Page 19 of Heart of Fire (Royal Ice Dragons #3)

DARE

Hanna and I dressed in clean clothes and then headed over to the pub. The party was already well underway when we arrived. Music and light leaked from the windows, and when we stepped inside, we were hailed as heroes.

I made small talk with everyone who wanted to talk to me, but I couldn’t take my eyes off Hanna. She lit up, working the room, smiling and charming everyone she met. She would always be at best a distant star, but for tonight, they saw how she shone.

She would be the best queen for our kingdom. Far away from here.

I knew what my people were like. In the end, they were suspicious of those who wielded magic, read too much, talked too highly. They were good people. But they weren’t Hanna’s.

Still, watching her smile, all I wanted to do was pull her away from the crowd and claim that smile for my own. I wanted to press my lips to her and lead her out onto the dance floor to dance like I had with dozens of peasant girls, until we were both heated and wild from the music.

“She’s pretty.” Greia said to my side.

“Mm.” Hanna’s beauty was not a safe topic.

“Has anyone else realized she’s someone else’s wife, already?”

My face stayed motionless. Beside me, Greia let out a trill of a laugh. She knew my face too well.

“Come on, Dare. Do you think I’m stupid? She might wear a different face right now, but of course if Kaelan is obsessed with a woman, you’ll be obsessed with her too. Everyone has heard how the prince has fallen in love.”

I skipped over her insult—which was well-targeted, I hated the implication that I trotted at Kaelan’s heels—because Hanna was in danger. “You’ll keep our secret.”

“ Our secret?” She raised her brows, lingering on the words, as if Hanna and I should share no secrets. Then she slapped my arm, her face relaxing. “Of course. What do you think I am, Dare?”

I knew what I wanted to believe she was: still my childhood best friend, even if she was all grown up. She was the person I had always been able to trust with my secrets.

“Come on,” she said, taking my forearm and tugging me to face her. Reluctantly, I tore my eyes away from Hanna. I couldn’t shake the feeling that if I stopped watching her, she’d vanish like smoke. Kustav wanted her, and unless I found a way to get us out of here that protected us all, Hanna would soon face him.

Then we’d all be in danger.

Especially Kustav.

“You’re boring now,” she chided. “Is that what the Royals have made you?”

“Yes. I have to blend in. What is the information you came all this way to share, Greia? I know there’s more than that.”

She told me all she knew about the troops being mustered, though she seemed impatient. She wanted to talk about other things, and she tried to lead me out onto the dance floor.

Luckily, someone called me just then.

Her fingers slipped through mine as I shook my head. “I need to talk with them.”

She sighed. “You’re tiring me, Dare. I came all this way for you.”

“You came all this way for our people, for our cause.”

“Is Kaelan our cause?” she asked, her voice mocking.

She had an arrogant smirk that used to be cute to me. Now, it was hard to believe I’d once found it charming.

I walked away from her, into the knot of miners who had wanted to talk about whether I really had the right to speak for Kaelan. At least I had brought some momentary goodwill with the rescue of the children. I wasn’t sure how long that would last once I left, though.

When I rose from the table, my gaze skipped over the crowd, looking for Hanna. When she wasn’t there, my heart began to beat faster.

I looked for Greia, but she was nowhere to be seen either. I’d known she would be keeping tabs on Hanna.

I forgot to say goodbye to anyone as I headed swiftly toward the door.

As soon as I swung the door open, Greia’s voice floated to me. It was distant; they must be around the corner of the building. “I know who you are.”

“Is that so? Then I suppose I’ll have to kill you.” It was Hanna. Light, laughing. I could imagine Greia’s face in response, though, and I knew her face had nothing in common with Hanna’s smiling one.

I stopped there, then moved out into the shadows, eavesdropping. My little spy could hardly be angry if I spied on her. I knew she would do the same to me if she felt it would be useful.

“When are you leaving?” Greia didn’t try to hide her irritation.

“When Dare does.”

“Why?”

“That’s no concern of yours.”

“Isn’t it? I’ve known him all his life. I love him.” Greia’s voice stumbled at the confession, and my stomach bottomed out. Then she rushed on, “I want what’s best for him.”

“So do I.”

“No.” Greia sounded suddenly furious. “You don’t. Because what’s best for him is here . He didn’t want to go with Kaelan, did you know that? Not when he was a boy and not now. He had no choice. He follows Kaelan around, taking his discards. Now he’s going to take you as yet another piece of trash Kaelan dropped and he scooped up?”

