Gathering Frost (Once Upon A Curse Book 1) (16 page)

"Take off your pants," he says while his head is buried in a trunk in the corner.

I flinch as nerves prick my skin. "What?"

"I need to clean your wound," he says, looking back at me, eyebrows raised in question.

"Oh, right," I murmur and stand. But in this small space surrounded by soft light, it feels oddly intimate to remove my clothes. With his back still turned, I sliver out of my jeans, hissing as the fabric scratches my exposed flesh.

"Are you…" He trails off as his eyes wander over my skin. I shiver, but not from the cold. The air feels warm. Static almost. Neither of us moves, but I know when his eyes land on the blood caked against my leg. The mood shifts perceptively and his entire face scrunches tight, as though he's absorbed my pain.

"Sit down," he says, hands holding my shoulders tight to help ease me into a seated position. His fingers gently grace my calf, lifting it onto his bent knee so my entire leg is exposed.

Asher flicks his eyes to me, apologetic, seeking permission and I nod. "This might hurt," he warns before placing a wet cloth to my leg. Rubbing alcohol. I've used it before, scavenged it from the old city. The burn is familiar, but on a wound this large, I bite down, crunching my teeth to keep from screaming out.

The blood rubs away, disappears in the graceful movement of Asher's hands, but my gaze travels north to the determined lock in his jaw, the purse of his lips, the concentration in his eyes. I keep staring, memorizing his face, trying to ignore the pain, stealing his strength as my own.

"I don't think it needs stitches," he tells me as he rubs a salve into the wound. "It's really not as bad as it looked, just bloody."

I muster the courage to peek back down and see that he's right. My skin is raw for about three inches, but in a narrow stretch, obviously the edge of a bullet. Still, it is a shallow wound and the bleeding has mostly stopped now. In a few days, I will be back to normal, but traveling with it will be more than annoying.

I take the tape as he cleans up the rest of the supplies, and wrap my leg, securing the gauze he used to cover my skin. How many precious resources did Asher just waste on me? Even though they have electricity, I can't imagine medical supplies are easy for the rebels to come by.

"We'll stay here for the night."

Asher pulls a sleeping bag from his backpack, unzipping it.

"I can move, really. Let’s go." I want answers, and I won't get them until we leave the rebel camp. I need to know exactly what they're planning, exactly what Asher is planning. I need to know so I can stop him. 

Betrayal was unavoidable all along.

Asher hesitates, looking at my leg, looking out the window. He is torn. Time is of the essence, but he does not want to cause me pain. So I take the choice away and stand, gritting my teeth as I pull my jeans back on. Nodding, Asher pulls his backpack together and hands me the other one he's filled.

"This way." He sighs, resigned, as he leads me outside and to the back of the cabin where two bicycles wait, tied up with chains.

My thigh already aches in protest.

We travel for two days before I feel safe enough to start asking questions.

Asher has stopped us in an abandoned house, clean shelter from the rain just starting to drop. Though dusty, the sofa is comfortable below my sore bottom, providing some relief from the pain flaring in my leg. The cut has opened again, so I sit tending the wound while Asher uses the flint to spark the old fireplace back to life.

Our mood has been low for hours, ever since we passed back into the queen's realm. I'm not sure how, but we both felt it when we crossed the dividing line this morning. The air was colder, goose bumps rose along my skin, but underneath I still feel warm, feel like myself. I have no idea how long my self-control will last. Is it a trick the queen is playing? Or could I have truly broken her curse?

I fear I won't know the answer until it is too late.

"Asher?"

He stops adjusting the wood, turning in surprise that I have finally broken the silence after so long. But it's time. Now that we are in the queen's realm, there is no turning back, and I can demand the answers he has been keeping from me, the secrets he is so poorly hiding.

As if he senses what's about to come, Asher leaves the fire, walking slowly back to the couch, sitting down and resting my throbbing leg over his thigh. His fingers run softly over my bare skin, dulling the pain, replacing it with pleasure.

"What do you want to know?"

"Everything."

He won't look at me. I refuse to take my eyes off him. As the silence stretches, I grow impatient, more demanding.

"Start with the plan. Why did the general say you only have one week?"

