“No guards?”
“Not this time.”
It was both a relief, and a worry, that we were leaving without our guard. I got so tired of being followed around all the time, but so many people were trying to kill us nowadays that I was anxious if our guards weren’t around. Wherever we were going had to be safe.
We stepped through the portal, and my boots hit snow. I felt an icy gust of wind rush against my face. I grabbed the clasp of my cloak to keep it from flying off.
I looked around. It was twilight— the sun was beginning to dip below the horizon. There was a dotting of mountains in the distance, along with the shimmer of sea and a flat expanse of white snow beyond, the earth covered in orange light. It was breathtaking. “Where are we?”
“Somewhere in Switzerland. Turn around.”
I did so, and gasped as I craned my neck upward. A massive wall of ice towered over us. It was crystal clear, and several miles wide. It reflected the sun, shimmering like glass, and made shivers run over my skin. There was an opening in the glacier up ahead, along with a snowy pathway that led inside the monolith.
“What is this place?” I asked, very much impressed.
“It’s an ice cave. Nature carved it out from the inside of a glacier. It’s here all year round,” Ethan said. “I heard of it, and thought it was a very Emma-like place to go.”
“You know me too well.” I started for the entrance. Ethan followed me as I entered the ice cave. The halls were wide enough to wander through, and there were all kinds of interesting formations of ice within the walls and ceiling. I trailed the designs of bubbles trapped within the ice, and became mesmerized by the merging colors of turquoise, amethyst, and aquamarine in the glassy surface.
Through the walls of the ice cave, the sunlight broke through, sending multicolor rays shooting across the cave and over the path we walked. The rays reflected off the massive icicles lining the ceiling, making the entire cave glimmer like diamonds.
Ethan and I passed a few waterfalls within the glaciers. Eventually, the cave widened, and we came to a circular pool in the middle of the ice cave. Ethan laid his cloak on the floor, and we sat by the edge of the spring.
In the ice cave, you could hear every shift of the glacier as it moved. It was a little eerie, if not beautiful music. I leaned against Ethan, and he put his arms around me to keep me warm with his shifter heat.
“This is really cool,” I said. “It’s great that we’re here together.”
Ethan moved closer. “I thought… well, I thought it would be a nice spot for us to talk in private, if I’m being honest.”
“Huh?” I turned my body so I could look up at him.
“The palace is always so busy. You never know who may be listening in, and there are some things that should only be reserved for us. We need to discuss things that are important to our relationship. Sometimes, we’re so busy focused on running the country, I think we forget to pause and consider our own lives, and what’s important to us.”
I hadn’t really stopped to think about what I wanted out of life— or about Ethan and me— in a really long time. I was so busy making sure everyone else got what they needed that I hadn’t really considered if my mate and I were on the right path.
“I think we’re doing well as king and queen,” I said.
“I think we are too, but there’s more to our life than just being royals. It’s important we have these kinds of discussions regularly, to check up with each other and make sure we’re still being honest about what we want,” Ethan said.
“I want you,” I said, and I placed a hand on his chest.
“Yes, but is that enough?”
Ethan’s eyes told me exactly what he meant. I’d said he was enough before, that the life we could build together was worth the sacrifice both of us had to make.
Now, I wasn’t so sure. I had been absolutely certain that I could live a life without children as long as I was with Ethan, and I’d meant it. I didn’t think I was lying to myself at the time— merely hadn’t realized how that loss would feel once the people around me started becoming parents.
And itwasa loss. I’d barely thought about kids before, but I’d always assumed at some point I would have them, and didn’t give much thought about it otherwise. But being told you couldn’t have the one thing everyone else could… I had a crown, a palace, and more power than I could ever imagine, but none of it could make up for that choice being taken from me. A choice that had beenmineto make.
Ethan was okay with not being a parent. He didn’t care, so long as he had me.
I didn’t know if I could say the same. Which sucked, because it wasmybody that didn’t work, not his. I loved Ethan. I could live my life and grow old with him without adding more members to our family, and still be happy.
But would I always feel like something was missing? Yes.
“I just want us to be clear on what we want going forward, and the type of life we want to make together,” Ethan said. “We’re going to be married soon. Whatever life we want to build, we have to do it as one.”
I nodded. “I want us to make decisions together, for sure.”
