Page 11 of Cursed Shadows 2

So I smile something sad up at him.

I throw myself against him, arms wrapped around his middle, and I hold him tight. His returned embrace is stiff, but he returns it and that’s all that matters.

“I hope you’re right about this,” he says softly.

Me too.

4

DAXEEL

††††††

Daxeel storms through the corridors of the garrison.

The harshness of his mood has his face set to stone. A half-hour he waited in the parlour of the harem, only to learn from the madam that all his appointments had vanished from the roster, and Willow was booked out.

Daxeel didn’t spare a second on wondering how that happened.

Her.

That vicious one is getting in the way. Before he could even ask anything about it, the madam made it clear that nothing can be done, though since she’s dokkalf, he doesn’t quite trust that she spoke the truth.

Now, it’s late into the First Wind already, too close to the Quiet—and so he needs to find his meddlesome sister and get her back to Hemlock House in Kithe.

Since she wasn’t in the Hall, he climbed the stone steps to the tower. Only Rune and Samick were up there. Now, the three of them head to the library, the only other place he can think she’ll be.

But as he steers into the corridor with too many plants from Licht, he falters. His breath loosens with a shudder.

Slowly, he turns to look at the crystal vase against the wall.

Daffodils.

An ache blooms in his chest, but stronger is the surge of ice-cold fury.

His hand reaches out for the daffodils.

Behind him, Samick is silent and still. He watches closely. Rune leans against the wall, arms folded, and a knowing glintin his severe eyes.

Neither speak a word, not about Daxeel’s pause or even that this is the first of the daffodils that they have seen in this corridor.

And Daxeel’s mind is thrown back to that night in lessons when she handed him one of those buttery flowers she plucked from the hill.

In the shadows of the corridor, he pinches the green stems in his fingers.

They wither in his touch. They die. Like he did.

He stalks off, Samick at his heels.

Rune gives the wilted flowers a moment’s look, then he plucks the single parchment piece sticking out from under the vase, before he’s following them through the corridor.

He unfolds the parchment.

‘My room. Break of the Quiet.’

Rune’s long, strong legs move quicker. He comes up to Daxeel’s side. Despite the glacier feel of his energy, Rune hands him the parchment.

Daxeel just runs it over with an icy look, then crumples it in his fist.

---