Page 10 of Court of Winter
For the briefest moment, his gaze drifted to my throat, to the area clouded in Vorl’s illusion affinity that hid my bruises.
“Remove your scarf.”
My heart lodged in my throat. “My prince?”
His eyes hooded, and a wash of irritation radiated from him. “Remove. Your. Scarf.”
A flurry of whispers erupted around the room, but a sharp yell from Vorl had them quietening.
I darted a look at my sister, then Birnee, and finally Finnley. They all stared at me wide-eyed, as the fear on my sister’s face grew.
With trembling fingers, I lifted my hands to the back of my neck and slowly undid the knot that held my scarf in place.
When the scarf fell, my hair tumbled down my shoulders and around my breasts in a shameful ebony waterfall.
The prince didn’t move. His gaze was unflinching as his attention traveled over my winged eyebrows, the tips of my ears, and then down the length of my hair.
Every villager sat frozen around us.
With a swift turn on his heel, the crown prince of the Winter Court gave me his back.
My eyes widened as I took in the thickest wings I’d ever seen. The height of those appendages was higher than any wings I’d ever encountered.
The prince glanced over his shoulder, his expression as cold as ice. “You’re coming with me.”
CHAPTER4
“No!” Cailis leaped from her seat and positioned herself in front of me.
Denial jolted through me as my breaths came faster. Surely, I hadn’t heard him correctly.
“You’re not taking her! She’s done nothing wrong!” Cailis yelled.
But the prince merely walked toward the door. His steps didn’t falter. He didn’t even deign her with a reply.
“Cailis,” I whispered as the rest of the villagers wore shocked expressions.Mother Below, is this really happening?
“He can’t!” Cailis wailed.
I grabbed her shoulders. “Cailis! Don’t.Please. I can’t lose you too.” Because if she fought the prince, he would end her without a second thought.
“But, how can he—” A sob shook her chest as her wings extended, then retracted. “Not you too.”
“See to it that her last wages are given to her next of kin,” the prince said to Vorl, as though he didn’t know—or care—that Cailis was my only next of kin. “She won’t be returning.”
I won’t be?My heart beat so rapidly that it felt as though it would beat out of my chest.
“My prince, what did I do?” I called.
The prince dipped his head to his four guards and began speaking quietly, my plea entirely ignored.
“No, no, no,” my sister wailed. She wrapped her arms around me and pulled me close, burying her face in my neck.
I clung to her, holding her tightly, as the shock of what the prince had just said slammed into me like a tidal wave on the Tala Sea.She won’t be returning.
Butwhy? Did he mean to kill me? Apprehend me? End me because I was different?
It was as though he’d known when he’d asked me to remove my scarf that he’d find me without silver hair, but since when was being an outcast cause for the Court of Winter to intervene?