Snow Like Ashes

  As Mather twitches to move I swing my body around in front of him and hold him there, one hand on each of his wrists, my head bent into his chest. Low growls bubble in his throat, but he doesn’t try to fight.

  “Now that this whole nasty business is out in the open,” Noam claps his hands behind me. “Don’t we have a wedding to plan?”

  A roar launches up out of me and I turn on him, keeping my body between Mather and Noam. “Why would we agree to this now?” I shout. “We have nothing left to lose!”

  Noam’s smile doesn’t waver, but his eyes flick from pleased to threatening as a few muscles around his brow twitch. “There are only eight of you, Lady Meira. And you are in my domain. You can either marry my son willingly or by force. I have not waited this long and worked this hard to not control Winter, and it only needs to look official—whether you choose to become Bithai’s prisoners afterward is entirely up to you.”

  I can’t tell whether I’m holding Mather back or he’s holding me back. I can’t feel anything else in the room, don’t know what Sir is doing or if that’s Alysson who is crying or anything outside of Noam’s awful sneer, and I regret for the umpteenth time this morning leaving my chakram in my room.

  “But I digress.” Noam waves his hand like he’s shooing a bug out of a window. “I’ll give you a moment to collect yourselves, but then, Lady Meira, I do believe you have classes to attend, and King Mather and General William have meetings, do they not? The dukes from Cordell’s coastal provinces are so looking forward to meeting our new ally.”

  Noam keeps babbling about what we need to be doing, about meetings staged to make everything look the part. Like he knows we’ll accept this fate, and the horrible thing is—we will. As Sir corrals us out the door, I see it in his eyes. The same defeat I saw when I first confronted him about the marriage arrangement. All these years of fighting, all these years of barely surviving under Angra’s attacks, and he’s giving up because one arrogant king made a mess of our lives?

  The door to the study slams shut on us, separating the Winterian refugees from Noam’s men. Theron stayed within the study, and I realize maybe I should worry for him, but all I feel is a thudding emptiness when I face everyone else and see the same shock rendering them immobile.

  I shake my head incredulously. “Angra’s coming for us, isn’t he?”

  My question makes the veil of shock hang heavier, and no one so much as breathes in agreement. No one except Mather, who pulls his shoulders straighter, and when I slide my gaze up to him, the look he throws me is the single most terrifying emotion he’s ever shown. A violent mix of fear and brokenness and a slow smile that gets negated by the tears in his eyes.

  “Not for us,” he amends. “For me.”

  Sir snarls. “Mather …”

  But Mather takes one step backward, and my hands go out to him like I already know what he’s going to say, like his words are an earthquake and my body shakes with the tremors.

  “If this is where it’s going,” he starts, “if this is the fate Noam chose for us, I won’t let every last one of you die in the fray. I’m done putting all of you in danger for a cause we can only guess at. I’m done being a pawn.”

  Mather’s eyes meet mine and my heart drops.

  “I’ll fulfill Noam’s agreement,” he says. “I’ll make it so Angra couldn’t care less about the rest of you, and you’ll finally be able to free the Winterians. We don’t need magic, not if you can get Noam to fight off Angra. Not if—”

  “Mather!” His name pops out of my throat, a scratching, clawing croak. “Noam won’t help us no matter what deal we fulfill—”

  “So I shouldn’t at least try? With Angra no longer searching for you, imagine the good you could do! All this trouble, all this pain, for—what? Magic that may or may not come back? Magic we can’t even use, even if we got it back? No, I’m done. I’m—”

  Sir’s fist comes out of nothing, a solid white rock that slams into Mather’s cheek. Mather crumples onto the floor, body caved over on his hands and knees, while the rest of us gape and stare and gasp ragged breaths. Sir punched Mather. I can’t feel anything beyond shock, disbelief, my eyes having trouble telling my mind what they saw.

