“Where to?” Lucas asked, breath steaming in the air.

“Just get me away from here,” she said. “I never want to see Eliot Gray again.”

“Ragnashuck. That’s the loveliest thing I’ve heard all day,” Lucas said. But the youthful Patrolman leaned over and hollered through the shop’s cracked-open window, “Get frostbite, Gray! You positively scotchy rung-nut!”

And they took off.

A measure later, a windswept, rosy-cheeked Lucas brought the deer beneath a glistening, glass willow. The skies had creamed to soft white as a salty blizzard roared in. ‘Twas there that Lucas decided to take shelter in a cove of muscled evergreens, slowing the creature to a modest trot.

“Though I’d never object to a pleasant ride through the Winter winds with you, perfect-little-Trite-darling, I wonder where we’re really headed? You didn’t actually come here alone with Gray, did you? It wouldn’t make a pinch of sense if you did,” he asked.

Kaley twiddled her thumbs before she answered. “Well aren’t you clever, Lucas Leutenski. Alright, we’re going to the Green Kingdom. You and I are going to steal something from Timber Castle.”

At her back, Lucas yanked the reindeer to a halt, throwing Kaley off. He hopped down to catch her and plant her feet on the snow before she turned into a cranky, damp Trite mess.

Pinning Kaley against the deer’s warm fur, Lucas blinked, all the fun and giggles gone from his face. “What was that, Trite?” he asked. “There must be frost in my ears, because I thought you said something terribly scotchy.”

“I think you heard me,” Kaley returned.

“Why would I ever willingly go to Green?” Lucas asked, blinking slow and deliberate.

“To steal a crown. It’s the first step in Helen’s plan,” she said, but her voice dipped on her sister’s name. She cleared her throat, and Lucas stopped his blinking.

“This is Helen’s plan?” he prodded, and Kaley nodded, though she flicked her gaze to a passing bug in the air. “You must think me a spinbug,” he said.

Kaley released a breath through her nose. “I’m here for Helen, that’s all you need to know. And frankly, I’m starting to wonder why you still don’t get why I came here looking for you of all the Patrolmen in Winter.”

Lucas’s topaz eyes narrowed. “Whose crown are you luring me to steal with you, Trite?” The daredevil himself seemed to fear the answer.

But Kaley spoke the words anyway. “I need to steal the queen’s crown. The Crown of Pines.” And then, “perfect-little-Rime-darling.”

THE FOURTH

Fred had gotten a new pair of glasses. They hugged his face as he rushed in a cocoa-stained apron to set out trays for a dessert feast. Pedestals filled the table in the middle of the room, a collage of autumn-coloured chocolates sprinkling every surface amidst the pinches of icing sugar he flung over everything.

Brass lanterns hung from the ceiling in this new room, turning the walls and tabletop to butter, and a bell hung over the door to alert those inside every time someone new entered. The Patrols had flocked in first, including Trevor and the rest of the Elders with their snowflake broaches. I realized I hadn’t seen the elders since the library fire and my gaze flickered over the pale scars some had on their hands.