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The corner of my mouth curled into a smirk. “I suppose as old as you’d like to be, Little Rose. We did begin this land. We can make the rules.”
She snorted. “I feel like we are the youngest, yet . . . we’re the eldest other than my Raven Queen. In truth, I figured I was younger during my parents’ battles. I appeared so small in my Golden King’s dream walk.”
“You arestillsmall.”
Calista rammed her elbow into my ribs. “Being small has gotten me out of more than one tight spot, you sod. All you thick, bumbling men draw more attention than anyone.”
“I wasn’t arguing the point.”
“I think you were.”
“And I think you,” I said, flicking one of her braids, “still start fights for no damn reason.”
Calista’s mouth parted. “I do not.”
“You do.”
“Wrong.”
I tilted my head. “Point made.”
“You’re irritating.”
I chuckled. Such a normal sound, yet one so foreign it sent the hair on the back of my neck on end. My smile slipped, and we fell back into a quiet until we entered the palace hall.
When I was silent too long, Calista forced a crooked grin. “You know, back on the Row, I, uh, I didn’t mean to lose my wits.”
“You lost your wits?”
A splash of pink tinged the tips of her ears. “Yes, when I practically ate you.”
The kiss. I cracked the knuckles of my thumbs and turned away. “Then I rather like when you lose your wits.”
A heady pressure gathered between us. Desire, unease, a new uncertain path, all tangled in tension.
“Seeing all that,” she went on, “It was just . . . a lot, you know? Learning you’re an all-powerful being that can’t die is quite the accomplished task to take in a day. I need to wrap my head around it, then find a way to rub it in Ari’s face, mostly. He boasts about his grandness so often, it’s time someone stuns him.”
I smiled. “What do you wish me to say first?”
She took hold of my hand and led us to a faded, musty bench. “Tell me about breaking the kingdom.”
I looked ahead. Turns of silence, now I could hardly find a way to speak longer than a few words. “Our first true song awakened new paths, alternate paths where the gifts of the Norns and gods-magic were divided among the people instead of held by one throne.”
“That was the song we sang as children when Saga was found battered and beaten?”
“Yes,” I said. “You . . . you loved her so much, and I only wanted to put your heart at ease, so I sang.”
“I always loved when you sang,” she whispered, rubbing her forehead. “Something about the sound was so soothing.” Calista’s eyes snapped to mine. “But you could see things, couldn’t you? You didn’t always need my words. I recall when my mother was possessed, you were singing. You told her something about her fate.”
“I get feelings and thoughts, the same as when you write simple premonitions. To truly change the outcome of fate, to truly build a destiny, I must have your words.”
The first glimmer of my seidr came to me as a boy, not long after the announcement of the heir of House Ode. As if my magic was born with her. When I was in her presence, the songs could hardly be helped.
When her power grew even stronger, well, together we shattered worlds.
“We combined words and song when we found Saga, right? That’s why it was so powerful?”
I looked away, ashamed. “We’d never truly used our voices in such a way. I never meant for it to break everything, but I told you to add whatever words you thought might make her happy. You wanted the kingdom to grow stronger than Davorin. You wanted your aunt to have the golden king I saw in a dream once. Those desires began the tale of fated queens because it became an alternate path for a raven princess tobecomea queen. It created a world that could rise stronger than before.”