“I’m not trash.” Hanna’s voice was cool. “And Kaelan is never going to drop me.”

“Then that’s worse! What do you even have to offer him? Do you think our selfish prince is ever going to let you love Dare? The way he deserves to be loved? Here, he’s like our own prince…” Her voice faltered again.

“You have the wrong idea of Kaelan and of me,” Hanna said. “But I’m glad he has a friend who cares for him so much.”

I winced. She sounded kind, but Greia would just take that tone as condescending. Especially coming from a Royal.

“What do you have to offer him?” Greia demanded. “You’re a spoiled bitch princess?—”

Rage tightened my chest. Well, this conversation needed to end now.

“Mm.” Hanna’s amused hum of agreement broke Greia’s speech, but not her stride. I’d started to step forward out of the shadows, but Hanna clearly was not distressed in the slightest by Greia’s attempt to scare her off.

Greia went on angrily. “You think you can have anything you want, even Dare and Kaelan. But Kaelan is as much a spoiled bitch as you are, and you’ll never all be happy together.”

When I pictured all of us together, I could imagine it just the way I knew Greia did: Hanna spending her nights with Kaelan, and me listening to her cry out as he pleased her, while I was alone; I could imagine myself having only moments with her, moments with Kaelan’s permission. It wouldn’t be enough for me. It would tear me apart slowly.

But I could imagine something else too.

I edged closer, wanting to see Hanna’s face.

“I understand why you think what you do, but I would never let that happen.” Hanna’s tone was soft, persuasive, unshakeable. “I grew up watching my sister share a group of men who love each other like brothers—and they fought to love each other and to be worthy of her. They’re all in balance. All equal.”

“You really think you’re equal to your sister?” Greia’s voice was low. “You’re nothing compared to her. She saved her kingdom, she broke a terrible curse, she brought magic to all her people—and what the hell can you do?”

I expected Hanna to have a quick retort. Instead, there was silence that tore at my heart.

I was already moving forward into the light when Greia added, “Can you even turn back a curse, Hanna?”

I burst into motion, stepping in front of Hanna just as Greia began to spit the words of her curse at her. It was peasant magic, nothing Hanna would’ve heard before or known to defend herself from. They were just small, unpleasant bits of magic, but it rankled at me that Greia would do anything to hurt Hanna.

“That’s enough,” I told Greia, my voice harsh.

Greia stared up at me, her eyes wide.

Whatever she saw in my face seemed to destroy all her hope. She whirled to run, and I feared where she would run, given what she knew.

“Stay out of trouble,” I twisted to tell Hanna over my shoulder.

“How long were you listening, exactly?” Her voice was heated.

But I was already moving away, chasing after Greia.

I caught up with Greia down the road that led back toward my parents’ house, the village that I had always missed. I knew at once she had led me here on purpose.

“We need you here. You understand the Royals—that was always the point.” Greia’s eyes were pleading. “You were going to get revenge for your parents.”

“They’re dead. I don’t think they care anymore.” My voice came out harsh.

“Then what about us? We’re alive. We need you.” She swept her arm toward the village, her eyes wide.

“It’s my own life to live, Greia.”

“No.” She shook her head, taking a step back away from me, her eyes haunted as if I were betraying her. Then suddenly, she leapt forward, wrapping her arms around me and raising her head to kiss me as if she could bring me back to my senses.

I flung up my hand to stop her, and she hit me with so much momentum that the force pushed her back. She landed on her ass on the ice.

She stared up at me in horror, and maybe I stared back at her the same way. But I couldn’t stand the thought of her kissing me with the same mouth that had cursed Hanna.

“And you have yours.” I told her, trying to sound more kind. “You’ll have a good life, Greia. It was never going to come to anything between us…I’m sorry that you thought it would.”

“You’re a liar!” she called after me, still seated on the ground, as I walked away. “You thought we’d be together too, in the end! You wanted me!”

I twisted on my heel as I walked backward. “Before Hanna, I didn’t know what it meant to want.”

“No one will want her here when they know what she is! Enjoy it while it lasts, Dare. She can’t stay here, and you can’t come back once you choose her. Even once she’s left you for Kaelan.”

Her words rang in my ears, but so did the threat: she would tell everyone who Hanna was, and it would cost us.

“If you hurt her, Greia, our old friendship won’t save you. I will kill you.”

That was no promise for Kaelan’s sake. It was a promise for my own.