Page 80 of A Throne of Blood and Ice

Clarissa’s words flood my mind, but for the first time in my life, I’m looking down on them from above, and it’s like I can see the twelve-year-old me—gangly and skinny and so very very much a child.

And when the words come out of Clarissa’s mouth—whore, stupid, slut—for the first time in my life, I don’t want to shove the little girl away, lock her up, forget she ever existed.

I just want to wrap her up.

“Why are you still here, Nox?” I ask, and it’s this question—not the admission that I bore a child out of wedlock—that has him flinching. His eyes shutter, and though I feel freer up on this roof as the queen’s prisoner than I’ve felt in six long years, my heart threatens to plummet off the side of this castle.

He swallows, and for a moment, I think he’s really not going to tell me.

“Oh, come on,” I say, punching him in the arm and doing my best to keep my tone light-hearted, though it’s straining at the edges. “I tell you I was locked up for nine months until I gave birth to a child who was stolen out of my arms, and you’re not going to give me anything? Not a smidge of darkness?”

Nox sighs, running his hand through his hair. He looks like the rim of the moon, the way his tousled hair falls in his face, the way his pale skin reflects the glory of the heavens above us.

He opens his mouth, but it’s like he can’t seem to get the words out.

“The queen has something over you, doesn’t she,” I state more than ask. When he swallows, I bite my lip. “I know what that’s like, sort of.”

He cocks his head to the side in question.

“Clarissa. She knows where my child is—where the family is who took my baby. It’s why I sent her almost all the salary I made working as a servant at the castle. It’s why I never told Evander where all my money went. For years, she told me that if I did as she said, she’d tell me where my baby was.”

Nox sighs, and it’s almost like he deflates. He tips back his chin and sips from his flask. When he’s done, he sets it next to him on the rooftop instead of returning it to his belt. “I’m guessing she never came through on her promise.”

The weight of what my words imply hits me, and I grab Nox’s hand. The queen is blackmailing him somehow, and I can only hope it’s through a bargain that Nox has struck to his own favor, that in extracting the parasite from me, the queen will allow him to return to his family. “It doesn’t have to be the same for you,” I say. “The queen is fae. She can’t lie to you, can’t go back on a promise like Clarissa can. If she says she won’t hurt your family, then it’s not just that she won’t. She can’t.”

“And what if the queen isn’t the one who I’m afraid will hurt them?” he asks, and his gaze is a plea.

“Isn’t that usually who we end up hurting, the people we love?” I ask. “But they always seem to be the ones who are most eager to forgive us.” I mean to be comforting, but my words come out stale, probably because Ellie’s set jaw comes flashing into my mind.

Nox nods, his gaze darting down to my hands as he traces the veins on my wrists with his finger absentmindedly.

“One of these days, I’m going to get you back to your prince,” he says.

I falter, my stomach twisting. “Well, he’s not really my prince…”

Nox grins, a wicked smile spreading across his face. “Then maybe I’ll keep you trapped here with me.”

I should hate the sound of that more than I do.

CHAPTER26

BLAISE

We stop by Nox’s bedroom on the way back to the dungeons.

“I have an extra set of quilts,” he explains as he places the key in the lock and turns, the door creaking open. “I’ve noticed yours is developing holes in it.”

He shoots me a disapproving look, but it’s the amused sort.

I may or may not kick holes in my blankets while I sleep.

When he slips into his room, I follow, and when he lights the lantern on the wall and light swarms the room, I can’t help the hole that chisels into my heart.

“How long have you had this room?” I ask, though I feel as though I already know the answer.

Nox runs his hands through his hair, his gaze upward as he counts back. Then he blows out a huff of air. “Oh, I don’t know. Eleven or twelve years?”

Eleven or twelve years.

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