Forged in Frost and Fire (Book 1 in the Chronicles of Kings trilogy)

Chapter Forty Two

‧͙⁺˚*･༓☾　　☽༓･*˚⁺‧͙

"I'm just....I'm just not sure it's my color," I said, staring at myself in the mirror. It wasn't an ugly dress, not at all, but I wasn't sure bright orange was my thing. The girl looking back at me did not look like me at all. My reflection was in a puffy orange dress with big sleeves and a skirt that weighed about a million pounds. My hair was in a knot at the top of my head, tight and practically glued down with product.

"I think it looks great," Nazira said, placing her hands on my shoulder, smiling proudly at us in the mirror. Of course she'd think it looked great, she was the one that spent an hour making me look that way. Nazira herself was wearing a bright sleeveless red dress that looked like roses were falling from her bodice down to the ground and collecting at the bottom of her skirt.

"It just doesn't feel very...me," I said. Not to mention the bun was giving me a massive headache already.

"Well you look like a princess and that was the goal," Nazira said.

"I know," I muttered. Gabriel had given me the dress with a crowd in mind. He wanted them to approve of me. Apparently, my dress was just an updated version of something princess Freya wore to her sixteenth birthday party. I felt like a doll in it and a fake. I was a spy, I was supposed to be killing the king not parading around in a dress that looked like a three year old imagined it.

"I'll be in the ballroom with the others. Come join us when you're ready," Nazira said, pressing a kiss to my cheek. She squeezed my arm. "I'm so glad you're a part of us." She grinned at our reflection and I found myself smiling back, leaning into her warm touch. She smelt of jasmine and the perfume of the gold glitter spray she had dusted herself with. She really was a vision.

"Remember Sable's entering with the king. Come down soon." She picked up her skirts and headed towards the doors.

"Wait," I said, standing. "I'm sorry." She turned towards me, her smile was still on but she looked confused.

"What for?" she said. Well, in reality, my apology was for a million things. For how I was lying to her about my past, how I was a spy right under her nose, how I was together and happy with Sable when she and Caspian had been playing it safe for a long, long time.

"For you and Caspian," I said. "You deserve a lot of love, Nazira. Both of you do. I hope one day you get it." She pinched her lips together, her brown eyes flickering down to the floor. Tonight, her hair was straight and down, two pieces were pulled back away from her face. She once told me she liked having her hair both straight and curly. She styled it however she felt.

"Don't fuck things up," she said. I felt myself freeze and the air in the room drop. She looked up at me. "You're doing a risky thing and putting all of us in danger just...just tell me he's worth it. Because I see the way he looks at you, Eira. He's never looked at anyone like that before. You've...changed him in a way I never thought he'd change and for that I am grateful but I need to know if you feel the same. Tell me he's worth it."

"He's more than that," I said. Deep in my bones....I knew it was true. "My whole life I feel like I've been encased in ice. I felt like I was in an impenetrable fortress of cold that could never be penetrated. But Sable....Sable did just that. For the past few years my life has been nothing but ice. Cold, brutal ice. But Sable broughy warmth into it. He brought passion and feeling and so much color. So yes, I was made in frost, but I was forged in frost and fire."

"That's an oddly...imaginative way of thinking of things," Nazira said, chuckling. "But I'm happy for you." Her smile looked genuine. "Really, really happy. For both of you."