Page 57 of Grim and Oro (Lightlark)

WATCHING AND WAITING

First, the Wildling lets me win the duel. Then, she uses me as a target for Azul’s demonstration.

I suspect she’s working with Grim ... but that’s not all. I know it in my bones. She’s hiding something. I’m sure of it. And I’m going to find out what.

I could have asked Zed to trail her, or contact his network of spies, but this feels personal. I saved her, after all. Will I again regret helping a fellow ruler?

I keep an eye on her balcony, from mine. I watch the fire in her hearth flicker; I see her silhouette through the curtains. Then—I watch it disappear.

It’s the middle of the night. She’s leaving.

I follow her from high above, flying, circling, but all she does is visit the agora. She’s watching too—for what, I’m not sure.

She visits the agora five times, and I’m overhead, studying her every move. Familiarizing myself even more with her every habit. Then I watch her sneak into Juniper’s bar.

Of course. The keeper of secrets. Why is she visiting him? What is she after? Which secrets will she exchange for information? I should sleep. I should be doing anything else—but I stay until she leaves, then follow her home.

Only after that do I visit Juniper.

“King,” he says merrily, not disturbed in the slightest by the fact that I nearly kicked his door down just now. “What will it be? Rum? Wine?”

“Neither,” I say, leaning against the bar. “I know the Wildling was here.”

His smile widens, and his eyes flicker in curiosity. “Yes, yes. A gemstone herself, is she not? A sharp one. I’m guessing you want to know what she asked me?”

I nod.

“You know the price.”

I narrow my eyes. “I’m your king.”

He lifts a shoulder. “Then I’m just a simple barkeep.”

I nearly throttle him; I don’t have time for his games. Then I think of what I said to Enya. I’m dying. Might as well give up all my secrets . I wage a brief internal battle before ripping my sleeve over my bicep to reveal my mark. “I’m dying. Happy?”

Juniper doesn’t look as concerned as he should. Instead, he looks pleased. “That secret surely bests hers,” he says. “The Wildling wanted to know about Moon Isle. About how to get on it, undetected.”

Moon Isle? I’d suspected she wanted to know about me , about the castle, about any way to betray me. Why would she want to go to Cleo’s land?

“Thank you,” I say.

Before I can leave, he stops me. “Because you’re king ... I’ll tell you this. The Wildling is a target. There are threats against her from multiple realms. They want to see her dead.”

Dead . I don’t know why that word, said in relation to her, makes me grip the edge of the bar. “Did you tell her that?” I ask. The barkeep shakes his head. “Then why tell me?”

He lifts a shoulder. “Your traded secret was better than hers.”

The Starling’s demonstration is in the Hall of Glass. It’s been centuries since I’ve walked these corridors, and for good reason.

My family is here. They are painted on the walls.

I try to walk by quickly, but my brother’s portrait snares me, and I freeze in front of it. Cold washes down my spine.

He was right here . Those eyes were alive, they were ready for a long life. They were bold and fierce.

More so, after he had fallen in love.

Love . We were always warned against it, though it was never forbidden. My parents taught us love was dangerous for rulers, but it was also rare.

My parents weren’t in love. I suspect my father loved my mother, but he wanted to control her even more.

And she seemed to simply tolerate him, for our sakes and the sake of duty.

The only time I ever saw a true connection between them was on the battlefield.

It was where they had met—in training. My mother bested him in a duel, and he, on his knees, begged her to go again. And again. And again.

He always said he never won a duel, but he won her.

As if she was a prize. Something to be possessed.

Then he locked her away in his castle. She wasn’t allowed to fight in many battles over the years.

Her light seemed to dim with every decade.

When she died, she was fiery bright. Fighting alongside her husband, the king, only because he knew our forces needed her to have any chance of winning.

“You fool,” I tell my brother’s portrait, while simultaneously reaching out to touch his heart. “I miss you. I wish you were here. You would know what to do.”

The hall fills quickly. Advisers, nobles, and other Sunlings from court surround me, murmuring. Predicting. They give me compliment after compliment about my gilding, and all it does is remind me of the pride in my father’s eyes, when I killed the attendant.

Though the shame and guilt has never left me, it’s been years since I thought of it. The curses have been a distraction from my own pain. My own emotions.

Now, I feel them all being dredged up, like a powerful current scraping the forgotten bottom of a sea and bringing everything to shore.

