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Tallin shook his head. “It doesn’t seem fair.”
“Radulf got to get away from all of this. All he had to do was run off and join the Moon Children.”
“Isn’t he their leader?”
“Yes, but he got to choose that life. I haven’t been given the chance to choose… anything. I spend my entire life behind these walls, following procedures and protocols, doing what my parents ask me to do. Then the one time I need something from them, I’m told to shut my mouth and do as I’m told, because that’s what the Kingdom needs.”
“Duty is duty…”
“I get it, okay? I’m not trying to sound spoiled or anything. But no one should be forced to marry someone they don’t want to marry. That’s barbaric, and we’re better than that.”
“Your mother certainly fought to abolish the Selection, but not even she could manage that.”
“Maybe if my father had been on her side.”
“He was. But he knew, like she did, that the Selection was the beating heart of the Kingdom’s culture… to cut it out was to kill the whole thing, and then he wouldn’t be King, she wouldn’t be Queen, and you wouldn’t be a Princess.”
“Nobody ever asked me if I wanted to be a Princess.”
“I’m pretty sure no royal has ever been asked if they want their title,” came my mother’s voice from somewhere behind us.
I jumped, Tallin did, too. My senses were heightened, and sharp—so much so that I couldhearthe snow falling over the city’s rooftops, and the Fae walking between them. Somehow, my mother was able to walk so softly, no one could hear her coming.
“Why?” I asked, heart pounding, “Why do you move so silently?”
“So that I can eavesdrop,” she said, smiling brightly.
“You’ve been listening…”
“It’s my job to listen. I’m your mother.” Her eyes fluttered over to Tallin, who was standing upright in her presence. “Tallin, dear, could you give us a moment?”
The furry little Winter Sprite bowed his head. “Of course, my Queen,” he said, and he went slinking off around the corner and back into the palace.
My mother paused and watched me from where she stood for a moment. Then she walked over to the edge of the balcony and cast her gaze across the city. Her silver hair hung perfectly around her face in delicate curls, one of which strayed too close to her eyes. She plucked it and brushed it back, over her long, pointed ear.
“I never get tired of this view,” she said. “It reminds me of London.”
“London?” I asked.
“Well… with less fumes, I guess. I remember once, as a little girl, I was taken on a tour of Westminster and Big Ben. We got to go inside the clock and climb all the way to the top. It had been snowing the night before, and all of London was covered in a thin, white blanket of snow, much like this one.”
“It sounds beautiful.”
“It was.”
“Do you miss it?”
“Occasionally…”
“You call ithomesometimes.”
My mother shrugged. “I feel like it still is. I spent more years of my life there than I have here… at least, I think I did. I’m not sure I ever adjusted to the time difference between Earth and Arcadia.”
“Time difference?”
“Oh, yes. I wish I knew how it worked, but sometimes a day here is a week there, and other times a year here is only a few minutes over there. My mothers are still as young and as full of life now as they were the day I came back to tell them I was Queen of Windhelm.”
“That must have been a shock.”