"Now five days," he mumbles. I wait for him to continue. With a sigh, Asher gives in. "In five days, the general will lead every fighter over the threshold into the queen's realm and they will march on Kardenia, or New York, whatever you want to call it. Before that happens, I need to kill my mother. I need to stop her from trapping more people in her web of magic. The general and I both know that we only have one shot at victory because I'm the only one who can get close enough to the queen to stop her."

"But they don't know the queen is your mother…" I trail off, mind searching for the right words.

"Correct," Asher responds, curt, giving nothing away.

"So why did they give you such an important task? Why do they think you can break through the magic to kill her?"

"Because I told them I could."

"Asher," I bite, tone scathing.

"Fine, fine." He pauses. "When I first arrived at the rebel camp as a boy, no one trusted me. They all thought I was a spy or entranced, under her thrall. And I told them that the queen's magic was weak on children, that they were too innocent to be fully controlled, which was why I was able to run away. That was my first lie, and they believed me."

"Why? Why trust a child? Especially one from a foreign world you do not understand?"

"Because hope makes people trust in lies. They wanted their lost children to be safe, and I gave them a way to believe it could be true."

"What was your second lie?" I ask. Asher looks away. Disgust is evident on his face, self-loathing pulls at his cheeks, strains his neck, wrinkles his lips. I grab his hand, connecting us, trying to let him know it is okay.

"I," Asher says, peeking at me underneath hooded brows, "I told them that once someone breaks the thrall, the queen can never control them again."

I close my eyes tight, shaking my head just slightly. "And that's not true?" My voice is soft, barely a whisper.

"I don't know." His tone is dark, ominous. I know what he is telling me. I understand the second meaning in his words. Asher is confessing what I always knew—I can never be free. The queen can reclaim me at any moment, can pull me back under her thrall. I'm living on borrowed time. Eventually, the frost will freeze my heart, will crystallize my blood.

But right now, my chest is warm, defiant. I'll never go down without a fight.

"I'm so sorry, Jade." Asher's grip tightens on my hand, as his voice grows full. "That's why I didn’t want you to come. Why I told you to stay."

"It's okay." I meet his eyes, dark with worry. I know the burden of keeping secrets. I understand the twisted pain, how it snaps the mind in two, pulling the body in opposite directions—what is right and what is necessary. Right now I'm split, torn by my own imminent betrayal, by the secrets I won't reveal. Asher at least is being honest. I wish I could say the same about myself.

Guilty, I look away before he sees the mistruths in my eyes, hoping my skipping heart does not give it away. I decide to change the subject, begin my questioning anew.

"So they sent you to kill her because they believed you are immune. But what will happen when we get there? When the queen uses her powers?"

"I am immune," he admits, "just not for the reasons they think. I am the heir. I am one with the magic. It can't affect me."

"Is that why the queen wants you back?"

"Yes and no." Asher's tone has become haggard, as though the words cut when they come out. "I know my mother, and I know when she becomes tired of someone. My father bored her, so she killed him. I disappoint her, so she'll discard me when the time is right."

I've leaned forward, closer to Asher, as though my proximity can protect him. My body is on edge, my nerves prickle in the silence.

"What time is that?"

Asher swallows, eyes absent of their normal sparkle, wet like the ocean at midnight, dark and deep and full of unknowns, rippling with the words he has kept to himself for so long. I want to dive inside, to see him raw, to know every inch of his mind. But I can't. I see only what he gives me, and right now, that's despair.

Asher licks his lips, swallows, and then says the very thing I fear. "When she has another child who can take my place."

Every ounce of fight leaves my body with those words, and I fall back against the couch, defeated, empty.

Asher will die.

He knows it. And now I know it too.

His fate is sealed. The only question is when and how—by his own hands or the queen's? The answer lies in me.

I stand, overwhelmed, needing an escape from the choice I must make. Do I betray all of the rebels just for the chance that Asher might live? Or do I give in to what he wants and say goodbye forever? Can I?

The queen has no second child. She may never have a second child. But what then? The rebels march, are captured. Asher is locked up, imprisoned in a life he never wanted, only for years to pass unchanging before the queen dies. He will inherit her powers anyway, he will kill himself eventually, and I will end up without him either way. I can lose him now to a fate he chose, or I can lose him after years of bitter hatred have torn us apart.

There is no good option, no choice I want to take.

So I run.

Out the door, abandoning the fire for the cold pellets of rain smacking my skin. Asher calls my name, but I ignore him. The ache in my thigh is comforting in a way, a punishment I deserve for this fate I've given myself. A fate I somehow chose.

