Page 118 of The Prince and the Ice King

“Highness!” the guard cried, seizing his shoulders.

Reardon had to keep him away from Wells, or risk the cure never reaching his father. “I… I must see Lombard!”

“He’s left to slay the Ice King in time to free you and your father,” the guard said, eyes widening at the sight of the dagger’s hilt. “It’s true…. Please, Highness, you must—”

“No!” Reardon fought to shake him away, but his vision spun again, everything around him a bright blur in the morning light—or perhaps that was the many colors of the crowd beginning to gather. “He lied to you!”

“You’re delirious—”

“I’m not!” Reardon fought that much harder, but realized quickly how futile it was, because he looked every bit the madman, and struggling only made him weaker and the pain that much worse. “I… I must reach the square. Let me tell the people what is happening. Then, if you’re still against me… you can take me to wherever Lombard told you.”

Through Reardon’s hazy vision, the guard looked sympathetic, as loyal as any could be after whatever lies Lombard spread. “I suppose it can’t hurt to let you speak, but… the state of you—”

“I’ll manage,” Reardon said, allowing the guard to loop an arm around his waist and carry him toward the center of the city.

It was only him and that single guard. The small crowd that had gathered at their exchange gasped and whispered, but whatever they thought the dagger in their prince’s chest meant, they followed with eager interest to learn more.

Allowing only a furtive glance back, Reardon saw Wells slip out of the shop and head for the castle entrance. That was one burden lifted, even if Reardon failed the rest.

Other guards they came across went silent at the sight of Reardon. There weren’t many. Lombard likely had most of them with him as part of the legions headed to conquer the Frozen Kingdom.

Word spread of the wild, wounded prince before they reached their destination, and by the time the guard brought Reardon to the center of the square and up the merchant platform, the streets were crowded and the din of voices hushed.

“Your prince is not dying!” Reardon called, weak but forcing each word to be as loud as he could. “Whatever you’ve heard… this daggerisenchanted, and it will kill me, but not from the wound. And it is not the Ice King who wielded it.

“General Lombard betrays us. The villain is him, not me, and not our neighbors. He wielded this magic and means to take more from the Frozen… from theSapphireKingdom to the north. Yes, that is where I’ve been these many weeks, but I am not bewitched.”

“Then where are our men?” someone called—a woman, old enough to be someone’s grandmother. “Two men went missing looking for you!”

“I know. I saw one of them die,” Reardon admitted, “and I am so sorry for it. So is the man who killed him. The soldier threatened a member of the castle at sword point, and her love merely meant to protect her. Would you have not done the same?”

The woman might have been that soldier’s mother, or the mother of the younger soldier, but though grief claimed her features, she didn’t speak again.

“The other was killed by Lombard to prevent him from telling my father that I was safe. He is your enemy, not the Sapphire Kingdom or its people. I have seen our loved ones that were cast so cruelly there, and for what? Magic? Destitution? Love for another that does not fit the molds of the many?

“If you need to steal to survive, then you have not failed your kingdom. Your kingdom failed you. And who someone loves or what power resides within them, however frightening it may seem, is not worth condemning. I… I have no magic, but….” Reardon closed his eyes to take a breath and steel his nerves to finish this, though it was not the same as admitting his deepest secret to a kinder kingdom weeks before. “Should I be your king someday, I would stand before you with a prince or other king at my side, not a queen.”

“Deviant!” a voice said in alarm, and when Reardon opened his eyes to look, he could not say who had cried it, for many more rose up to call similarly punishing things.

“Corruption!”

“Cursed!”

“The Ice King controls him!”

“No,” Reardon snarled, lurching forward from the guard who held him and nearly toppling right off the platform. “No… I am no more worthy of vile words or banishment than any other! And I know I’m not alone. Not only in my passions, but magic exists among us, as prevalent as in any age before.”

He said it without thinking but knew it to be true as soon as the words left him.

“Lombard uses magic in the despicable way you fear, but he did speak one truth before he plunged this dagger into my chest. He said I was the rare one, having no magic at all, which means far more of youthan those put in chains or sent from our kingdom as exiles and sacrifices have magic within you, right here amongst us.”

That stirred the crowd to cast their accusations on each other.

“Do you wish to hide? To pretend forever? To wait for Lombard to return victorious, claim the throne, and continue to pick you off? If you have elvish blood or some hidden ability you think dooms you, know that I will never allow someone to be sent to the dungeons for such things again.

“Speak! Show yourselves! Please…. And we can be a larger army than those who call us corrupt. If you don’t… then I have no one to help me stop Lombard, and when he destroys our neighbors, he will destroy us too.”

Reardon sank down on weak legs, but the guard was there to catch him. Expecting a few more volleyed insults, Reardon was surprised to hear only silence, eerie within the square when it was usually so bustling.

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