Page 3 of Crown of Ashes

I missed the days when it was so easy to be extraordinary.

I missed the days when I was happy to be here, happy to be with my friend. It was a time when I could not have fathomed I’d ever escape here, leaving behind the wreckage of my kingdom and most likely the corpses of my family. I wouldn’t know they were dead for sure until he told me what his spies had learned. If I had any tears left to cry, they might’ve burned in my eyes then. I was exhausted.

I had watched the dragon of the so-called rebel prince, Celyn, yank my mother into the air, tearing her hand out of mine. I had sailed for Fear, and safety, because that was what my family wanted me to do. To preserve our family line, to preserve the throne, to be safe at Fear’s side with his ring on my finger, no matter what happened to them.

And so I had sailed away, even as Celyn’s dragon opened his talons and let my mother’s corpse drop into the sea.

My gaze went back to the hound, with its not-quite-perfect eye. We had named it afterward. Kurian, for the great warrior of myth. It had been an act of contrition, the kind that children can manage.

Now I sat on one of the chairs in the room where I once played hide and seek, in a time when I had felt safe and loved and could never have imagined losing not just my crown but my family.

I looked like a petitioner in a room where I had once been princess. The truth was, I was a petitioner. I had thought I was coming here as his future wife. Of course he would lend his wife his army.

But the stories I had heard during the long and fraught voyage here, trying to shake off Celyn’s spies and the dragon guard trying to capture me or kill me, had left me aware that the dragon prince was in love.

I couldn’t quite believe it until I saw it for myself.

The door opened, and I stood to my feet, hope leaping in my chest. I didn’t look the way I would’ve liked to, seeing Fear again. I’d been allowed to wash. Despite the uncertainty people had about my identity. Someone had brought me a gown that almost fit. I pinned my hair up rather badly, because I used to have my servant do it for me. I did not look like the princess anymore. But at least I looked less like a bedraggled street rat pretending to be me without even being good at the pretense.

It was not Fear who stepped inside. Disappointment hit me so hard that I couldn’t hide it.

The woman who stood at the door wasn’t dressed like a queen.

“Who are you?” I demanded.

Her guard, who followed her in, had been one of the many who interrogated me. She was tall and brown-skinned and gorgeous, her purple eyes watching me, a mocking smile coming to her lips.

“Cara,” the small queen said. Then, almost apologetically, she added, “Fear’s wife.”

Her bodyguard snorted. “Also queen of Caer Own. Also savior of our kingdom.”

Cara, queen of the kingdom and savior according to her bodyguard, waved her off. She wore a simple beige linen shirt and leggings that hugged her long legs and a pair of black boots. Her long blonde hair, shot through with pink, hung in a long braid over her narrow shoulder, woven through with flowers. She wore no crown, but she did wear daggers on her belt. She hadn’t bothered to dress in armor to meet me.

She was pretty. Not exceptionally so. There were very few women I’d ever seen who could resist Fear’s charms. Why her?

I’d heard the rumors. I had almost managed to laugh at them, and I had certainly managed to pretend to. Fear, marrying some girl nobody had ever heard of. Some mortal.

“Where is Fear?” I demanded. Something cold settled over me. It wasn’t jealousy, or at least it wasn’t only jealousy. I hadn’t been in love with Fear. He’d just been my good friend, and I had thought that was enough: to rule beside my best friend, to spend my days with him, to bind Caer Lira and Caer Own together so tightly no one could pry them apart.

And here she was, standing in front of me, dressed like a stable boy, and looking rather unextraordinary—especially to be the wife of the most incredible and dangerous trickster I knew.

“He’ll be here soon,” she said. “I hope that perhaps we could talk about the necessary elements of your visit so that you two can focus on catching up as friends.”

I tilted my head, studying her. She studied me right back.

“You cannot be comfortable with me being friends with your husband,” I said, flatly. I intended to put her back on her heels, to catch her off balance. It seemed only fair to repay the favor.

Her brows arched, but she just smiled.

“Sit, please. By the windows. It’s a beautiful day today, and I’ll have tea sent.” She glanced at her bodyguard.

The bodyguard shook her head. She was regarding me with a far colder look than Cara, as if she might throw me out the window if I insulted her queen again. Fascinating. How had that loyalty bloomed so quickly?

“Please, Maura,” Cara said to her. “She’s had a long journey.”

It sounded like an apology for my behavior, and I stiffened in irritation.

Cara settled into the chair across from me. Morning sunlight fell across her face, illuminating faint freckles across her nose. I had always thought freckles were a little bit ugly. Blotches, really.