Page 44 of Spring Guardians & Songbirds

It was almost dawn. I had no choice but to hold back the day. The veil of unnatural night spread over the blanket of violet dawn, holding back the light of Cyra. Interfering with nature was something I could do with ease, but not something I wanted to do at all.

“What if this doesn’t work?” Larg asked, surveying the night I’d summoned.

“It will work,” I said, running her riddle over and over. Over and…over.

A small light lit on the second floor window. Small enough that no one could have noticed, but I was not just anyone. Not when darkness called my name like a prayer, like I was its god each time light broke it. It called for my command to make the world entirely lightless again.

“Larg,” I tried to say calmly, but sleeplessness and anger had laced my voice. “Has anyone checked inside the house?”

Larg swivelled his head round and Merle stood. Her mouth quivered and rounded to the shape of a gasp. “They…they don’t come from school till late afternoon. I was at home all day. I…I would have seen them come in.”

“My asteri, did you check the rooms?” Larg asked his partner, frowning.

Merle shook her head, shivering from dread. “I was at home all day. I would have known. I would have seen them return from school.”

“Then who is lighting candles on your second floor?” I asked, pointing to the growing light upstairs. The noise of soldiers and clatter of hooves would have woken them.

Both Larg and Merle ran upstairs and returned sobbing and thanking the heavens while they held the two sleepy children in their arms. The smell of lavender philtre was strong on their clothes. She’d given them a sleeping potion.

Fucking woman.

Larg wiped a large hand over his eyes. “I knew she wouldn't hurt them.”

“It wasn’t them she wanted to hurt, Larg.” It was me.

The old man sighed. “She is angry. That I understand.”

I shook my head. “She shouldn’t have done this. She shouldn’t have done this to you or Merle or the children.” She had wanted me gone. And she’d found the best way to have me gone.

“You can pull your magic back.”

“No, I don’t think I will,” I said, cracking my neck. “My wife wants to play.” With that, I faded back to my room.

She laid on her back, reading a book and chewing a nail on her free hand. When I clicked the door shut behind me, she flipped to her front and blinked in surprise between me and the window still showing the night sky. “That was…quick?”

“You can say so,” I agreed, unbuttoning my jacket. I noted she was wearing one of my shirts. “Didn't you like the clothes I had picked out for you?”

“No. I’m not planning to join a nunnery.”

“Are you trying to get me to sign to a priesthood?” I asked, tracing her lines and curves visible through my linen shirt and she raised a brow at me.

“Good one, Adriatian. Bet you gagged a little in your mouth coming up with that.”

She had no fucking idea, did she?

“No more dirty little tricks, Snow,” I said, slowly walking to pour myself a drink.

“Or what?”

I swung down the liquor and filled another glass. “You honestly don’t want to know the answer to that.”

The book she held slammed shut and she sat herself up, my shirt slipping down her shoulder. I was too gods damn distracted to even be mad. “Indulge me. You like indulging me, darling, don’t you?”

I plopped down on my armchair. Though I was angry, my heart pumped fast because of how she looked on my bed and wearing my clothes—how I’d always imagined it. “The sun comes out when I tell it to come out. Can you recall how I got my name? How the realm regards me as the Night King.”

She glanced at the window and then down at the bargain seal on her hand, her breathing picking up. Something else flashed in that entirely too apathetic expression she wore. “You can fool the bargain, but you cannot cheat it.”

I raised a brow and pointed my head at the window. “Try and leave. It is yet dawn though time is beyond sunrise, and I did not in fact specify that you might leave at a certain dawn either. The bargain is that you leave at dawn. I, love, am the king of night. Make the connection yourself. Thought we could use this opportunity to discuss what you did.”