If he walked in, the laughter would stop. The masks would go back on. He would be the Prince again, and she would be the hostage.
Alistair's hand dropped from the handle. His jaw tightened, and he turned away, his cloak swirling around his boots as he retreated into the shadows of the North wing.
"Let them have their lunch," he whispered to the empty hall, his voice a jagged edge of irritation and something that felt suspiciously like loneliness. "Tomorrow, the mountain returns. And tomorrow, she belongs to the ice again."
He spent the rest of the day in the library, staring at the same page of a tactical manual until the words blurred into meaningless lines. The laughter from the parlour seemed to haunt the very stones of the castle, a reminder that while he could control the North, he couldn't control the warmth that was slowly, inevitably, beginning to melt his world.
On the other side Elissa spent her day with Kestrel,Vane and Dante. While Vane and Dante left an hour later of their lunch. Kestrel accompany her till evening.
They gossiped and watch the pup playing.
But as night fell and the castle grew still, the throbbing in her side became a restless, biting heat. The tincture Martha had given her was sitting on the nightstand, nearly empty. She needed more of the willow-bark salve from the lower infirmary if she was going to be ready for the "reset" training tomorrow.
Moving like a ghost, Elissa wrapped herself in a heavy fur cloak. She didn't want to wake Martha, and she certainly didn't want to alert the guards. She slipped out of her room, the pup following silently at her heels like a white shadow.
The halls were lit only by the dying embers of the wall sconces. She made it past the Great Hall and down the spiral stairs toward the apothecary's stores. She was nearly at the door when she saw a flickering light coming from the library across the hall.
She should have kept walking. She should have stayed in the shadows. But the door was slightly ajar, and the scent of old parchment and cold ozone—his scent—drifted out into the hall.
She peeked through the gap.
Alistair was there, but he wasn't reading. He was standing by the large, arched window that looked out toward the Frozen Falls. He had his back to her, his broad shoulders silhouetted against the moonlight. In his hand was a small, silver flask, but he wasn't drinking. He was simply staring at the mountain, his reflection in the glass looking older and more tired than she had ever seen him.
"You should be asleep, Elissa."
His voice was a low, tired rasp that cut through the silence. He didn't turn around. He didn't have to.
Elissa froze. The sound of her name on his lips, spoken with such heavy weariness, felt more intimate than any command he had barked at her in the courtyard. She hesitated, her hand hovering near the heavy oak door.
"I couldn't sleep," Elissa whispered, pushing the door open just a fraction more. The hinges didn't even groan; in this castle, even the wood seemed to fear waking the Prince. "The silence in my room was... too loud."
Alistair finally turned. The moonlight from the arched window caught the crystalline, luminous blue of his eyes, making them look like twin glaciers burning in the dark. He didn't look angry, as he usually did when his solitude was interrupted. He looked exposed.
"Silence is the only thing the North gives for free, Princess," he said, his voice regaining a bit of its rhythmic, icy edge. He set the silver flask down on a mahogany table without taking a drink. "You should learn to appreciate it. Tomorrow, the drills will not be silent."
Elissa took a tentative step into the room. The library was a cavern of knowledge, smelling of leather, ancient dust, and the sharp ozone of Alistair's presence. "I heard you didn't eat lunch today."
Alistair's brow flickered. "I had matters to attend to."
"You were in the hall," she said, her voice growing bolder as she moved closer to the hearth, where a few embers still glowed orange. "Kestrel told me. You came to the door of the parlour, but you didn't come in." After a pause she asked...."Why?"
Alistair stiffened, his jaw locking. He turned back to the window, his reflection ghost-like against the glass. "I saw that you were occupied. My siblings have a way of... distracting people from their duties. I didn't wish to add to the noise."
"We weren't just making noise, Alistair. We were talking." She paused, watching the tension in his broad shoulders. "You could have joined us. Vane was telling a story about a mountain buck and a very ripped cloak."
A ghost of a grimace crossed Alistair's face—the first crack in his marble mask. "Vane has a creative memory. And I have no desire to be the subject of the afternoon's entertainment."
"It wasn't entertainment," Elissa said softly, stepping into the pool of moonlight beside him. "It was like family,.... Your family. Something I didn't think existed in this fortress."
Alistair looked down at her. From this close, she could see the faint lines of exhaustion around his eyes—the physical toll of a man who spent every waking second holding a kingdom together.
"Family is a luxury, Princess. One that the Crown Prince cannot always afford," he said. He reached out, his gloved fingers hovering near her arm, but he pulled back before he touched her. "How is your side?"
The question was so sudden, so direct, that Elissa nearly gasped. She felt the heat rise to her cheeks, the massive bruise beneath her tunic throbbing as if it knew it had been discovered. "My side?" She hesitated..."I... I don't know what you mean."