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There is blood under my fingernails. I wonder how many of my people I’ve killed this time.
Once there would have been a stablehand rushing to take his horse, especially upon hearing my tone. Once there was a castle full of courtiers and historians and advisers who would have turned over a coin for a bit of gossip about Prince Rhen, heir to the throne of Emberfall. Once there was a royal family that would have frowned on my antics. Now there is me, and there is Grey.
The girl will be gone, and the season will begin again. I’ll be newly eighteen. For the three hundred twenty-seventh time.
Everything is always the same. Except for the dead. They never come back.
Are you truly so tired of our little dance?” Yes. I am. So terribly tired.
This shall be your final season. Your days will march in tandem with the rest of Emberfall.
If you were lucky, you could pull me right into your blade.” My mouth is working, but no sound is coming out. I can’t decide whether to be impressed or angry. “Can I do that right now?” He smiles, and his eyes light with genuine amusement. “Perhaps next time.”
You alone can break this curse. You must find a woman to love you. You, not me. If Lady Lilith wants to break me again, I would ask you to let her.”
“The curse grants him the ability for one hour, every season. No more, no less.” I turn my head to glance back at her. “Magic was once banned from Emberfall. You will find no one else who can help you.”
“You should not wish for violence.” How he’d make statements like that. “Not violence,” says Grey, his expression losing any humor. “I had almost forgotten what this was like.” Rhen doesn’t answer that, so I say, “What what was like?” “Being useful.”
I mean, why aren’t you sleeping?” He glances at me. “Perhaps you are unfamiliar with what a guard does?”
Then my hand stops on what should be the jack. A blond man holding a shield, with a large red heart in the center. “Rhen,” I whisper. Grey taps the edge of the card in my hands. “The prince of hearts.”
“Have you not figured it out yet? The curse torments us all.”
“You asked how I got her to play with me. As if there were some trick to it.” He wraps up the stack. “My lord, I did nothing. I sat down and asked.”
“Whose blood is that?” The first hint of anger slides into his voice—but it’s backed by resignation. “The blood you saw was mine.”
I’m used to the weight of prying eyes and critical glances. Harper’s judgment is different. She is my final chance. The stakes feel immeasurably high.
“One escaped,” I say. “Or one was hidden.” I pause. “And she appeared on the night of my eighteenth birthday. Dressed as a courtier, ready to seduce a prince.”
“You turned her away after spending the night with her.” “Yes.”
“Now I understand why you’re shirtless.” “You screamed,” I say. “Many times, and quite loudly. Would you rather I had waited to dress fully? It is lucky I did not find you facedown in a pile of entrails.”
“I’m not going to fall in love with you,” she says. Her words are not a surprise. I sigh. “You won’t be the first.”
I’m used to loneliness. Despair. Sorrow. Disappointment. I’m not used to fear, at least not this kind. I have never met someone so reckless. She is not the first girl to run, or to fear me, or to question my motives. She is the first girl to force me into situations requiring armor and weaponry.
Of course my final chance would be a girl determined to undermine me and create new obstacles at every turn. Every step forward seems destined to end in two steps back.
But when Davin sneaks close and dares to put a hand on Grey’s sword hilt, the swordsman feints as if he’d chase him away. The boy jumps and darts back a few feet—but then he laughs, full out. Grey smiles and tousles his hair. “Go,” he says, his voice kind but leaving no room for disobedience. “Play.”
Rhen takes a step forward. “Lord Vincent Aldrhen, Prince of Emberfall, son of Broderick, King of the Eastern Lands.” His eyes narrow. “A better question is, who are you?”
I pause, fixated on the one part of her tirade that’s taken root in my head. You sat by the fire and wouldn’t even speak to me. For that to matter, she would have to care, at least a small amount.
But for one brief moment, I forgot the curse. I forgot that she is not some simple girl who sparks intrigue with every other word from her tongue. And for one brief moment, I remembered. I remembered what it was like to want to touch a girl, not as part of a carefully planned seduction designed to lure her into breaking this curse.
“This is so weird. Yesterday I wanted to kill you.” “Indeed. That gives me hope.” “Why?” “If you have come to trust me, that means you may come to trust him.”
“Guarding Rhen. I know you swore an oath. Do you think he’s worth the sacrifice?” He hesitates. The easy smile is gone. He holds out the knives to me. “Time will tell.”
Can you understand that? That they need me? Can you?” I press my forehead against the door. Her pain reaches me through the wood, tightening my own chest and dredging memories of my family. “Yes. I can.” “No!” Her voice is fierce, her rage pure. “You can’t!” “I can,” I say softly. “How?” “Because I need you.”
And then, because fate seems content to surprise me this season, she steps forward, presses her face against my chest, and wraps her arms around my waist. I’m so startled that I can’t move. She could draw my weapons and stab me and I would be less shocked.
“My father once said we are all dealt a hand at birth. A good hand can ultimately lose—just as a poor hand can win—but we must all play the cards fate deals. The choices we face may not be the choices we want, but they are choices nonetheless.”
“If I can convince my people—and Karis Luran—that Emberfall is not defenseless, that future conflicts may arise, I may be able to convince her army to leave.”
I may not be able to save myself—but I may be able to save my people.”
“In matters of the heart, I am clearly hopeless.” He puts down his final card—a prince. A wild card. I stare at him, stunned. It didn’t matter what I played. He would have won anyway. “In matters of strategy,” he finishes, “I am not.”
“I do not deserve your loyalty, Grey.” “Deserved or not, you have it.”
When he moves away, I think of one of the first things he said. I was never alone. The nights were never this silent. “Commander,” I say. He stops and turns, waiting for an order. I have none to give. “Wait.” I set my own mug in the snow. “I’ll walk with you.”
“You keep asking people to keep this a secret. I think Coale and Evalyn really will, but you just met this guy. How do you know he won’t tell everyone about this?” “My lady.” He glances over, looking genuinely startled. “I am counting on them telling everyone.”
Commander. You have my thanks.” “Don’t worry,” says Rhen. “Commander Grey likes to feel necessary.” Grey pushes sweat-dampened hair off his forehead and says, “Commander Grey is going to regret saying that.”
But Jamison’s sword appears at her throat, forcing her to lift her chin. She freezes. Her eyes shift to the soldier. “You have no part in this. You want no quarrel with me.” He stands strong. He’s tired, but his sword does not waver either. “I know an enemy when I see one.”
She lets Rhen go and he all but collapses into the dirt, his breathing rapid. His forehead isn’t pressed to the ground now. He’s turned his head to look at me.
Harper will wake. She will survive. She has a lady-in-waiting who could sit at her bedside. I do not need to be here. But I find I cannot leave.
This feels like the cruelest season of all, to present me with a girl with the fierceness to stand at my side—yet with a home and family she needs to return to so badly.
She stands a foot away from me. I want so badly to touch her face, to whisper my thoughts against her skin. This torture is nearly as bad as what I endured in the arena.
“Freya did it?” “She did.” I pause. “She was quite forceful, in fact. Yelled at Commander Grey.” “She yelled at Grey?” Harper’s eyes widen. “Yanked the needle right from his hand.” “What did she say?” I raise my voice into a lilting imitation of Freya’s. “ ‘You will not put field sutures in my lady’s face! She is not a common soldier!’
“I have learned to draw and hold her attention. What she does to me is bad enough. I can endure it. I will not watch her visit pain on my people.”
“You are not angry about what Lilith has done?” “Oh, I’m furious. But not about my face.” “Then what?” Her voice fills with steel. “I’m mad I missed.”
It is not the moment of passing that is most important. It is all the moments that come before.”
when the world seems darkest, there exists the greatest opportunity for light.”
“I seek no apology. I understand your motives.” “Then what do you seek?” “Your trust.”
“But not with Lilith! How could you stand there and watch that, Grey? How could you?” “Do you truly think it costs me nothing?” His voice is sharp, but torment sparks in his eyes. “I have seen her actions countless times. And to a much greater extent.”
