Rhys leveled a look at me. “I’d suggest keeping those observations to yourself.”

“You think I’m some busybody gossip? My life is miserable enough as it is—why would I want to spread that misery to those around me as well?”

“Is it miserable? Your life, I mean.” A careful question.

“I don’t know. Everything is happening so quickly that I don’t know what to feel.” It was more honest than I’d been in a while.

“Hmmm. Perhaps once we return home, I should give you the day off.”

“How considerate of you, my lord.”

He snorted, unbuttoning his jacket. I realized I stood in all my finery—with nothing to wear to sleep.

A snap of Rhys’s fingers, and my nightclothes—and some flimsy underthings—appeared on the bed. “I couldn’t decide which scrap of lace I wanted you to wear, so I brought you a few to choose from.”

“Pig,” I barked, snatching the clothes and heading to the adjoining bathing room.

The room was toasty when I emerged, Rhys in the bed he’d summoned from wherever, all light gone save for the murmuring embers in the hearth. Even the sheets were warm as I slid between them.

“Thank you for warming the bed,” I said into the dimness.

His back was to me, but I heard him clearly as he said, “Amarantha never once thanked me for that.”

Any warmth leeched away. “She didn’t suffer enough.”

Not even close, for what she had done. To me, to him, to Clare, to so many others.

Rhys didn’t answer. Instead he said, “I didn’t think I could get through that dinner.”

“What do you mean?” He’d been rather … calm. Contained.

“Your sisters mean well, or one of them does. But seeing them, sitting at that table … I hadn’t realized it would hit me as strongly. How young you were. How they didn’t protect you.”

“I managed just fine.”

“We owe them our gratitude for letting us use this house,” he said quietly, “but it will be a long while yet before I can look at your sisters without wanting to roar at them.”

“A part of me feels the same way,” I admitted, nestling down into the blankets. “But if I hadn’t gone into those woods, if they hadn’t let me go out there alone … You would still be enslaved. And perhaps Amarantha would now be readying her forces to wipe out these lands.”

Silence. Then, “I am paying you a wage, you know. For all of this.”

“You don’t need to.” Even if … even if I had no money of my own.

“Every member of my court receives one. There’s already a bank account in Velaris for you, where your wages will be deposited. And you have lines of credit at most stores. So if you don’t have enough on you when you’re shopping, you can have the bill sent to the House.”

“I—you didn’t have to do that.” I swallowed hard. “And how much, exactly, am I getting paid each month?”

“The same amount the others receive.” No doubt a generous—likely too generous—salary. But he suddenly asked, “When is your birthday?”

“Do I even need to count them anymore?” He merely waited. I sighed. “It’s the Winter Solstice.”

He paused. “That was months ago.”

“Mmmhmm.”

“You didn’t … I don’t remember seeing you celebrate it.”

Through the bond, through my unshielded, mess of a mind. “I didn’t tell anyone. I didn’t want a party when there was already all that celebrating going on. Birthdays seem meaningless now, anyway.”

He was quiet for a long minute. “You were truly born on the Winter Solstice?”

“Is that so hard to believe? My mother claimed I was so withdrawn and strange because I was born on the longest night of the year. She tried one year to have my birthday on another day, but forgot to do it the next time—there was probably a more advantageous party she had to plan.”

“Now I know where Nesta gets it. Honestly, it’s a shame we can’t stay longer—if only to see who’ll be left standing: her or Cassian.”

“My money’s on Nesta.”

A soft chuckle that snaked along my bones—a reminder that he’d once bet on me. Had been the only one Under the Mountain who had put money on me defeating the Middengard Wyrm. He said, “So’s mine.”

CHAPTER

25

Standing beneath the latticework of snow-heavy trees, I took in the slumbering forest and wondered if the birds had gone quiet because of my presence. Or that of the High Lord beside me.

“Freezing my ass off first thing in the morning isn’t how I intended to spend our day off,” Rhysand said, frowning at the wood. “I should take you to the Illyrian Steppes when we return—the forest there is far more interesting. And warmer.”

“I have no idea where those are.” Snow crunched under the boots Rhys had summoned when I declared I wanted to train with him. And not physically, but—with the powers I had. Whatever they were. “You showed me a blank map that one time, remember?”

