Page 119 of The Prince and the Ice King

Perhaps silence was worse….

“I have magic,” the guard blurted.

Reardon tilted his head up at him, and the guard shucked the helmet from his head, revealing a handsomeelfas the glamour lifted from his ears, rippling like the veil of the Mystic Valley, to show how they were pointed.

“My whole family are elves, taught to hide it until a time when the ruling power would learn sense. I’m also in love with a fellow guard.”

Reardon laughed. He didn’t mean to, but he’d never expected—

“Me too!” someone called. “Well… not the guard part, but I’m a half-elf! Most of my family is at least a quarter!”

“I see spirits!”

“I can transmute without alchemy!”

“I want to court the grocer’s daughter!”

The chorus grew into such a frenzy, louder than the jeers against him, that Reardon hardly caught it all, but his smile continued to grow. The racket wasn’t without dissension and wary glances from magicless humans, especially when more and more pointed ears were revealed, but the silent majority wasn’t being so silent anymore.

“Please!” Reardon tried to hush them.

“Quiet!” the guard yelled, and the chorus fell to a murmur.

“Master Wells delivers a cure to my father, but the only way to save me and our kingdom is to stop General Lombard. I must give chase. And so I ask you all, as your prince….”

He’d feared for most his life admitting half the truths he’d spouted today, but without anything hidden from his people any longer, he saw most of them looking back at him with pride.

“Who will join me?”

Jack

Not aging made it easy to ignore the passage of days, never truly feeling them, but for Jack, waiting on his prince, the days since Reardon’s departure moved at a crawl.

Barclay’s vision never once changed, save to say that the shadow over Reardon seemed darker as the expected time for the prince’s return grew close. Whether that meant good or ill, Barclay didn’t know.

Even so, with the castle fortified and Jack’s people as ready as they could be for whatever might be coming, everyone had a remarkable way of staying in good spirits.

It was in realizing that the approaching night might be Jack’s last, his final moment to be the man Reardon believed him to be, that he asked Josie to meet him in the passageway behind the great hall after sunset.

“Are you certain?” she asked, taking his arm. “You haven’t shown any of the others yet. I didn’t tell them you’d shown me. Not even Zephyr.”

“You don’t think he knows?” Jack grinned, dressed in a simple blue doublet, saving the one crafted by Reardon until his prince was at his side again. “If he doesn’t, he’s about to find out, and everyone else with him.”

Together, they entered the hall through the doorway that usually only admitted the court on the first night of a new sacrifice. With stalwart steps, Jack walked with his sister to his center seat at the head table.

The rest of the court was out amongst the people, feasting and drinking as one. As a hush fell over everyone gathered, Jack sought out Branwen, Liam, and Zephyr first.

It was no surprise to find them with their loves—all three at the same table with Caitlin, Shayla, and Nigel respectively. Barclay was with them too, though contrary to the surprised gapes they all wore, he was smirking.

“I may have told Barclay, though,” Josie whispered.

Jack shook his head at her, but he was smirking too, because for the first time since they’d been cursed, he stood before his kingdom as himself and didn’t feel the need to hide his face. “What are you staring at?” Jack called, making sure to maintain a pleasant tone. “Aren’t we here to enjoy dinner and drink, or are you going to gawk all night?”

Without being asked, Oliver and Amelia rose to fill fresh plates to deliver to them, and Jack allowed the gesture, since they looked so pleased to offer it.

Barclay came forward too, bringing goblets and a jug of wine.

When Josie curled a finger at him to join them at the table, the young fortune-teller retrieved his plate and wine to sit at Josie’s side.

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