardened stone. I blew a long whistle, calling my wolves back from their hunt. They bounded in through the gates, their maws dripping with the blood of frostbeasts.

The scent of it clung to the air, acrid and raw, following us through the palace halls.

The wards had held for all the night’s violence. It should have been a relief, but unease coiled tighter in my chest.

Something was still out there testing our defenses. Waiting for the perfect moment to strike.

My mana flared in response, ice rushing through my veins, begging for a release. Time. I needed time. But it was clearer than ever that time was something I was running out of.

The thought followed me all the way to my rooms, quietly pressing in on all sides until?—

Laughter. Bright, high, cackling laughter spilled down the corridor like a wave breaking free from the tide.

I froze.

The sound was so wildly out of place for this night, and this part of the palace, that it took me a moment to register the other sounds that followed.

The voices that drifted from my wife’s suites. The distinctly male voice… My wolves’ ears flicked forward, and something twisted low in my gut.

When I pushed open her chamber door, the sound hit me full force.

Everly was sprawled across her chaise lounge, cheeks flushed, navy hair tumbling in disarray.

Her gown was wrinkled as though she’d tried to wrestle it into submission and lost. A goblet dangled from her fingers, still half full.

Noerwyn was collapsed beside her, laughing so hard she nearly slid to the floor.

Soren leaned against the mantle, his normally sharp composure undone, eyes glinting with amusement as he raised a nearly empty bottle of Emberkiss whiskey in salute.

And Nevara, the Visionary herself, was perched cross-legged on the rug, her staff discarded in the corner, shoulders shaking with unrestrained laughter.

The table between them was littered with empty bottles, crumbs of sugared cakes, and cards scattered like fallen leaves.

All four turned when I entered.

Everly blinked up at me, slow and unbothered, a smile tugging at her mouth that was far too reckless, far too unguarded for every circumstance we found ourselves in. Her skathryn was fastened around her wrist like a clunky bracelet, fast asleep.

I glared down at Lumen who had the decency to look mildly ashamed. Then I glanced back at my oldest friend, who did not possess that same decency.

Soren parted his lips to speak, but Noerwyn cut him off.

“Wait, let me this time.” She cleared her throat. “The Frostgrave King stands in the doorway. His hair is windswept and his face is angry.”

Nevara’s lips pulled up into a rare expression of mirth, and I blinked. “Well, thank the Shard Mother you were here to protect her.”

“I had Lumen for that.” My wife clumsily got to her feet while the wolf in question stood straighter. “He is a noble palace guard puppy.”

I had seen that guard puppy rip monsters three times his size to shreds in the span of a single heartbeat, but now he nuzzled against her leg like he approved of her ridiculous title.

My Visionary only gave a graceful half shrug.

“I Saw the evening going…thusly.” Nevara pronounced each word slowly and with precision, accompanying the statement with a sage nod.

I tried to remember the last time I had seen her over-imbibe. Nearly a decade ago, when we were both grieving but still too naive to understand the consequences of the day at the Pass. When the monsters were still just passing nightmares and it almost felt like we had won.

Everly stepped closer to me, tilting her head while she dragged her gaze along my features. Scrutinizing me. “You’re always so angry.”

I opened my mouth, then closed it, having no response that wouldn’t feed into her assessment. She took another step toward me.

“Did you know that I can feel your rage…in my body?”

Wynnie snorted, abruptly reminding me that there were other people in the room besides my inebriated wife.

Everly shot her a sideways glance, then returned her attention to me. “In my bones, I mean. From your mana.”

“Does mana have feelings?” Soren asked, tugging Nevara to her feet.

If I could move past the presence of another male in my wife’s bedroom, I might concede that he had a point, one I had considered more than once of late. Especially since my wife’s mana was firmly locked away, but her feelings were decidedly less so.

“Draven’s does,” Everly insisted. “Angry ones.”

She looked up at me with wide, earnest eyes.

In spite of everything, in spite of the frostbeasts and the Unseelie and Lord Redthorne’s smug face far too close to my wife…

for the first time in as long as I could remember, I felt the unexpected urge to laugh.

She leaned closer to me, and I stepped away.

Dangerous . All of this was.

“I trust you can see yourselves out,” I said to Lord Redthorne and my still-smirking Visionary, spinning on my heel to head back to my own rooms. And away from all of this.

But of course, my wife followed me into her bedroom.

“Draven.”

I paused, turning reluctantly to face her.

She stumbled forward, and my hand shot out on instinct to steady her.

Her skin was warm to the point of being hot, her arm slimmer than it should have been.

Her blue eyes were wide when they met mine, brimming with things I couldn’t afford to decipher right now.

Just like I had felt her panic thrumming through the palace, and later her desire echoing in my soul, I felt her now, radiating something that was strangely close to grief.

“I’ll return your dagger in the morning when I can be sure you won’t stab yourself with it.”

A faint smile tugged at her mouth. “That wasn’t what I was going to ask. Did you find anything? Do you think it was my family?”

Her family. Had she ever referred to them that way?

“The Shadow Clan, I mean,” she added quickly.

“I know who you meant.” The words were more clipped than I meant them to be, both because of the reminder of what she was and the reminder of what we weren’t.

Not for the first time, I wondered how things would have gone if the Shard Mother had chosen a different bride for me. Any other bride. Would things be easy now?

Or was I always destined to be chained to someone who would rather be anywhere else?

Everly blinked, tugging her plump lower lip between her teeth, and I had a visceral memory of those same teeth clamped around my lower lip. Grazing along my shoulder. Her nails on my skin.

Talons .

Shards, I needed sleep.

I forced myself to focus on her question, parsing through what I had seen this evening and comparing it to the flickering of the wards. Did I think it was the Unseelie?

“No.” I dropped my hand from her arm, stepping abruptly back. “I believe it was something far worse.”

Then I turned to go, trying to pretend I didn’t feel her disappointment thrumming through the air.

That it wasn’t echoing in my own soul as well.