  Vicious red blotches paint Sir’s face as he crouches down and rips Mather’s head back so he can hiss into his face. “You are the king of Winter—you are not a coward,” he growls, and the anguish that leeches out of Sir’s voice shakes the same emotion into my body. “The only time you will ever face Angra is to run a sword through his chest, and if I hear you speak like this again, I will teach you the true meaning of the word sacrifice. We will figure this out—and it will not involve you handing yourself over to Angra.”

  Mather gawks up at him, just as aghast as the rest of us. Most of what Sir said was right, except for one thing. Mather didn’t suggest fulfilling Noam’s agreement because he’s a coward—he suggested it because he’s our king, because he’s tired of our lives being like this, because he saw a way to end it all.

  Sir grabs Mather’s arm and yanks him to his feet. Mather puts a hand to his face, covering the already purple bruise there, and eyes Sir with the wary look of someone who regrets what they just did.

  I open my mouth to intercede when a Cordellan soldier bursts through the doors at the end of the entryway, the ones leading outside the palace. He barely gives us a passing glance as he flings himself at the door to Noam’s study, yanks it open, and topples to his knees inside. Noam, Theron, and the soldiers within whirl toward the open door, Noam’s face tight with rage.

  “My king,” the soldier sputters, gasping for breath. “I bring grim news. It’s Spring. They’re—”

  Noam stomps forward. “What is it, man? A messenger? Damn king hasn’t—”

  “No, my king,” the soldier interrupts. “A Spring battalion crossed our southern border an hour ago—they’ve burned three farms and refuse to negotiate. They’re marching on us, my king. Angra’s men are marching on Bithai.”

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

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  17

  SPRING IS HERE. In Cordell.

  Noam flies out of the room, shoving past us, vanishing before anyone can say a word. Because if we were able to get a word in, we would have pointed out that all his machinations were for nothing. Spring is attacking him, which means there is no deal. Angra not only won’t agree to give him Winter, he won’t agree to anything.

  All Noam’s playing with us, all his lying, was futile, because now Angra has betrayed him. Mather was wrong too—handing himself over to Angra wouldn’t have stopped anything. Angra won’t rest until all of Winter is his, completely, every last piece of it.

  I inhale, breathing down a sudden surge of anxiety as the soldiers file out of the room after Noam. We’re alone, the Winterians standing in the hall and the Prince Heir of Cordell still hovering by his father’s desk.

  Theron moves forward. He didn’t know about his father’s plan. He couldn’t have, not the way he looks at me now as he crumples the letter in his slowly tightening fist, his face a mix of regret, anger, and sympathy. I jump when Mather’s fingers move against mine and I realize I’m holding on to him like he’s the only thing in this palace keeping me from falling into a hundred different pieces. When did I take his hand? After Sir punched him? I still can’t admit that really happened. That Mather suggested, for the briefest of moments, dying for us.

  My hand tightens on his, my chest pulsing with a medley of emotions. Fear for what he wanted to do; sorrow that, for a moment, I could have lost one of my friends; relief that Sir didn’t agree to his insane suggestion. But of all the emotions I feel, I’m most shocked for the ones I don’t feel. There’s no giddiness at holding his hand, none of the things I used to harbor for him. Mather is my king, my friend—my best friend—and I am his soldier. I’d hold Dendera’s or Finn’s hand the same way, if they needed it, if the
y threatened to let themselves die for us.

  The reasons why I’m holding Mather’s hand changed so fast. But this isn’t about him, or anything that’s happened between us. This is about a soldier protecting her king. This is about what it’s always been about: Winter. And Mather is Winter.

  Sir is the first to wake out of his shock. Of course he is. He starts spitting orders at everyone. “Finn, Greer, Henn, Dendera, Mather—to the armory. If any of the Cordellans give you trouble about getting gear, come find me. Alysson, stay with Meira. Neither of you are to leave this palace. Prince Theron—” Sir starts, then realizes he has no responsibility to order Theron about.

  Theron looks at him, teeth grinding together. “Armory too.”

