She blinked up at me through tears. “Okay,” she said. “I believe you. But what are you going to tell Avery?”

I took strength from her presence and gritted my teeth.

“The truth.”

The wolves howled outside the keep, calling to her.

She did not answer.

The window in the tallest tower commanded a view over her entire world, from forest to lake to sheltered glen. Somewhere down there was Rowan.

Rage built.

The tower room had served another purpose, once. She did not remember what it had been, only that it was irrelevant, now, but this high up it still preserved the voices of the dead, echoing in the soft stir of flower and vine.

Queen among the bones.

She would have ruled these mountains with the same cold fury she felt now, stretching her territory to the foothills and beyond, raiding all the way to the coast. That had been her destiny, another thing the witch had stolen and replaced with ice. She reached for a storm, willing the clouds to roil into snow, but the sky refused to answer.

The breaking of her power rolled over her like the storm that had not come. Below, the wolves howled on, speaking in a language that felt as foreign to her now as the tongue they spoke across the sea. She slid to the ground. She did not remember the stones being this cold, or the cost of each breath so high.

I am dying, she realized, lifting her face toward the light. I am dying, and I cannot outrun this fate or fight it off. I am the hunted now.

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Nineteen

“Avery Lockland.” My words reverberated in the darkness as I pounded on the Lockland door. A storm was coming. I felt it in the sharp cold of the air and the silence in the trees. The scent of roses flooded my nostrils, and I could hardly hear the footsteps coming to the door for the rustling of those hidden leaves.

Avery answered. He was still dressed for the day’s work, his dark shirtsleeves rolled up over corded forearms. “What do you want, Rowan?” he said.

“I want to see my father.”

“You should have thought about that before you ran away from us.”

“I did not run from you,” I said.

He let out a bitter laugh that reminded me of the Huntress. “I would have been good to you, you know,” he said.

It was not what I had expected him to say. I thought about Juniper’s words, and wondered how far Avery would go for the sake of injured pride. “You would have tried, Avery, and you would have grown to hate me. You do see that, don’t you? Aspen was always the better choice.”

At my words, she appeared behind him, her hands on her pregnant belly and her eyes wide with fear.

For me, or for Avery?