Page 136 of Beneath a Shattered Sky
I lay a restraining arm on his bicep, trying my hardest to ignore the way that my dust is still coating every inch of him.
He slumps a little behind me. “We need to pick up the pace if we’re to reach the ruins of Mirrwyl tonight. It’s the last shelter before Calimnel.”
“Mirrwyl?” I ask, hoping for more information.
He just grunts in reply.
“It’s the ancestral home of House Iceblyd,” Lore adds. “Bit less grand than it was when I first visited, but there’s a shrine there. Who knows? Danu might spruce the place up a bit.”
“It would be better not to bless the shrine at all,” Drystan mutters. “Cedwyn was the one who ordered it destroyed in the first place, and Hawkith might see any blessing of Danu as a sign that you plan to support her quest for power.”
Goddess, that seems a bit far-fetched. “I’m not sure how either of them can expect me to support them after what they did to you.”
“They let me live.”
Yes, but only to suffer.I don’t say it aloud, but he must read it in the tense lines of my shoulders because he groans.
“A child is a huge drain on resources,” he reminds me. “My mother invested countless gold in my keeping and education.”
“Really?” I raise a brow. “You were a huge drain on resources for the two richest houses in Calimnel?”
“Besides,” he continues, ignoring me. “A change in leadership right now would not be beneficial to our cause. Especially as Ashton is an unknown variable. Cedwyn may be paranoid, but he’s a male of his word.”
One who ordered Drystan hurt over and over again.
“Look past your instincts?—”
“I don’t think I will.” I cut off his no-doubt wise counsel without care. “I did that with Aiyana and with Eero, and it didn’t work out well for us. If anything, I think I should be listening to them more.” I brush a stray piece of hair back from my face as I say it. “I told you, I intend to lead, and you promised to follow.”
“So we get to murder them both in a bloody coup?” Lore sounds positively gleeful at the idea, and I can’t help but smile a little at his enthusiasm.
“That remains to be seen,” I say quietly.
Though my fae instincts clamour for the blood of anyone who hurt my mates, I’m not so stupid as to think killing everyone is always the best solution. I have no desire to rule like Elatha.
It’s not until hours later, when the twilight sky is heavy with thick grey clouds, and the ground around us hidden by near-impenetrable fog, that Drystan pulls us to a stop.
“Mirrwyl.” He sighs the name in dreary resignation.
At first, I don’t understand. It’s only when I make out the remnants of an archway in the distance that I start to see things for what they are. A rock over there that’s a little too tall to be anything but a wall. A straight ditch that borders a snowdrift which has a perfect right angle.
Mirrwyl is a ruin buried in the snow, almost invisible, save for that one arch. Perhaps if not for the fog, I might be able to make out more features.
“Come. A little over here is a wall that will offer shelter from the wind.”
The wall turns out to be the remnants of what must have once been some kind of audience chamber. There’s even a smashed pile of rubble that can only have been a throne at one end, and a handful of pillars leaning drunkenly against one another in two neat rows.
“Cedwyn destroyed all of this?”
“In his defence”—Jaro reaches up to help me down before tugging me into his arms—“his parents had just been slaughtered.”
“He was probably more concerned that his crown was threatened.” Drystan swings down behind me and leads Blizzard over to one of the pillars.
Goddess, he’s practically a walking statue. I hate how being so close to Calimnel is clearly affecting him. But if I draw attention to it, he’ll only shut down more, and forcing the issue willnotgo down well.
“Where’s the shrine?” I ask Jaro quietly, reaching up to brush the snow from his beard.
“I’d expect in the temple somewhere. Want to find it while the others set up camp?”