  Sir turns to Mather. “I want you battle-ready in fifteen minutes.”

  Mather nods, his face set in a mask that could hide a plethora of emotions. Fear. Anger. Regret. Everything. He drops my hand and jogs down the hall after Finn, Greer, Dendera, and Henn, not looking back at me or letting me know at all what he’s thinking. Maybe he’s not thinking, can’t think, after all this.

  Sir points at me. “Meira—”

  I grimace. “Stay in the palace—I know.”

  His jaw clenches. “I was going to say be careful too.”

  My mouth falls open. But Sir has already hurried down the other end of the hall, toward the front doors that Noam just exited.

  Theron sets the letter on his father’s desk. “I didn’t know,” he promises when it’s just us and Alysson and a few soldiers down the hall.

  I inhale, amazed at how hollow I feel. Like the chaos of the past few seconds has drained everything out of me. “It doesn’t much matter now, does it?”

  Theron looks up at me, something working behind his eyes. A few quick steps through the study and he bursts into the hall, grabbing my hand. “Lady Alysson, would you please accompany us? I will place you under watch of my personal guards.”

  Alysson gapes at him. “Your Highness—” she starts but Theron is already walking, dragging me down the hall. She follows, but soldiers come from around the corner to fall in behind Theron and me, cutting us off from Sir’s wife as they stand guard over their heir.

  Theron pulls me closer to him and we stop at the entrance of the ballroom. “Shall we head to the armory?” he asks. His voice is low enough to be blocked from Alysson by his wall of soldiers.

  I look up at him. He keeps his eyes on me, a strange light glowing behind them.

  “But Sir—” My voice falls out from under me as the gleam in Theron’s eyes intensifies. In the aftermath of all that happened, in the midst of all that is happening, it’s such a warm relief that I smile back.

  Theron shakes his head. “Wants you to stay in the palace? You and I both know that’s not where you’ll do the most good.”

  I stare at him, letting his words roll over me. “You’ll let me fight?”

  “Once we get to the gate, whether you fight or return to the palace is up to you. But I’m not going to hold you back, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Why?”

  Theron’s mouth twitches. “Because I’ve been at my father’s disposal my entire life,” he whispers. “And I will not stand for this game monarchs play. These are our lives. I will not let my father or William or even Angra continue to tell us that they aren’t.”

  His poem rushes back to me, his jerky handwriting on the parchment in the library. Theron cocks up a corner of his mouth, studying me in a way that doesn’t feel possessive or condescending. It feels equal.

  Warmth gathers in my stomach when I smile back. It’s hardly the time for smiles and lingering gazes, but I can’t help it. It kicks away a small bit of the anxiety of facing Herod, as if having Theron beside me will keep me safe through this. Not as a protector—as an equal. I’m not the only one caught in this. I’m not alone.

  My mind flashes to the last time someone helped me like this, when Mather faked an injury so I could be the one to go to Lynia and get the locket half. Mather did it because he knew I wanted it, but Theron is doing this because he knows he would want it.

  I look up at Theron. They’re so similar. And yet so not.

  Theron nods at the soldiers behind him. “Escort Lady Alysson to safety.”

  “Yes, my lord,” one of them says and turns. Alysson starts to walk away with them, assuming we’re somewhere in the hodgepodge of men. The moment her back is turned, Theron and I slip in the opposite direction, diving through a door and into the servant’s halls.

  I know what I have to do to prove that I can be useful as both a future Cordellan queen and myself—fight in this battle. Protect this city and the Winterians. Sir will hate it.

  At this point, I couldn’t care less.

  We wait for Mather, Greer, Henn, Finn, and Dendera to get their gear and leave before we enter the armory. But it turns out Cordell doesn’t have armor suited to my small stature, so an extra layer of padding later, I’m marching beside Theron out of the armory with one of the beautiful metal crossbows strapped to my back. Too few of Cordell’s soldiers use the Autumnian weapon, and I’d stand out in the ranks of the army. The longer I go without Sir noticing me, the better.

