Winter's Bride - Candace Wondrak Page 0,33

secret any longer.

I felt like I should cry. Like I should weep for those women and the lives they’d lost, but I couldn’t. Instead, my feet took me away from the door, to the winding spiral stairs that seemed to go on forever and ever. Down I went, until I emerged into a dark hall.

I should be sleeping. I should be trying to be well-rested for my wedding, but I could not. I could not shake the sight of those frozen girls, each and every one of them, nor could I ignore the worry that had settled in my heart. Would I be next? Of course I would be. I was not special enough to be the one to break whatever curse was on this place, on Abner.

The castle was huge. I knew I could wander the entire night and never find Abner, never be able to demand answers from him, but I had to try. I could not sit there and let things be, nor could I simply go with Ishan without trying to piece it all together myself. Did those girls do something to make him mad? Did they not want to marry him? What was it about them that had led them to turn to ice?

I was cold, sure, and maybe it was due to Ishan’s favor, but I could still feel the fire burning inside. I would not let this place or its chill into my heart. I wouldn’t do it.

Perhaps it was fate, or perhaps it was something else, some other guiding force leading me right to him, but I found Abner standing on a balcony, overlooking what would be the castle’s gardens, if it was not constantly covered in snow.

He leaned on the balcony’s railings, his head bent and his shoulders slumped. It seemed he did not often sleep, either. Though his back was to me, though I could not see his face, I puffed myself up before going to him.

No matter what happened after this, I had to know the truth.

Chapter Six – Winter

Everything had become too hard, I think. After all this time, I think I was finally growing tired of the never-ending game, the constant searching, never being able to find what I want. What I need.

Were gods supposed to feel this tired?

I stood on one of the castle’s many balconies, the wind blowing bitterly against my skin. My head was bent as I heaved sigh after sigh. These last two days, I’d tried. I really had tried to be more, to do more. I’d eaten every meal with her, tried not to snap at her when she took a tone with me or asked me questions which she had no right to.

But it was hard. It was so, so hard, and I felt so tired of this. It would only end up the same. Morana would join the ranks of the others, and my brother would hate me for it. He would hate me for it, because he wanted her. Somehow, someway, the same girl had become a focal point in both our lives.

I should simply let him have her. I should give her up, call it all off. There was no law that said I must marry every twenty-five years; it was something of my own making, and it could be canceled easily.

When I thought of canceling the whole thing, I pictured her face. The fire in her greyish blue eyes, the way her skin was sun-kissed in the most entrancing of ways. She was beautiful, surely, and she was every bit a child of Summer, not Winter. She’d never been mine; Morana had always belonged to Ishan, and my fool of a brother had taken his time in realizing how badly he wanted her. Only when she was in my grasp, when she was set to become my bride, did he see the truth of his feelings.

Could I take that away from my brother? Could I be so selfish?

Yes, I could, but I knew I shouldn’t.

Fate, it seemed, had more in store for me tonight than a simple self-loathing session, for the next thing I knew, I was not alone on the balcony. Morana appeared beside me, staring at me as if she both hated me and was confused by everything I was. To that, I’d say, you aren’t the first… and you probably won’t be the last.

“There are things you must answer to,” she started, appearing as if she wanted to rip me apart.

I was slow to