“I told you!” Mist cries out. “She’s a deceiver. A cheat. She seduced Midas and took his power, and now she’s going to do the same to King Rot!”
A crescendo of voices surges, and within moments, the rumor is caught up in a current too forceful to stop.
How in the Divine-damned could I have missed something like this? How could I not have known?
“You’re trembling,” my brother says, yanking me out of my flooding thoughts. His gaze casts over my shoulder. “Your queen is cold. Find something for her.”
There’s shuffling behind me and then the weight of a cloak being draped over my shoulders. “Here you are, Queen Kaila.”
My fingers grip the front of the cloak, pulling it tight around my chest, though it does nothing to ward off the chill, because it’s seeped all the way through to my bones. I need to be back in Third, walking along the beach at the height of day in order to feel any sort of warmth again after being stuck here for so long.
However, I can’t go home yet. Not when everything I’ve worked so hard for is falling through my fingers. I can feel the eyes of the crowd glancing at me, waiting to see what I’ll do.
“Manu, have someone confirm that Ravinger just fled with Lady Auren.”
My brother nods at my command before moving out of my line of sight, where I hear him issuing orders to someone. I glance around the courtyard, noting that only Ranhold’s guards are gathered outside. Not a single guard of Midas’s. Not a bit of gold-plated armor in sight.
“Keon,” I call, and he immediately turns to me. “Have some of Ranhold’s guards go inside and confirm that the danger has passed. See if they can find Midas and if he needs help.”
He moves away with a nod, pointing at a couple of Fifth’s guards standing around a splatter of gold on the snow, kicking at the solidifying puddle warily.
As I continue to stare at the castle, the wind picks up, glazed slush starting to spit from the sky, as if it wasn’t miserable enough out here already.
Three of the Ranhold soldiers break away, walking forward with grim faces as they head for the broken doorway. The first one holds out his hands to the others, then kneels at the first splash of the spilled gold that lies motionless on the steps.
He presses his finger against it, and when it does nothing, he stands again, nodding to the others. Together, they walk up to the doorway, boots clicking over the solidified gold before they disappear inside.
We wait.
The crowd still gathered in the courtyard has grown quiet again, the anxiousness of the wait seeming to clog up their throats.
Despite my own warring thoughts, I walk to the front of the castle, stopping to face everyone as I put on a calm yet strong demeanor. Their prince is dead, Rot has fled, and Midas isn’t here, so I’m the one they need to look to, and it’s important that I cultivate that. Right now, I need to be seen.
“Do not fear,” I announce. “The danger is over, and I will find out if what has been claimed is true.”
The people murmur, my powers gathering the whispered relief, the admiration, the respect they have for me.
“Well done, sister,” Manu says beneath his breath.
When one of the guards reappears, I nod to Keon to go collect his report. My brother-in-law steps over, expression stoic before dismissing the man, but my eyes scan the crowd, magic picking up their mumblings.
I break off my magic when Keon comes over.
“Well?” Manu asks nervously.
“All the gold seems to have stopped its movement and is solidified,” he says quietly, keeping his voice down.
“And Midas?” I press.
His brown eyes center on me. “They believe he’s dead.”
I suck in a shocked breath. It stays stuck to my throat, just as the words themselves weave in my head, wrapping around my skull in trapping strands.
Dead.
My lips press together, and I feel my eyes chiseling into the face of the castle. All my hard work...all this time I’ve spent on my machinations, and now this.
King Midas does nothing for me if he’s dead.
I came here to negotiate deals, to exert my own wants through an impressionable prince and a rich king. Things changed, but they were for the better. I had a plan. I was going to be the first monarch in history to join two kingdoms together through marriage, while having a hand in a third.
Because power is everything, and though I may not have a physical magic like gold-touch or rot, I have words, and a queen can do a lot with a web full of people’s secrets.
I have been working endlessly since I took my throne to ensure that my people see me as just as much of a power threat as any other monarch. That would’ve been solidified even further with these alliances. Now, all of that is crumbling.
All because of Lady Auren. Lady. As if a saddle pet warrants the term.
Anger and fear clash inside my head, though I don’t let it show. Not when so many people are watching. As a woman in power, you can never let people see your true emotional reactions because they would only use them against you.
“I want to see.”
Before either of them can stop me, I stride toward the castle, toes frozen as more snow saturates my silk slippers.
“Sister,” Manu calls, but I don’t stop. I hear rushing footsteps as he and Keon catch up with me just before I make it to the steps.
“At least let me go first,” Keon says as he abruptly cuts in front so he can walk up before me.
“Be careful,” Manu cautions.
With a brisk nod, Keon heads up the steps, and as soon as he does, I follow behind him. “Kaila,” Manu hisses beside me. “Just because it’s stable right now doesn’t mean it’s going to stay like that. We don’t know how volatile it is.”
“It’s solidified,” I say, shoes rasping against the slick gold just before we make it to the top step. The doors are hanging from their hinges like teeth knocked loose and crooked.
“It was solidified before, too,” he retorts. “And look what happened with that.”
“Looking to see what happened is exactly my intention.”
I hear him sigh as I walk through the doorway, but my footsteps slow as soon as I’m inside. The flames from the wall sconces are flickering erratically, as if they too are jumpy, still recovering from the assault.
The entry hall echoes with our footsteps as Manu and I follow a few paces behind Keon until we reach the ballroom. All three of us stop in our tracks when we make it through the doorway.
I blink at the darkness that’s settled over the room. At the darkness and at the gold inside that glints in shadowed warning. Before, flames from the chandeliers and sconces lit up the entire space, making it rival the daylight. But now, everything’s been cast in shadow. The only light comes from the iron furnaces still burning in the corners, their presence only now visible because the ballroom is empty. This room doesn’t even look remotely the same. It’s as if the entire space was made with wax, and someone held a burning candle to it.
The walls look half melted off, gold frozen in its drip. The ceiling, too, has strings of it cast down like icicles, ends pointed down at us with sharp purpose. The plated pillars are bare of their gilt, every bit of golden adornment melted away.
The floor is a rippled mess, clumpy in some areas, raised with motionless shapes that make me cringe. A visible hand reaching up, frozen in place. A gilt lump of a body curled beside the raised platform. A frozen wave caught below the mezzanine, as if the balcony melted clear off and splashed to the floor below where I can see someone’s leg sticking out.
“Gods...”
Manu’s whispered declaration spurs me back into motion. My footsteps take me across the ballroom, gaze cautious, skipping from one spot of gold to the next. Yet as I get further in, a horrible groan comes from the walls. The floor. The ceiling. Like an old home settling with cracks and creaks, only this is far worse. It’s eerie. Like the gold is a ghost, bemoaning our presence, threatening to haunt.
I go still, pulse spiking even more than before. Beside me, Manu grips my arm. “Kaila, we should get out of here.”