  “Don’t you look battle ready?”

  I don’t turn as Mather jogs up beside us. He’s outfitted in armor that matches Theron’s—everything from breastplates down to greaves, chain mail clinking under it all. He’s got just as many weapons too, a sword and knives and even an ax strapped to his back, and the bruise on his cheek is a flaming purple-red now.

  Mather eyes me but I refuse to look at him. “You’ve never listened to William, have you? Not when we were children and not now.”

  I don’t respond, even as I realize that Theron is on my left, Mather my right. Both of them are wound as tight as I get before I launch my chakram through the air, and shooting looks as sharp as knives at each other.

  We’ll deal with that later. I just hope later isn’t after Bithai’s been ransacked by Spring and we’re scrounging through debris.

  The closer we get to the main entrance to Bithai, the more hectic the crowds are. Soldiers run toward the gate while citizens run away from it, dragging carts or livestock laden with whatever valuables they can hold. Residents of Bithai’s outer villages, most likely, come to take shelter within the city’s stone walls.

  “There’s a tower by the gate. My father will be there along with your general,” Theron says. He looks at Mather like he’s trying to decide what else to add.

  Mather nods. “How many men do you have in the city?”

  “Five thousand. Not nearly the bulk of our army, but enough.”

  “Conduit?”

  Theron cocks one corner of his mouth up, letting slip the smallest bit of pride. “My father may be known for pouring his conduit magic into agriculture, but he also gives much of his power to defense when needed. I think you’ll be pleased, King Mather.”

  Theron’s smile does nothing to ease one out of Mather. He stares at Theron, through him, and nods. “I hope for Bithai’s sake that you’re right.”

  The streets leading up to the front gate may have been busy, but the gate itself is chaotic. Citizens pour in from the land beyond, cattle bleat, babies wail. A few soldiers try to instill some sort of order, but the overall feel of the area is to get in as fast as possible, in any way possible.

  The tower Theron mentioned looms on our left, spiraling high above the wall to give those within a view of the surrounding area. A few captains linger around the door and as we draw closer, the muffled shouting of their fearless leader makes even the air feel nervous.

  Captain Dominick is one of the few by the door. His dark hair hangs in sweaty strands and when he turns to us, his tense face loosens almost imperceptibly.

  “My prince, a messenger reported that Spring’s current speed puts them at our gate by late afternoon.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” Theron says. He shoots a look at Mather, hard and daring. “Shall we?”

&
nbsp; Finally, finally, Mather lets his mouth twitch in a small grin. “Your kingdom, you first.”

  Theron tips his head and darts into the tower, his armor clanking as he twists up the spiral staircase. Mather starts to follow so I trot behind him, nearly smacking into him when he slams to a halt.

  “You can’t come like that,” he snaps down at me.

  My lip twitches in a snarl. I was prepared to hide somewhere in the tower to avoid Sir, but Mather owes me at least his silence, doesn’t he?

  “If you send me to the palace I’ll just sneak out and you won’t know where I am or be able to keep track of me. Trust me, this option’s better for everyone.”

  Mather cocks an eyebrow. “I know.”

  “What?”

  He sighs and waves over a running soldier. “Your helmet, please.”

  The man pulls off his helmet. Mather takes it in one hand and wraps my braid in a knot at my neck to slide the helmet over my head. The visor is still up and I feel like I’m looking at him, hazy and distant, through a tunnel, memories overlapping this moment with all those times I sparred with him. All those practice fights when it was just us, two children pretending to be soldiers. Or two soldiers pretending to be children.

  “Don’t speak,” Mather says. “Don’t draw any attention to yourself. If William realizes it’s you, you’re on your own.”

  “Nothing I haven’t dealt with before.”

  That makes him pause, one hand on each side of the helmet. I think maybe he wants to say something else, but he just drops the visor down with his thumbs.

  “When it starts, stay near me or so help me, Meira, I will march you back into Bithai myself.”