Protect the Prince (Crown of Shards #2)(116)

This time, Calandre’s smile was far more genuine. “Let’s get you out of that horrid garment. Things will seem much better after you’ve had a nice, hot bath.”

To my surprise, she was right. Calandre and her sisters fussed over me for more than an hour before they tucked me into bed. I fell asleep even before they had closed the doors to my chambers. Thankfully, my dreams were free of any nightmarish memories of my past. Or perhaps that was because I had lived through another nightmare tonight.

Either way, I woke up late the next morning feeling . . . not quite refreshed, but at least strong enough to face a new day of trouble. I had breakfast in my chambers with Paloma, Serilda, Cho, and Xenia, who updated me on what was happening. Captain Rhea was drastically increasing security, but they all agreed that Maeven was gone and that Glitnir was free of the Mortan threat—for now.

Serilda told me that Sullivan was having breakfast with Heinrich, Dominic, and Gemma. Good. As much as I wanted to make sure that he was okay, I was glad that he was with his family. Hopefully, they could help him come to terms with the truth about Dahlia.

Eventually, my friends left to check in with Rhea again, as well as to start the preparations for our journey back to Bellona. Now that Heinrich had agreed to my treaty, I didn’t want to stay in Glitnir any longer than necessary, especially given all the awful things that had happened while I’d been here.

It was time to go home to my own problems.

I was scheduled to meet with Heinrich to hammer out the details of our treaty over lunch, but instead of going to the king’s dining hall, I took a detour and climbed the steps to Alvis’s tower workshop. I knocked on the door and waited for him to tell me to enter.

Gemma and Grimley were here, and the princess ran over and hugged me. “Evie! I’m so glad you’re okay!”

“Of course I’m okay, thanks to you and Grimley.”

I hugged her back, then went over and petted Grimley, who was lying in his sunspot. I left the two of them to play together and walked over to Alvis, who was perched on his stool, working on his latest design.

A long, jagged block of light gray tearstone was laid out on the table. It hadn’t been cut yet, but Alvis was holding a piece of white chalk, and he’d already sketched out a design on the block.

“A tearstone sword?” I raised my eyebrows. “How come I’m not surprised?”

He shrugged. “I already made the girl a dagger. I might as well make her a sword too.”

“And a shield?” I teased.

He grinned a little. “And a shield, eventually. Maybe even another dagger. Or a spear. Or a bow and a set of arrows. Whatever weapons she likes.”

I nodded. He leaned forward, peered through his magnifying glass, and made some more marks on the tearstone. I watched him work in silence for several minutes, while Gemma fed Grimley small shards of opals that were left over from one of Alvis’s jewelry designs.

“I was going to ask you to come back to Seven Spire. I was going to offer you your old space in the dungeon and all the gold and gems you could ever desire to work with.”

He looked up and arched an eyebrow at me. “And now you’re not? How disappointing.”

“You should stay here with Gemma. She needs you more than I do.” A wry smile curved my lips. “Besides, you need a new apprentice, and I’m far too busy as queen to fetch your tools.”

“You are a wonderful queen, Evie,” Alvis said in a serious voice. “Bellona couldn’t be in better hands.”

“Why? Because I’m a Winter queen?” I asked, my tone a bit snide.

He shook his head. “No. Not because of your magic, but because of you, because of the strong, caring person you are. Your magic is part of you, but it’s not the most important part. Remember that.”

“I will. And I want you to know that I finally figured out what it really means to be a Winter queen.”

“And what’s that?” he asked in a guarded tone.

“My whole life, everyone always told me that I was a mutt, and I always thought of myself that way too. That I had an enhanced sense of smell and my immunity and that was it.” I waggled my fingers. “These small, random magical skills that everyone overlooked or mocked or dismissed as weak, unimportant, insignificant. They were right, and they were wrong. I am a mutt. But that’s not all that I am.”

“So what else are you?”

I straightened up. “I’m a master.”

“And your element?”

“Magic.” I waggled my fingers again. “I can control magic.”

Satisfaction gleamed in Alvis’s hazel eyes. “Yes, yes, you can.”

“I always thought that I had to actually touch something in order to snuff out its magic, but in the gardens, when I was trying to save Sullivan, I pushed my power outside myself, just like a regular magier would,” I said. “And I realized that I can still kill magic, still destroy it, but that I can control it as well. That I can wield my immunity like a sword, and maybe even other people’s magic along with it.”

“A master has complete control of their element,” Alvis said. “You can do anything to magic that I can do to metal and stone. You just have to practice and work and figure out how, just like I had to figure out my power for myself.”

He hesitated, as if he wanted to say something else. Finally, he did. “But realizing that you’re a master isn’t what it means to be a Winter queen. Not really.”