Page 25 of The Prince and the Ice King

“How did you put it?But down the Ice King came to feed,” he sang softly, haunting and low. “I swooped upon her like a storm. I knew what my touch would do, though I hadn’t seen the effects on a human yet. In that moment, I wanted to freeze every highwayman that had ever lived, every liar, everyone who thought they could claim their place and then simply be gone when it no longer suited them.

“If she wanted out, then she was out. I caught her before she reached the gates and laid my hands on her without mercy. She froze on the spot… right here where I left her.”

Jack saw Reardon stumble, the young man not expecting to be brought before the subject of the story, yet there she was, untouched by time. Jack rarely shattered statues, preferring to keep them as reminders.

Her expression was preserved in mute shock, the trinkets she carried frozen with her in a bag at her side.

“Was I wrong?” Jack asked as he stopped in front of her.

“I… don’t know,” Reardon said. “I can’t say I ever agree with someone being killed. But you certainly seem to be the hero of your story.”

“I’m no hero,” Jack snapped, lunging toward Reardon more closely than intended and causing him to stagger back. “That is not the lesson here. I earned my curse, but the people your kingdom sends to me did not. Even ones like her….” He glanced at her frozen body, remembering the sweet smile she’d afforded everyone in the castle, like she was a doppelganger of her own self once the truth was revealed. “I can’t say if she deserved her fate, but as I said—”

“You won’t hesitate to kill an enemy,” Reardon finished. “But like I told you, Majesty, I am not one. I believe all of this. You don’t need to frighten me. We can end this. Together. The sacrifices. Maybe even the curse. Just tell me. Tell me what caused it.”

What caused it… was that Jack had proven to be the real monster of his kingdom, far worse than the jagged edges his body now displayed. He hadn’t killed or robbed or bedded anyone unwilling. He’d done worse.

Apathy was so much worse….

“Please.” Reardon inched closer. “Do you think I can’t sympathize?”

Jack fell to crunch down into the frost at his feet on all fours and leaned close to Reardon’s face. “I think you will realize that this curse cannot be broken and all you hope to accomplish will fail. When you can no longer deny that is true, you will see no other answer but my death. And I will not allow that to happen.”

“Majesty….” Reardon shuddered.

A small part of Jack would have preferred to end this now, before he had to again be disappointed, but the sweet face before him… he didn’t want to see it frozen. “We’re done for today,” Jack said and turned to move back toward the castle.

Reardon

Reardon had the entire day ahead of him—but for at least a quarter hour hedidn’t move from the garden.

He walked back through the statues of ice, staring at each expression, at each look of terror or surprise, and understood why the Ice King didn’t believe him or his ambitions, but he couldn’t give up after only one day.

He hadn’t seen Barclay yet that morning. Maybe he could find him—

“Thinking of fleeing already, dear prince?”

The familiar voice spun Reardon around.

Shayla.

Even in the bright light of morning, she wore dark colors, making her stand out starkly against the frost on the ground, with her equally dark skin and black hair. Adornments hung from her ears, and her lips were painted burgundy. She looked like the type of thief the Ice King had talked about, especially with a large knapsack thrown over her shoulder, yet she had proven herself welcoming and clearly had her place here.

“Dearprince,sweetprince,littleprince. Can someone just call me Reardon?”

Shayla laughed, reaching him and giving his shoulder a firm smack like last night. “Reardon it is. Still have some time left on your cold potion,Reardon?”

“I think so.” Reardon didn’t feel much chill, and Caitlin had said the potion should last for hours.

“Then come on.” Shayla motioned him toward the gate, which Reardon had assumed didn’t open much outside the acceptance of annual offerings, but apparently he was wrong. “You said you wanted to earn your place. It’s my day to go foraging, and around here, no one leaves the castle alone. You’re coming with me.”

Chapter 3

Reardon

The Emerald Kingdom wasto the south, the Mystic Valley farther north down the opposite side of the Ice King’s hill, but Reardon followed Shayla to the east toward a clearing and the edge of a thick wood that he knew would eventually join with the Dark Forest to the Shadow Lands.

He hoped the true sacrifice had made it there safely and that he hadn’t doomed them instead. The Shadow Lands were just as much a mystery as the Ice King’s castle.

---