The longer I run, the shorter my breath comes, the more strangled, thinner until my lungs feel completely empty. This is how desperation feels. My throat is dry, scratchy, and it burns. My eyes burn too, and I realize the water on my face is not just the rain. It is salty. Bitter. I push myself. When I stop, I'll need to face it, so I won't stop.

Pounding on pavement, my feet sound like thunder. I am the storm. I destroy everything around me.

"Jade!"

Asher's voice melts me, pulls me toward him like a magnet, and I stumble. Bent at the waist, I heave, quickly trying to fill a chest that has stopped working. I cough. And when that does not work, I give in to the burn. Through the patter of rain, my sobs sound animalistic, howls that hang in the air around me, echoing in my ears.

I don't even know what I'm crying for.

Asher?

My mother?

Maddy?

The rebels?

Myself?

Too many images flood my mind, too many choices, too many lives that hang in the balance.

"Shh." Asher tries to soothe as his arms encircle me, try to comfort me. "Shh, it'll be okay."

But it won't.

And I'm furious.

My blood boils as I turn in his arms. Just as quickly as my tears came, they are gone, replaced by a crimson tide I cannot control. So I ride it, throwing myself out of Asher's embrace, pushing against his chest so we stumble apart.

"Why?" My voice is manic. The rain begins to fall thicker, creating a wall between our bodies, gray and foggy, just clear enough to see through.

Asher is confused, uncertain. He remains silent, eyes never leaving me, lips curling into his mouth. His fingers rise, stretching for my arm, trying to close the distance, but I swat him away.

"Why, Asher? Why did you do this to me? If you knew this was how it would end the entire time, why did you make me feel? Why—" But I cut myself off. I won't say it. I refuse.

"I don't know," he says, stepping back.

"That's not good enough," I shout, closing in, shoving my hands into his hard chest, pushing him back once more. "There are a thousand people in the guard, why did you have to take me?"

I pound his chest again. He stumbles back. I hit him harder, determined to beat the words out of him. I know it's not fair. I know it's not all his fault, that I carry blame too. But I'm too far gone to care. And when he still doesn't talk, I throw my fists at him once more. This time, Asher catches my wrists tight, yanking me toward him so I fall against his chest.

"Because I'm selfish," he tells me, tone even. I squirm, trying to break free, but he won't let go. He tugs me closer.

"You are," I spit, because words are my only weapon now. They do not faze him. He does not even flinch.

"As soon as I saw you, I wanted to know more. Needed to. Maybe it was how quickly you snatched my gun, or the fire in your eyes, or the fact that you let me go. I don't know. I was taken. I couldn't think about anything else." Asher's tone has grown frenzied. His eyes dart around my face, looking everywhere but my eyes, as though he is trying to memorize every curve, every spot.

And then the pace slows, his expression grows tender, calm. His gaze drifts from my lips to my nose, higher until it meets mine. "You were so beautiful, but so hard, so cold. When I looked at you, I saw caged fire. Your spark was almost gone. It was smothered, slowly dying. And all I wanted to do was set you free."

He releases my wrists, doing just that, but I don't move. I can't. My feet are stuck to the ground. My muscles have grown tight in the rain.

Would I rather be safely back on the wall, oblivious to the way passion burns the skin, ignorant of the heat it pulses through my veins? Or would I rather be here, torn between two impossible choices, but aflame with feeling?

That answer is easy.

I lift my hand to his wet cheek. We only have five days left, and I do not want to waste them with more words. I want to fill them with a lifetime of memories, brilliant constellations to guide me through the dark, because a starless night is fast approaching.

In this moment, my decision has become clear. 

I'm not strong enough to let him go. Not strong enough to let him die. To just give in. I'm a fighter. I don't know how to do anything else. And I refuse to believe there are no other options, that there is no way to save him. But when I betray him, I fear Asher will never look at me this way again, like my eyes hold every wish he's ever dreamed.

Soon he will hate me. 

But right now, there is only him and me. Alone in the rain. Inches apart. Breath mingling. Proclamations unspoken but there all the same.

I don't know who moves first, I just know that we are touching, kissing, grasping for one another. I give in, lost in the feel of his skin on mine. I let go, falling so fast that even Asher cannot catch me.