“You did it before,” Bron said with a forced, grating laugh. “Can you not just do so again?”
“If it were that easy, these garments would have been replaced with others by now, wouldn’t they?” I knew I should have watched my tone and chosen my words more carefully, but I’d spent most of my life doing just that, and in the end, it had done nothing good.
Not for me nor those I loved.
“You can do this. I know you can. I’ve seen it.” The prince stood. “And then we will have our revenge, Opal, this I swear to you.”
Revenge.
The word had never sounded more attractive, had never caused my heart to refire in such a violent, deafening way. I wanted it more than I remembered wanting anything—knew that I would need it. I stared down at the rippling fabric. “We will die trying.”
Bron’s footsteps halted halfway to the door. “But try we must.” He hesitated, then murmured, “I shall return tomorrow if that is okay with you?”
I said nothing, knowing that was his way of saying the time for lamenting my fate and dawdling had come to an end.
Once the door closed, the latches clicked on the other side, and I willed my heating blood to calm so I could try to focus.
There was nothing else I could do. I wasn’t leaving this castle alive unless I’d given them what they wanted, and even then, the chances of that happening seemed slim. Still, it was all I had, and though I was tired, so stars-damned tired of being told what to do, I’d learned that doing what I wanted led to far graver fates.
Hours sped by, the sun dragging toward the bottom of the sky as I sat with that first cloak, now spread before me over the floor. Tears threatened, but I knew they wouldn’t fall. Instead, they left an ache in my skull that I tried to infuse into my unachievable task.
By nightfall, all I’d managed to do was undo the previous stitching, ragged pieces of thread waiting to be rewoven with gold.
My fingers brushed and glided over every inch of fabric, and then I moved on to the next, a tunic made from fine cotton, and willed my heart to unspool before me into the awaiting garment.
Either it refused or something was missing, something was wrong, but I couldn’t piece together what that could be, what that could mean, as I thought back to the handful of times gold had spun from beneath my fingers before.
Another tray of food was delivered, and my uneaten lunch taken away. I’d managed a few sips of water, feeling guilty when I’d remembered my mother and how she’d promised to make herself do what felt impossible when all she wanted was to fade away and allow her soul to find my father.
The door closed once more, the servant girl never once looking my way.
She’d be reporting to the queen, of that I was sure, and after tearing more clothing from the trunk and staring at it in dismay, the days spent eating poorly in my own kingdom and eating nothing here began to catch up with me. I grew dizzy, my eyelids unbearably heavy, and slumped over the clothing on the floor to stare at the filigreed ceiling.
A clack sounded upon the windowsill. I didn’t move. Another bird hoping I’d throw them my uneaten food.
“Sunshine, what in the bleeding stars are you doing in this putrid place?”
Sitting against the window frame with one booted foot perched on the floor and the other upon the wooden sill, the intruder cocked his head. “I’ve been looking all over the countryside for you.”
Not a bird. I wished it had been.
A wolf.
“Well?” Beneath the hood of his cloak, his eyes gleamed, roaming over me in a quick, assessing sweep. “Did they steal your tongue? I hope not.” His mouth curved. “I am rather fond of it.”
“You,” I breathed, my heart finally restarting with a painful thud.
His smirk widened into a grin. “Me.”
I scrambled back over the clothing, hands slipping on silk and chiffon. “No.”
He watched from his perch, a brow poised high. “No?” His cloak absorbed the starlight as he tilted forward. “No, what?”
“You’re… you’re him, and you killed him.”
A low laugh fell from sin-shaped lips, the roughened sound lighting his eyes. “Sunshine, though I do find your befuddlement amusing, you’re making very little sense.”
“My father.” I climbed to my knees, my gown in tangles beneath and around me. “You killed him,” I seethed through my teeth, each word fire, “and you ate his heart.”
The blood king’s lips pursed. “Oh, that.”
A heavy silence fell like a noose to wrap around my neck, freezing my desire to scream for help, to alert the guards below the stairs that the enemy had breached their walls. That he might kill me.
“So it was you,” he murmured, so soft, too soft, and I ground my teeth against the fluttering inside my empty stomach. “The black swan.”
“What swan?”
“Don’t even attempt it.” Throwing his hand at me, he said, “We both know you were there.”
About to call out, my intentions wilted when the king tutted. “I wouldn’t do that. You’d hate for someone else to die because of you, now wouldn’t you?” I swallowed, my eyes shuttering. “It wasn’t your fault really. Sheltered, shrouded in a bubble of innocence as you were, why, I’ll bet your only responsibility in this life has been…” He feigned thought. “To save yourself for breeding, perhaps?”
He hummed, receiving confirmation he hadn’t needed when I said nothing. “As I was saying, even if you hadn’t been guileless, how would you have known who I am?”
I wasn’t sure if he was trying to alleviate the guilt that weighed my every breath or cause it to spread like a forest fire.
“Those from this side of the realm who have seen me rarely live to tell the tale.”
“Why?” A useless, stupid question I shouldn’t have set free.
“Why what?” Midnight rippled over his black attire, the breeze flowing around him to kiss my burning skin. “Why did I deceive you? That should be obvious.” His words carried a dry humor I wanted to wring out of him until he begged for me to stop. “Why did I kiss you? Well, my pretty little broodmare, that should also be obvious by now being that—”
“Enough. Why did you kill him?”
“You’re a little rude. Has anyone ever told you that?” He contemplated the thought, his tongue skimming his upper lip, and I directed my eyes to my shaking hands. “Perhaps you’ve been too spoiled in that lovely kingdom of yours. Manners, my black swan, are not archaic, nor are they barbaric. They are ingrained in our heritage and a part of who we are.”
I nearly laughed at the absurdity, hissing, “You’re the barbarian, a savage with no heart. Where were your fucking manners when you murdered my father, my people?”
A smile entered his voice, but I kept my attention fixed on my twisting, squeezing fingers. “We’ve all the time in the world for stories, but unfortunately, that time has not yet come.”
I looked up when his other foot dropped to the floor with a controlled thump so as not to alert anyone to his presence. “Where are the others?”
“Who?” he asked, rising to his feet.