Ashes of Snow

Chapter 22

THAT NIGHT, SLIPPERY, fleeting dreams suck me down like a hungry wave. Dizzy and disorienting, soulless eyes and faces from my past, and darkness, always darkness. From that blackness come monsters, clawing fingers and bloody teeth lunging for my throat—

I fly awake, every nerve tight. But there are no monsters here. At least, not in this cage. My panic fades a little at the sight of the three people staring at me. The two men, both at least ten years older than me, and the girl. Her blue eyes gleam, set in a sunken, pale face, and she studies me like she can see my whole life story written across my forehead.

"I'm Nesta," she says, and points over her shoulder. "Cressen and Troy, my brothers."

Troy nods but Cressen keeps his eyes level with mine. His expression is a vibrant contrast to Nesta's—she is open and willing, he is closed and decided. Decided, from the look of it, that I am just as much a danger as the Spring soldiers moving around our cage.

It's morning.

I jump up, back scraping along the rough wall. Will Lorgen send for me? Will he let Cain torture me into submission, until everything about the past sixteen years comes tumbling out of my mouth? My chest fills with lead-hot pressure, pinching off air.

"I'm Aerin," I manage around a tongue that feels more sand than anything, my eyes darting between Nesta and the door, waiting for soldiers to burst inside and drag me out.

"If they were going to take you so soon, they never would have brought you here to begin with," Troy offers. He holds some of Cressen's distrust, but his face softens, offering me the smallest bit of kindness.

"How can you know that?" Cressen snaps, watching the door.

"The same way I do," Nesta declares proudly, taking my hand. "She's here for a reason."

Cressen turns a glare to me, like I'm the one who made her say that. I don't have the strength to pull away from her hand, though, needing her small bit of comfort, and I just stare at him until he swings his gaze back to the door.

"Where did you come from?" Nesta asks, the question popping out of her mouth like she's been holding it in since I got here. "Winter? No, of course not—they say no one lives there anymore. One of the other Seasons?"

"I was in Avellia before I came here," I say. Cressen's glare makes me feel guilty for talking to her, like any word I say will only strengthen her slowly growing hope. Nesta still looks at me with a hint of caution, but the brightness in her eyes is ... beautiful. It's hard not to want to make her happy, and just that word lights up her whole face.

"Avellia," she echoes, and releases my hand to face Troy. "That's a Rhythm, right?"

Troy's mouth twitches in a smile, cracking his face like he doesn't do it often. "Our Nesta's going to be a world traveler one day," he says, and I can't miss the pride that swells in him. