Page 45 of Frost Like Night
He’s looking at me now like he loves me, and he doesn’t care who sees.
Mather hobbles down the steps, his movements still a little delayed. As he starts toward me across the yard, my eyes catch on something in his hands.
I jog to meet him halfway, a new disbelief rushing through me.
“This was given to Phil,” he says, lifting my chakram. “It was meant to be another threat, I think. But I’m not even sure you need a weapon anymore—that was amazing.”
I reach out, fingers hesitating over the worn wood handle curling through the circular blade. With this much power, I don’t need anything—and I could let that consume me.
But I want to need things, and people, and that choice feels far more powerful somehow. Choosing something regardless of what it can do for me. Regardless of who it can make me.
Choosing it becauseIwant it.
I take the chakram, my eyes on Mather. “I’m not me without it, am I?”
A smile flips across his face before he shakes his head. “You’re perfect the way you are.”
And it thrills me to the Klaryns and back that I couldn’t agree more.
14
Ceridwen
DESPITE THEIR INTERACTIONthe night of their arrival at the Summerian refugee camp, Ceridwen had found dozens of things to keep her distracted from Jesse. The largest of which was the one she had expected—and feared—the most: the news that Angra had seized Summer.
It had taken all of Ceridwen’s not considerable store of patience to keep from screaming at the messenger who had shown up explaining that Angra was setting up a strong presence in her kingdom—mainly because she knew how receptive Summer would be to his magic. Every upper-class Summerian was so used to a constant influx of magic that Angra’s would be no different—until their eternal joy was traded for the mindless terror and compliance Angra had unleashed in Rintiero.
But this gave her an advantage. Blindfolded, she could find any building in Juli. And if Angra was there, it wouldbe easy—no,enjoyable—to sneak in with a small contingent of soldiers and end his reign of terror.
So that was exactly what they’d do: sneak into Juli and assassinate Angra.
They all knew—some had even seen firsthand—how Angra’s magic spread. It didn’t matter what kingdom anyone was from—it could affect people without limitation. But Ceridwen had been in Rintiero, and had left unscathed; Jesse and Lekan had done the same. So it was possible to resist Angra’s magic. And of anyone in the world, Ceridwen’s Summerian refugees had the most experience resisting magic. They had trained themselves to break free of Simon’s stifling joy.
It was mad, to be sure, but possible—as long as they could use every tool at their disposal.
“What are you going to say to them?” Lekan asked, dust kicking up under their feet as they walked toward the Yakimian quarter of the camp.
Ceridwen’s fingers tightened around the seal in her palm. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to reveal it to the Yakimians when she’d confronted them; she wasn’t Giselle’s lackey, and any good that came from this would be her doing. But it was all she could think of to convince them to fight with her now.
“They’re Yakimians. I’m sure standing against Angra will speak to their rational side as much as it did Giselle’s.”
Lekan grunted. “But will they agree that their first moveagainst him should be to help you reclaim Summer?”
“No—of course they won’t. They’re Rhythms. They’ll laugh in my face, and I’ll probably end up punching one of them.”
The three hundred Yakimian soldiers had only revealed themselves once Ceridwen had stood on a platform and shouted Giselle’s plan at her entire camp. As she had expected, not every Yakimian was aware of their queen’s intent, so before an uprising could occur, the soldiers had stepped forward and spent the past two days trying to make their countrymen understand. This was an issue among the Yakimians, so Ceridwen had allowed them that time.
She came to a dead stop. The intensity of the plains’ sun beat down, but the heat didn’t have its usual comforting effect on her. Burn it all, whatwouldshe say to them now?
“Then you shouldn’t present it like that,” came a voice that did even less to comfort her.
Ceridwen spun around to find Jesse on the road behind them.
“Shouldn’t you be with your children?” She squinted to hide her surprise.
Jesse’s smile might have been hurt, but most of his face was covered with a mask crafted from burlap, the best he could do to hang on to Ventrallan tradition here. “They’re asleep, and well watched over by the Winterians who brought them here,” he said. “Which is why I thought I would join you. I heard you’re off to confront the Yakimian soldiers? ARhythm monarch’s presence could be useful to—”
“I can handle a few angry Rhythms,” Ceridwen snapped.
