Winter Glass (Spindle Fire #2)(5)
The fluttering stops.
“We must do better,” Isbe tells her sister. She squares her shoulders. “We have to be strong now, for Deluce.”
Aurora stands up, a tiny stir in the stillness of the room. And then she is beside Isbe, pulling her into the room, her delicate fingers pressing words into her sister’s palms.
But how can I be strong for Deluce, when I know that Sommeil needs me too? My heart is in two places, sister, and I cannot bring its other half back.
“Whether it’s split in two places or a dozen doesn’t matter. You must move forward with the half you still possess. Or whatever portion.”
You’ve never been terribly good with math, Aurora teases, and Isbe laughs.
“I’ve never been good at much, really.” She forces the next part out. “I’m quite sure I won’t be any good at all when it comes to planning your wedding, either.”
Aurora’s hand twitches in hers. So there is no way to stall further?
Isbe sighs and hugs her sister. “For what?” she whispers. “Heath?”
Aurora pulls away.
When she first awoke, she and Isabelle had spent hours relaying what had happened to each of them since Isbe ran from the palace. Isbe was shocked to learn that Aurora too had experienced an unbelievable journey. That she’d not just been sleeping, but somehow, another part of her—a part of her that remained awake—had been transported to a land called Sommeil, a world constructed out of dreams by the once-thought-dead Night Faerie, Belcoeur. In Sommeil, Aurora had come close to falling for a hunter named Heath, but she hadn’t had the time to find out if it would blossom into true love, because Sommeil itself was in distress. . . .
Is in distress still. When Aurora awoke, she left Sommeil in flames, and she has pleaded with Isbe since, begging to return. I’ll bring a small brigade of soldiers with me this time, Aurora insisted. We’ll find a way for everyone to be safe.
But it’s not that easy. They don’t know for sure if it’s even possible to return, or to bring others. And can Deluce really spare a legion to stage a rescue in a nebulous dream world?
There’s a settee in front of the hearth. Isbe flops down onto it. “Aurora. True love—it’s a trick.” She hates the way the truth abrades her throat. “The language of the curse? It was all a terrible lie, a puzzle. The fae are notorious for their deceit. We know this.”
Aurora comes back to her, pushing Isbe’s feet off one end of the settee so she can sit beside her. Maybe so. But that should have been for me to discover, for me to feel. And now I’ll never know for sure.
Isbe is doing everything she can to control her frustration, but the fact is that Aurora’s romantic notions have no place here anymore. They’re no longer little girls. She has realized something in the last few weeks: at birth, we receive our share. Though we don’t always know it, our hand has been dealt. Our lives will have their demands, their inevitabilities—and what we want will have very little to do with it.
She thinks suddenly of the way she and her lifelong friend, Gilbert, came together urgently in the slippery, salt-sprayed chaos of the whaling ship and kissed just once before the sailors wrenched them apart. And then, the same way the stench of the injured narwhal’s blood seemed to permeate her hands and hair and the whole ocean, her separation from Gil infused everything that came after: Her desperate arrival at the Aubinian palace. Her bargain with Prince William, Deluce’s oil for use of Aubin’s weapons. And of course the other trade: Deluce’s princess—and her nation’s gold as dowry—for Aubin’s military alliance.
Isbe picks at a loose thread in the upholstery to keep herself from shaking her sister into reason. “I’m convinced now,” she says, “that love and pain are two sides of a coin, and you would be blessed to be spared both. Besides—” She pauses, the thought coming to her in a sudden, unwanted burst. “There’s no reason to think that, over time, you might not fall in love with William. There are many things to admire in him. He is not as serious as he seems. He has a mind like fire. He—”
Isbe stops, feeling heat rush to her cheeks. She hasn’t brought herself to tell Aurora everything. She can’t—the secret of what happened between her and William is something that even she can’t quite believe, let alone admit aloud. It was wrong; wonderful and wrong. And yet she cannot find a way to feel ashamed of it, which terrifies her more than anything else. She clears her throat. “And anyway, what matters is that we have a duty to our kingdom. We have lives to save, people to rally.”
But the people of Sommeil are real too. What about their kingdom? What about their lives?
Isbe leans back, facing the hearth, listening to the morning fire crackle and pop. All this talk of love and war is overwhelming. She feels like a loose carriage wheel about to come undone, on the verge of dropping her cargo, of letting everyone down, and still so far from their destination. “I can’t tell you which lives to save—or if we can save any at all.” Even our own, she thinks. “All I can say is that we need you here. I need you.”
Aurora stands up then, and pulls on Isbe’s hand. Well, let’s go to the gardens, then.
“Why?” Isbe allows her sister to take her by the arm and lead her out the library door.
Because, Aurora taps, something must be in bloom even now. Maybe the crocuses. And I can’t get married without proper table bouquets, now can I?