Lynet watched her reverently, struck by Mina’s serene smile, her soft brown eyes no longer flashing with the fire that always burned in her room. Mina seldom spoke of her life before she had become queen, as though it hadn’t truly begun until she’d worn a crown. Lynet could believe it—she couldn’t imagine her stepmother as anything but a queen, even though she had vague memories of the first time they’d met, before Mina and her father had married. Even in her memories, Lynet always saw Mina as a flame, something fierce and fearless and regal.
But here inside the calm quiet of the chapel, she could imagine Mina as a child—not a child, but sixteen, the same age Lynet was fast approaching—sitting here by herself in a strange, cold world, her flame somewhat dimmed. She thought of the fire that was always roaring in Mina’s bedroom, the furs she wore even though everyone else at Whitespring had long since adapted to the cold. This one place alone had given her a sense of comfort, of belonging, and Lynet wished she could find the words to tell her stepmother how dearly she appreciated being here with her now.
“You’ll find something that’s yours alone,” Mina said, taking Lynet’s hand in her own. “And when you do, don’t let anyone take it from you.”
Lynet thought of the argument she had heard between Mina and her father, the way Mina had fought for what was hers. Would Lynet ever be able to do that? Could she ever burn as brightly as her stepmother, when she was made of snow?
“Thank you for telling me the truth,” Lynet said. She hoped Mina understood that she was thanking her not only for that, but especially for sharing this place, this memory, with her.
But Mina frowned slightly as she looked down at their joined hands. When she spoke at last, it was to say in a halting voice, “Yes, Lynet, of course.”
Lynet wanted to ask her what she had been thinking about, but something stopped her. She kept picturing that girl sitting alone in the chapel, and it was strange and even unsettling to think that Lynet hadn’t been a part of Mina’s life then. Whatever Mina had just been thinking—whoever she had once been—was a world away from Lynet. She held Mina’s hand more tightly, not yet ready to accept that there were still so many secrets hidden away at the center of the flame, too bright for her to see.
8
LYNET
Lynet sat on the edge of the North Tower’s one large window, waiting.
The patches in the ceiling let in beams of moonlight, illuminating pieces of the room one at a time: a corner of a faded rug, the skeleton of an empty bedframe, the arm of an overstuffed chair, all covered in dust. The only inhabitants of the North Tower lay in the crypt below.
Each morning for the past few days, Lynet had found a new note from Nadia tucked into the branches of the juniper tree. She kept imploring Lynet to see her again, to let her apologize for handing Lynet this burden so gracelessly. Lynet didn’t respond, but she still checked every morning for the latest one. Besides, she was too busy to visit. More and more visitors were arriving at Whitespring as Lynet’s birthday celebration approached, and Lynet’s duty as a princess demanded that she stand by her father’s side in the Hall, greeting and visiting with each new arrival personally. And now she understood why her father made such a fuss about her birthday every year. He had been trying, in his own way, to make her feel human.
As much as she tried, Lynet couldn’t be angry with him for that.
She wasn’t angry with Nadia, either, not really. But she couldn’t stand to go back into that room, to look at that spot by the table and think, That was where I learned the truth.
And then, just this morning, she’d found another scrawled message in the tree—the shortest one yet:
I have the prior surgeon’s journals, if you want to know more.
She knew Nadia was appealing to her curiosity, but did that matter? Lynet did want to know more. For the first time, she left a note in response:
Midnight at the top of the North Tower. Bring the journals.
She had chosen the tower because it was the highest point at Whitespring, a marked contrast to the subterranean workroom where Nadia had unraveled her with a few simple words. Perhaps in the tower room, high above the royal crypt, Lynet could put herself back together again.
Shortly before midnight, she had climbed out the window of her room, descending carefully to the ground below. It may have been dramatic of her to choose to meet at this time, but she felt freer at night. There was nowhere she was supposed to be, no one she was supposed to be, and so it seemed a fitting time to find out who she was.
When she had reached the courtyard, she quickly checked the juniper tree to be sure Nadia had seen her note—yes, the note was gone, so she quickly went through the arch that led to the garden. After only a few hurried steps, she found herself running.
Running to the tower? Running away from something? She wasn’t sure—she only knew that she needed to feel her blood rushing through her body, to become so aware of the pounding of her heart and the rush of air through her tired lungs that she couldn’t feel anything other than human—flesh and bone, not snow and blood. In the dark of night, with only the moon watching her, she could even pretend that she didn’t look anything like her mother.
She knew the position of every tree in the Shadow Garden, and so when she suddenly collided with something, her first thought was that one of the trees was in the wrong place. But then she looked up and found that she hadn’t run into a tree, but a man.
His hands were on her shoulders as he held her away from him, and so she recognized him as the best of her father’s huntsmen when she saw the scarred skin that peeked from under his sleeves. Lynet had seen him many times from the window when her father was preparing for a hunt, but she had never encountered him personally, and she was glad of that. His scarred arms didn’t frighten her, but his eyes did—they were so blank, so empty, like black marbles set in a human face.
“You’re the princess,” he said, bending his head a little to look at her. “You’re as beautiful as they say.”
She shrank back when the huntsman brought his face closer to hers. That was the other strange thing about him—over all the years that Lynet had seen him, he never appeared to age. Even now, he looked only a little older than Lynet, but she knew that was impossible.
She was growing uncomfortably aware of how close he was to her, and that his hands were still on her shoulders, so she pulled away from him.
“It’s late, child,” he said, and she wondered how old he could possibly be to call her that. “Why are you out at this hour?”
“I have a right to be here if I wish,” Lynet said. “What are you doing here at this hour?”
“I have a right to be here if I wish,” he echoed.
Neither one of them sounded entirely convincing, but perhaps that was to Lynet’s advantage. “If that’s the case,” she said, her voice starting to shake a little, “then there’s no reason for either one of us to tell anyone that we met here tonight.”
They both watched each other, and maybe it was only a trick of the moonlight, but Lynet thought then that he did seem the age he looked, eyes darting nervously over Lynet’s shoulder, body slightly hunched like a guilty child’s. Lynet noticed she was standing the same way.