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Chapter Seventy-Two

RAIN

" S hit, shit, Rain!" Keir whimpered as he raced towards me.

Warmth immediately flooded my back, but little else. I turned, waving Keir off. "You can't heal me. Doesn't help. Just makes Wild magic."

"Fuck, are you ok?" he asked.

I tried to twist. "Aspen? The others?"

"I'm fine," Aspen panted, but she was now on her knees, and Torian was beside her.

Ms. Rhodes ran into our little clearing with Bracken and Tag right behind her. The woman's head snapped over, her brow creased, but she didn't waste any time with pleasantries.

"Hawke, put your wings away before someone sees!"

"Fuck," Hawke grumbled, and silvery mist drifted from his back as his wings quickly dissolved. "Sorry."

Ms. Rhodes turned again, surveying all of us. "The rest are coming." Her eyes landed on Aspen. "And we heard him. The Huntsman's voice carries."

"Magically, probably," Torian grumbled.

But Bracken didn't care about any of that. Pushing his way around the headmistress, he headed right to me. "Rain?"

Like I had with Keir, I waved him off. Unlike with Keir, I pointed to my throat to show the problem. Bracken immediately pushed magic at me. Yeah, I could feel it, and the shadows inside me grew, but little else.

Then he knelt beside us. "Heal yourself."

"How?" I asked, able to hear the damage in my words.

He offered a weak smile, then shrugged. "I dunno. I have a feeling you do. Do it the same way you do everything else."

"Rain..." Jack said, hopping across the ground to get closer, one of his wings hanging lower than normal. "Rain-Jack."

"Jack!" I gasped, so happy to see him. "Are you ok?"

He nodded, but kept hopping until he could reach my hand. There, he nibbled at my fingers. I turned my hand, caressing his back, and pushed shadows towards him. The bird stood a little higher. His wing shifted, and then he ruffled his feathers and reset himself properly.

"Jack-Rain. Shadow!" he insisted.

"I think he means to do that to yourself," Keir said.

So I lifted my hand to my throat and tried it. The scratchiness immediately eased. So did that burning feeling of abused flesh. And yet, even as the pain receded, I didn't want to waste the power.

"I'm good," I said as a few other teachers and staff moved into the clearing.

They were in small groups and clusters, and no one looked completely good.

Dirt smudged faces. Hair was askew. Everyone was breathing heavily, but that wasn't what shocked me the most. They all stopped at the edge, looking down at the ground.

It took me too long to realize what they were looking at.

"Who died?" Ms. Rhodes wanted to know, confirming my suspicion.

"Hunter," I said, thrilled when my voice no longer sounded broken.

"What hunter?" she demanded.

I shrugged. "Not the Huntsman, but one of the others."

"That's not a hunter," someone said. I recognized my math teacher's voice.

"He was," I said. "Before Aspen - "

"No!" Ms. Rhodes said, cutting me off. "The six of you, up!" Then she pointed back towards the school. "Go. Someone shield that body. We do not need children seeing such things."

A green haze was quickly thrown over it even as Ms. Rhodes herded the rest of us past it.

I had a million things to say, because I'd been the one to shove my sword in him.

Never mind the way I'd watched his eyes change and then fade.

Yeah, that was going to fuck me up, and now she was trying to keep us from seeing it?

But Bracken followed behind us. Tag stepped up and started giving directions to the staff who huddled around the body.

I heard something about disposal, and decided I really didn't want to listen to anything else.

Yet somewhere in the darkness between the school and where we'd had our fight, Ms. Rhodes turned, stopping all of us.

"Sorry," she said. "I heard enough to know things were said that cannot be taken back, and too much information is now out there."

"Yeah," Keir agreed, nodding his head. "I also have questions."

"We can't answer," Torian told him.

Bracken moved beside me, clasping my shoulder. "Release them, Ivy."

"Oh, I think I have to," she said. "I release all of you - and Liam as well, Bracken.

There is no point in sowing discord among the six of you.

You can talk freely about anything you want, because I'd be an idiot to try to put limits on what is clearly working.

" She sighed. "But this does not make things easier, Torian. "

"Why?" I asked. "And so you know, I killed that guy. I saw him die, so why can't we - "

"A true excuse," Bracken broke in. "Rain, she wanted a reason to get you away, and death is a good one."

"Oh."

"And we will discuss that later, Rain. I have questions - so many of them - but now is not the best time." She looked at Bracken. "Just make sure she's ok?"

"Always," he said. "But – Ivy, the Wild Hunt is immortal."

"Clearly not," Ms. Rhodes pointed out. "We also have more pressing things to discuss first."

Keir waved that off. "I just want to know one thing." He turned to Torian. "Why the fuck did you let us think you were a monster?"

"Ms. Rhodes said we could not discuss our titles or ancestry.

" He glanced over at Aspen. "I agreed as long as keeping my silence did not cause my sister to suffer in any way.

" Then he looked back to Keir. "And since I'm not a jevadu, there was no reason I couldn't fight my best friend's battles for him.

" He tapped his chest. " I don't care if people call me a monster. I already know I am."

"You're not," I hurried to say.

He just turned his fae eyes on me. "Haven't you figured it out yet, Rain?

You've had enough fae history to know this.

If Aspen is the Winter Princess, and we share a father, then that only leaves one option.

I was bred to inherit her throne. I was designed to take that power and funnel it to my mother. "

"When the Mad Queen began killing the Winter nobility," Aspen explained, "our father cast a very strong enchantment.

The Mad Queen would not stop until she was with child.

My father needed a fertility spell, and it worked.

His power was strong enough to create us both within days, and tie us together forever. "

Torian glanced at her and smiled. "I told her."

"Oh," Aspen breathed.

He nodded. "No one else, though."

