Billy—I know it’s him by the pattern of freckles across his nose—blinks as he recognizes me, then lowers his blade. “Hah hah, very funny.”
I cross my arms. “Mind telling me why you’re armed and holed up on my balcony? Do you not have a perfectly good room with abed?”
Billy gives a sheepish grin and shrugs his shoulders. He meanders over to the railing and assumes a position much like mine moments ago. Except he’s at the age where he’s all arms and legs, gangly as a willow tree’s branches. “Oh, you know. Dom and I are just looking out for you.”
I peer around the balcony, searching for another shape.
“He’s watching your front door,” Billy mumbles.
I run a hand over my short beard and level my brother with a watchful gaze. “Care to explain why you two are standing guard?”
Billy stares out across the horizon. Fae age slowly in adolescence compared to our human counterparts, but I can’t help but think he and Dom have grown up so fast in the last few years. But what other choice do you have? War steals the innocence from us all.
“We thought…you seemed like you needed someone to look out for you, Fare. You’ve been a smidge on edge lately.” Billy turns to me and flashes a crooked grin. “So we’re here to keep you safe.”
Words catch in my throat. “Oh, Billy.” I wrap an arm around him and tug him close. He smells like cloves and pumpkin andmemories. “You don’t worry about that, okay? Keeping us all safe—that’s my job.”
13
Keldarion
The wind howls across the endless white horizon as I run.Snow whips against my fur, sharp and biting, but I hardly feel it. My paws dig deep into the ice-crusted powder, pushing forward, relentless. The hunger for movement, for escape, is a gnawing thing, but no matter how far I run, she is always there.
Rosalina.
I can’t stop seeing her. Her voice is in the wind. Her scent clings to the frozen air. And Cas, curse him, lingers like a shadow at the back of my mind, tormenting me with all the things I should have done differently. All the ways I failed him. Failed her.
I snarl and push harder, leaving deep gouges in the ice. If I run fast enough, maybe the memories won’t catch me. Maybe the ghost of her warmth won’t reach into my chest and tear me open all over again.
The storm howls louder, a beast of its own. Ice shards spin through the air, but I don’t stop. Not until the land changes, shifting from rolling drifts to jagged peaks jutting from the snow.
I slow, breath misting in the thick clouds around me. Justus told me to meet him here. But why? This is the middle of nowhere, nothing but unending white and the silence of the frozen expanse. Yet I know I’m in the right place.
I shift.
Pain lances through me as my form bends and twists, bones snapping and reforming, fur withdrawing into skin. The cold bites, but I ignore it. My clothes were strapped to my back, and I move quickly, pulling them on. The thick cloak and furs help, but they do nothing to chase away the unease curling in my gut.
Where are you, Justus?
A figure steps from behind a jagged rock, Justus’s form barely visible against the misty snow. His expression is unreadable, but his eyes gleam.
“I’ve found what I was looking for,” he says. “When you’ve been alive as long as I have, your memories start to feel like dreams.”
“And what exactly were you looking for?”
Justus gestures me forward. “Come and see.”
I follow him. The peaks around us twist into strange, jagged formations, and something shifts beneath the ice. Not only cracks and fractures but shapes.
Ruins.
High columns and pillars, half-buried in ice, stick out of the earth. Their surfaces are carved with sigils. The further we walk, the more the ruins reveal themselves, winding across the frozen landscape.
I glance at Justus. His face is unreadable, but something flickers in his eyes. Something ancient.
Aeneas.
The first High Prince of Summer. That’s who he truly is.