It’s dangerous

My feelings don’t matter. They shouldn’t.

As the Wildling walks into the room, my fists clench, thinking she is the one who started all this turmoil within me.

The Starling, Celeste, walks to the center of the hall. “My demonstration is a trial of fear. Whoever conquers their greatest fear first is the winner.”

Then, she unveils a towering mirror. Its glass seems to tremble. I’ve never seen a relic like it.

“Who would like to begin?”

A test of fear .

I take a step forward. My feelings are distractions ... and so are my fears.

I want it to tell me what I’m most afraid of, so I can kill it.

I press my palm against the mirror, and the glass ripples beneath my skin, like water. Then, it stills ...

And I fall through it.

I’m in a snowstorm. White blocks my vision. I make to create a fire, but I can’t. My powers are gone. I’m back to my Moonling training with Calder, unable to form a single ember.

Find your fire .

I try, but it’s no use. It’s not there, and it’s getting colder.

I keep walking until I can’t anymore. I take one step—and I can’t move.

My leg locks into place, the snow falling faster, burying me, reaching my ankle and then my calf, as if I could drown in it.

I move my arm to propel me forward, and then it too locks in place.

I watch, stuck, as the blue on my skin spreads, piercing my bones, becoming ice . Freezing me solid. I turn blue, until I become a statue. I can’t move. I can’t breathe. I can’t bellow. All I can do is watch as the world around me freezes—then shatters.

As the island fragments into a million pieces. As the sky falls, and the ocean rises, and everything in between is swallowed up.

And I can’t do anything to stop it.

Weak. Useless .

Just like my father foretold.

White wholly blocks my vision. My mother’s voice is in my head. Oro , it says. My golden boy. My sun. Find yourself .

Find your heart .

Your fire has never left you .

Find it .

Then I see green eyes.

I see them widen in fear. I see them narrow in anger. I see them fill with pride. I see them melt into the sea I haven’t visited in centuries, because why would I deserve to see anything beautiful? Why would the distraction be worth it?

No. Now, as my frozen heart begins to ignite, I realize it is not just a distraction. The beauty of that beach, the fierceness of her, is something greater.

That green is a beacon of hope—a world to look forward to, a world worth fighting for.

A sign of spring in the heart of winter.

The more I think of her, of that beach, of her on that beach , the more the snow melts away. The more the fire in me grows, blazing through the storm. I think of heat, and sand, and salt, and green eyes, staring back at me.

I feel myself thawing, I feel the emotions washing over me against my will, against my oaths, against my frozen disposition.

Fear. Curiosity.

Hope.

My eyes open as I break free from this glass cage. I straighten, back in the hall, and catch a flash of green from across the room. Her . For a moment I’m frozen again, just as I was in the mirror. Unable to move. Unable to breathe. Then, the claps begin, and I snap out of the moment. It’s done.

I made good time.

The demonstration continues, but I’m barely watching. All I can see is green, filling my mind, filling my soul. Before I know it, everyone has conquered their fears and the trial is over. Cleo wins. She was just slightly faster.

These feelings ... they’re rushing back. I’m thawing. I’m not the statue in the mirror.

And I’m not sure I like it.

I suspect the Wildling won’t try to go to Moon Isle until the full moon, when no guards are present. But I’m willing to bet it’s not the only place she wants to go.

I sit on top of the castle, overlooking the front stairs, waiting to see where she sneaks off to next. Far past midnight, I see a flash of movement and blue hair. Blue?

She’s disguised, but I’d know her anywhere. In any color. In any clothing. The way she moves is seared into my very soul. I’ve memorized her like she’s a map, and I’m a traveler. I’ve studied her like she’s a text, and I’m a scholar.

I’m becoming a damned expert in her.

And yet ... I get the sense that I could study her forever and never tire.

I am losing my mind. I am well aware. But I can’t get that image out of my head. Her, in my favorite place. Her eyes full of fire, the same way they were when she knocked the crown from my head.

The fire in her has lit a fire in me. And I’m not sure whether I’m going to ignite—or burn.

I can’t trust her. She has so many secrets. She could be working with Grim. Tonight, she’s disguising herself as a Skyling, and I’m going to find out why.

I follow from above as she makes her way across the Mainland, determination plain on her face. Several times, I want to land right in front of her and ask what she’s doing—I want to see what she’ll say.

If I’m honest with myself, I just want to hear her voice.

Even if it’s when she’s lying to me.