Page 4 of Crown of Ashes

I took the seat across from her. I was being petty, and I knew it. I reined myself in. I’d been trained carefully to have a certain kind of demeanor. Snarky. Quick-witted. A bit mean.

Maura stepped aside and opened the door, calling to a servant for tea.

“I know you and Fear were quite close, but I’m not uncomfortable,” she told me gently. “I know Fear. I know the bond we share. You can be friends with my husband—God knows it sounds like you need one.”

Sympathy from a mortal? It could not be endured. “When will Fear be here, exactly?”

“How was your journey from Caer Lira?” she asked me.

“It began with the battle where I watched my parents die, and ended with the discovery that I am no longer betrothed.” My voice came out light, amused. It was the only way I could speak those words. “Between, I played at being a servant to one of my doubles, who turned up murdered, and I thought I would be summarily executed for the crime. It feels as if I’ve been chased across half the isles. But I knew if I could get here, I would be fine.”

“You will be. You’re welcome here.”

She could say that, but I did not believe her hospitality would last long, given that I had been her husband’s first kiss. Certainly, we had been eleven years old at the time. But still.

“I’m sorry for your losses.” She had a rather blunt way of speaking, not very elegant, but there was sincerity in it.

If she had not been married to Fear, I would’ve liked her.

I found myself looking away from that penetrating blue gaze. I knew what to do with enemies. I knew what to do with flattery. I didn’t know what to do with this woman, who had good reason to want me gone, yet seemed genuinely sorry for my pain.

I kept looking out the window at the blur of streets beyond. The city looked the same outside as it had the last time I was here, but the world all around it had changed. “I don’t need sympathy. I need soldiers. Lend me some of your army to take back what’s mine, and I’ll be out of your court and out of your way.”

Her shoulders set, as if she were steeling herself. “I would like to help, but⁠—”

“We’re rather busy using our army, Zia.” His voice was deep and rich and cut in from the door.

I leapt to my feet. Something in my chest that had been clenched for days let go all at once as I saw Fear’s handsome face, the smile that crossed his lips.

“Fear!” I crossed to him without thinking about it, careless, eager to be comforted. I needed to be near someone who knew my face, someone who had known my parents and eaten at their table and been scolded by my mother, which was a singularly terrifying experience Fear and I were both quite familiar with.

“Hello, Zia. I’m glad to see you.” He stretched out his hands, but not quite to hug me. His hands landed on my shoulders, and he didn’t pull me in, but held me at arm’s length, warmly but carefully, the way he would steady even a stranger who was about to fall. “I’ve been worried. I’m glad you made it.”

I felt the distance between us as if it were a winter storm rising up.

His hand squeezed my shoulders, warm and comforting. An array of images crossed my mind of things that were like this incredibly unsatisfying contact. Being checked over by a physician. Being touched by a cousin. Being scolded by a tutor.

“I made it,” I said, my voice quieter, chastened.

“It was a hard journey,” Cara told him, and again I had the sense that she was defending me.

He let go and moved toward Cara. His arm slid around her waist, and he dropped a kiss into her hair without looking, as if he knew where she was the same way he knew where to find his own shadow. The careless ease of a habit, worn in deep.

And in that moment, I knew something else I’d counted on was lost forever and would never be again.

I liked her. That was the worst part. I wished to hate her. That would’ve been far easier than standing across from this woman who should’ve been less than I was.

I was better trained, better educated, better bred. I had known him first. We had a shared history, shared troubles. There were only so many royal children scattered across the five kingdoms; we knew what it was like to live with parents like ours and kingdoms to serve.

And yet somehow, to him, she was more. Clearly, she was everything.

“I heard rumors that you’re not keeping our engagement. That seems rather conclusively proven out now,” I said, my voice light, with a smile.

Fear didn’t smile back, but then there had been no real levity in mine. “We were never engaged, Zia. That was my mother’s plot. I was already betrothed to Cara when our parents negotiated.” Genuine sympathy was in his gaze, and it scalded my skin. “I am sorry.”

I tucked my hair back behind my ear with trembling fingers, then crossed my arms. Why had they begun to shake? It was only that the journey had been so long, and I had thought there would be relief at the end of it…

“The day they died, they spoke of my wedding. They were comforted by the thought that I would be safe here⁠—”