Page 104 of A Serpent in the Garden

She’s always angry with me. He said it as if this were a throwaway concern. I don’t think I can remember a time when she wasn’t.

I let that float in the air for a little while before I responded, watching a shaft of firelight set ablaze a swirl of dust motes. That’s not much of an answer.

I don’t have much of an answer to give you. I’ll find out soon enough. She’s never been one to mince words.

She didn’t arrive until very early the next morning after I’d gotten little more than a fussy nap. Without a knock, she swept into Remy’s apartment. She wore a cloak that echoed the night skies of Frost, a velvety iridescent black spangled with starbursts. Half her face was hidden behind a mask that seemed carved of ice, spreading across her nose and cheekbones, her moonlit gaze staring out from behind the eye holes. A net of silver held her hair, dotted with gems that looked like starlight and sent rainbows blistering across the room.

She said nothing, but even her silences had teeth.

I felt a tremor of premonition as the hearth flames sucked back to embers at her presence. The torches gasped and nearly died, leaving behind nothing but a faint, ghostly glow.

She’s come from a judgement session. Remy sat up from his slouch. It must be nearly dawn.

A few seconds ground by in utter silence. There was no brittle humor in her eyes, which did not so much as blink as they considered me.

“I would hear your explanation.” Her voice was soft and dangerous. I felt it might have been better if she’d yelled. “I thought I made it plain that I wanted you to remain in your room until I came to find you.”

Inadequate sleep had left me with raw nerves, and I felt Remy’s fray as well beneath his mother’s expressionless gaze, as if he were facing down his doom.

“Finn needed help with an errand,” Remy started, in a voice of careful supplication. “He thought my ice might come in handy. I’m sorry we left without a word but I didn’t think you’d mind. You were about to lift the curse before the alarm went off. You wouldn’t have made her promise if you weren’t going to let her go. You never called for a council vote to get permission to execute her; you haven’t treated her like a prisoner—”

Frost broke across the stone floor as she drew closer to the bed. I had to fight the urge to claw my way backward toward the headboard. “This is the story you’re sticking with? Some absurd emergency errand with your ridiculous brother?”

My throat had gone so dry my voice was but a crackly whisper. “It’s not a story, it’s the truth.”

She stared down at me, most of her face hidden behind the glittering mask. I felt Remy get to his feet, pressing against his window.

“Mother.” He sounded the closest to beseeching that I had ever heard him. “It may have been a mistake, but none of this was her fault.”

She was the brightest thing in her son’s apartment, glowing like a star. “I know exactly where the fault lies.” Her voice was like a backhand. Remy had been about to say something else when she held up a finger and sat on the edge of the bed beside me. “I’ll hear no more.”

Taking my chin in her icy hand, she tilted my head back to look into my eyes. My heart shot into my throat at her touch despite the gentleness with which she held me. For a moment she did nothing but hold my gaze, silencing her son with a look of pure ice.

And he was silent, so absolutely quiet it was like he wasn’t there at all.

She dropped my chin, rose to her feet. Remy didn’t make a sound.

Are you okay? I asked. What’s happened?

But my words blasted through what sounded like a vast, empty space. No voice answered me, no anxious rustling. It was as if he’d disappeared.

“Where is he?” I clambered to my feet after her, limp with fear. I felt as if some hourglass were running out, time racing on without me, the future slipping through my fingers. The room rocked around me as I stood there, or maybe I was trembling. “I can’t feel him.”

Halfway to the door, she turned, a circle of frost arcing about her feet. “Gone.”

Gone. The word was so large it sucked up all the air in the apartment.

“Where?” I looked about the place as if I’d find him lounging in a corner.

Behind the mask, her silver eyebrows rose. The nearest feeble torch flame struck a jewel on the silver net around her hair, throwing a prism across the ceiling. “Do you think I don’t know when I’m being lied to? A chimera? Truly?”

A mist of hair rose on the back of my neck. “Is he—is he dead?”

The thought was too unbearable to imagine. My dread was nearly transcendent as I gaped in horror. It wasn’t supposed to end this way, in some dual abyss, no resolution, no ending. He couldn’t be gone before we’d ever had our first lucid hello. She couldn’t be so cruel to her only son. I had to believe that, because the alternative was too much for me to stomach.

It felt as if my blood had paused in my veins, holding its breath.

She didn’t answer, heading back toward the door. Her cloak of midnight murmured across the iced stone. “It will be dawn soon. You’d better collect your things if you want to make it through the wood at first light.”