Snow Like Ashes(39)

Noam puts a hand on his conduit, the purple hilt glowing against his hip. “It’s time a Rhythm tried where the Seasons have failed. Yes, Cordell is linked to Autumn, and yes, I will scour that kingdom for the chasm entrance—but if it isn’t in Autumn’s section of the Klaryns, what then? You are young. You have been removed from politics. But you will soon learn that this is how things work—this is your new world.”

I fall back to Sir. “No. Tell him we don’t do this, not in Winter. We don’t let—”

But Sir’s eyes drop. His entire body looks like it might dissolve and I’ve never, in all my life, seen him show so much emotion at once.

We’re entirely at Noam’s mercy until he decides either to help us or fling us back out into the dark where no one else will come to our rescue. I had always assumed Sir had a plan for who our allies would be after we got our locket back. If this is the best option—a trap—then would anyone else even bother helping us? Or would the other Rhythms rather wait for us to disintegrate under the “Shadow of the Seasons” and then swoop in to claim our kingdom and, by extension, access to the chasm of magic? With their own internal struggles, none of the other Seasons are strong enough to overthrow Angra.

We’re stuck.

I back up a step. Mather puts his hand on my spine, leaves it there, his thumb moving slowly over the fabric of my dress.

No, no, no.

“Lady Meira.” Noam sweeps his arm back toward the ballroom. “This ball is in your honor. It will raise suspicion if you are gone too long.”

I shake my head but start to walk forward, my feet taking me toward the light of the ball. When I’m parallel to Noam, I stop. “Why me?”

Noam’s smile falters for half a heartbeat and he casts an amused glance at Sir. “That is part of the arrangement, that you will be given a proper title in Winter. By Cordell’s golden leaves, have you been led to believe that you would fade into history once Winter has been reborn? That you wouldn’t matter to your reestablished kingdom?”

I look over my shoulder at Mather, Sir. Next to Noam, who stands cool and relaxed, they both look defeated in the flickering light of the ballroom. Noam has said more things that make sense in the past few minutes than Sir ever has. That sad realization makes something click, something that shuts off the ache deep in my stomach.

I never wanted to fade into nothing, but Sir never told me that’s where I wouldn’t end up. He never let me believe I mattered to Winter beyond my responsibility to lead a normal, safe life once our kingdom was free from Angra, regardless of how fervently I tried to prove to him that I was more. He just let me think I would be lost in all this, that I wasn’t important enough to matter further.

And now this is it. This is how I will matter to Winter. As a marriage pawn.

“Yes,” I whisper. “I did believe that.”

Walking away from Mather and Sir feels like a nightmare. A nightmare in which I want Mather to run after me and fight off Noam and admit he could never do that to me, marry me off to someone else, because he’s been in love with me all along.

Noam opens the door to the ballroom for me, smiling as the music and laughter of his court rushes out. “You are part of this family now,” he says when the door shuts behind us. “And it would benefit you greatly to remember that my son has options. Many more beneficial options that do not involve us in a war. My kingdom progresses, adapts, and changes, while your people fester in stagnation like stones eroded in a stream, sitting atop power but not caring in the least that it’s there. This is a favor, granted only out of my generosity.”

I hold back a growl. Noam slips his hand around my arm, pulling me to a halt, and as his thick fingers tighten against my skin, a memory sweeps into my mind, one of Sir’s lectures on court lineages. Noam had a wife. Theron’s mother, Melinda DeFiore, a princess of Ventralli. In my mind’s eye, I see Noam kneeling at her bedside, her frail body sinking slowly into the tight grasp of death. She was sick, very sick, but there’s something wrong with Noam—did he let her die?

I shake my head. When did Sir tell me how she died? He must have. I remember it so vividly that sometime in all his lectures, he must have mentioned Queen Melinda of Cordell’s death.

Noam shakes me out of the flash of memory by tightening his grip on my arm, holding me the same way Theron did. No, not the same way. Theron was gentle, made sure I knew I could pull away at any time. Noam clutches me like he owns me. He owns everything in Cordell and is used to every person, animal, and plant bowing under the power of his conduit. And even though I’m not Cordellan and his conduit can’t actually affect me, I still feel the power he wields when he curls his hand around mine and squeezes. He does own me now.