Ms. Rhodes just lifted a hand. "I do not want to know.

Decide for yourselves if your friends need to.

" Again, the woman sighed, sounding like she was carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders.

"All of you need to understand that this?

It is a mess. Many people - like the Valentinas - want to see all Winter fae exterminated.

They think it will make Summer magic more powerful.

And this? If they had any idea who Aspen was?

Or Hawke?" She shook her head. "They would make sure the pair died. "

"And Torian?" I asked.

He scoffed. "They would worship the ground I walk on. I am the Queen's only begotten son and heir."

"Explains the bad attitude," Keir teased.

Torian huffed, but one side of his mouth had curled higher. "Fuck off."

"Look," Bracken said. "All of this is dangerous, and with Aspen being the oldest living heir with a tie to inheriting the crown? People will want her dead if they know. Wilder's power is enough to put him at risk, but Aspen? If she survives long enough to - "

"I'm eighteen!" Aspen broke in. "I'm an adult, and now I can claim it, and I do!

They're not going to stop just because I never wanted this.

They don't care if I would rule well or horribly.

They only care that I exist and that I could.

I didn't ask to be born, but since I'm here?

Since Torian's helping me? And Rain?!" She looked at me almost desperately.

"I have to. I said it, and that may have been in a panic, and because I was scared Rain would die, but. .."

"Say it," Torian told her.

"I am the Winter Queen!" Aspen insisted, lifting her chin slightly. "And I can still learn. I can still have fun with my friends. I can also change things for the better, so I claim the crown. I am my father's first-born child, which means I am the Queen!"

The darkness in front of me popped, and an even darker shape unfurled, grew, and moved before me. Torian spun towards the sound. Keir's hand filled with swirling iridescence. Wilder shifted between it and Aspen. Hawke and I just flinched.

"Shadow!" Jack announced.

"Fuck!" Keir muttered as he shook his hands clean of magic. "Rain, you have got to - "

But my shadow grew a little taller and a lot more solid. The eyes appeared, but this time they were glowing with the same purple shade my stone often had. It looked at Aspen, turned to Torian, then back to Aspen and knelt.

"What?" Aspen asked.

I shook my head, as confused as she was, but the thing reached into its chest to reveal something that glistened.

My mind couldn't even make sense of it at first, and then I realized the sparkle came from gems. So many gems!

White, clear, blue, and even black sparkled in a setting that reminded me of a cluster of inverted icicles.

In the center, right at the front, was an ornate silver snowflake, with a perfectly white orb in the center.

"The Winter Crown?" I asked.

"May I?" Torian asked his sister.

She jiggled her head in a nervous nod, so he reached for the crown the shadow was holding, but the glowing eyes narrowed to slits, and the shadow shifted the crown away. Torian paused, tilting his head slightly.

"I am her brother, and the spare to the throne. My goal is to coronate her, nothing more."

The eyes widened again, and it offered him the crown. Lifting it from the sides, Torian turned to Aspen and gently set the diamond-and-jewel-encrusted thing on her head. Then he caught her hands, gripping them tightly.

"For lack of a higher authority, since our father is dead, I am honored to coronate you as Ildilyntra Siel Zylfine, the Queen of Winter." And he dipped his head.

Around me, everyone sank to a knee. I looked from my zez to Ms. Rhodes, and then at all of my friends. But just as I shifted, intending to do the same, Torian's arm shot out and he pointed at me.

"Not you, Rain. "

"What?"

"Morrigan!" Jack cawed, proving he was also standing straight up. "Morrigan, Jack, Court!"

"Exactly," Torian said. "Jack is a prince and equal to me. You, Rain, are the champion of his crown, and the fae see you as a Queen's equal. You never bow to a crown - or a throne."

But Aspen was already waving for everyone else to get up. "I don't like the kneeling. It feels weird, and while I may be the Queen, my first order is no kneeling until I graduate, ok?"

Ms. Rhodes chuckled. "I think that's fair, Aspen. I also think you need to put that crown somewhere very, very safe."

Aspen smiled and glanced at me. "Rain has a really sweet Monarch's Assassin that will keep it safe for us."

"Perfect," Ms. Rhodes said. Then she stepped closer and clasped Aspen's arm. "I will continue to treat you as I did before, but do not think things are the same. You are in danger now, Aspen."

"I think I've always been."

Ms. Rhodes just tilted her head. "More now than before.

So trust your court. I think it's time for the secrets to come out.

And with that, I will go back to cleaning up the mess the group of you made of the Hunt.

" She looked back at us and smiled sadly.

"I'm proud of you all, but if you cannot handle this, please see me?

I can remove your memories, but you will lose your friends in the process. "

"Nope, I'm in," Keir said.

"I was kinda picked for it," I pointed out.

"Born into it," Torian said.

"Same," Wilder agreed.

Hawke just shrugged. "I'm here for the laughs, but I got this, Ms. Rhodes."

"Yeah, you do," she agreed. "Bracken? Let them have their space. She might be your daughter, but Rain is not a child."

Bracken chuckled. "No, she's not. I'm proud of you, Rain." Then he turned to Aspen. "And tonight, I'm so very proud of you, Your Majesty. We will settle things between us later, if you allow?"

"If you stop talking to me formally," she said.

So he stepped in and hugged her. "The crown sparkles almost as brightly as you do, Aspen. I'm sorry you had to take it."

"Yeah..." But she shrugged. "I'm just scared of what comes next. "

"You have time for that."

She glanced at me. "Wrong part."

Bracken laughed and hugged her again, whispering something in her ear that was too soft for me to make out. It did make Aspen giggle, though. But when my zez pulled away, he simply turned and followed Ms. Rhodes back to the other side of the property - and the mess we'd left behind.