“Precautions.”

“Am I ever going to see a proper one, or will I be left to guess about where everything is?”

“You’re in a lovely mood today,” Rhys said, and lifted a hand in the air between us. A folded map appeared, which he took his sweet time opening. “Lest you think I don’t trust you, Feyre darling … ” He pointed to just south of the Northern Isles. “These are the Steppes. Four days that way on foot,” he dragged a finger upward and into the mountains along the isles, “will take you into Illyrian territory.”

I took in the map, noted the peninsula jutting out about halfway up the western coast of the Night Court and the name marked there. Velaris. He’d once shown me a blank one—when I had belonged to Tamlin and been little more than a spy and prisoner. Because he’d known I’d tell Tamlin about the cities, their locations.

That Ianthe might learn about it, too.

I pushed back against that weight in my chest, my gut.

“Here,” Rhys said, pocketing the map and gesturing to the forest around us. “We’ll train here. We’re far enough now.”

Far enough from the house, from anyone else, to avoid detection. Or casualties.

Rhys held out a hand, and a thick, stumpy candle appeared in his palm. He set it on the snowy ground. “Light it, douse it with water, and dry the wick.”

I knew he meant without my hands.

“I can’t do a single one of those things,” I said. “What about physical shielding?” At least I’d been able to do some of that.

“That’s for another time. Today, I suggest you start trying some other facet of your power. What about shape-shifting?”

I glared at him. “Fire, water, and air it is.” Bastard—insufferable bastard.

He didn’t push the matter, thankfully—didn’t ask why shape-shifting might be the one power I’d never bother to pull apart and master. Perhaps for the same reason I didn’t particularly want to ask about one key piece of his history, didn’t want to know if Azriel and Cassian had helped when the Spring Court’s ruling family had been killed.

I looked Rhys over from head to toe: the Illyrian warrior garb, the sword over his shoulder, the wings, and that general sense of overwhelming power that always radiated from him. “Maybe you should … go.”

“Why? You seemed so insistent that I train you.”

“I can’t concentrate with you around,” I admitted. “And go … far. I can feel you from a room away.”

A suggestive curve shaped his lips.

I rolled my eyes. “Why don’t you just hide in one of those pocket-realms for a bit?”

“It doesn’t work like that. There’s no air there.” I gave him a look to say he should definitely do it then, and he laughed. “Fine. Practice all you want in privacy.” He jerked his chin at my tattoo. “Give a shout down the bond if you get anything accomplished before breakfast.”

I frowned at the eye in my palm. “What—literally shout at the tattoo?”

&nbs

p; “You could try rubbing it on certain body parts and I might come faster.”

He vanished into nothing before I could hurl the candle at him.

Alone in the frost-gilded forest, I replayed his words and a quiet chuckle rasped out of me.

I wondered if I should have tested out the bow and arrows I’d been given before asking him to leave. I hadn’t yet tried out the Illyrian bow—hadn’t shot anything in months, actually.

I stared at the candle. Nothing happened.

An hour passed.

I thought of everything that enraged me, sickened me; thought of Ianthe and her entitlement, her demands. Not even a wisp of smoke emerged.

When my eyes were on the verge of bleeding, I took a break to scrounge through the pack I’d brought. I found fresh bread, a magically warmed canister of stew, and a note from Rhysand that said:

I’m bored. Any sparks yet?

Not surprisingly, a pen clattered in the bottom of the bag.

I grabbed the pen and scribbled my response atop the canister before watching the letter vanish right out of my palm: No, you snoop. Don’t you have important things to do?

The letter flitted back a moment later.

I’m watching Cassian and Nesta get into it again over their tea. Something you subjected me to when you kicked me off training. I thought this was our day off.

I snorted and wrote back, Poor baby High Lord. Life is so hard.

Paper vanished, then reappeared, his scribble now near the top of the paper, the only bit of clear space left. Life is better when you’re around. And look at how lovely your handwriting is.

I could almost feel him waiting on the other side, in the sunny breakfast room, half paying attention to my eldest sister and the Illyrian warrior’s sparring. A faint smile curved my lips. You’re a shameless flirt, I wrote back.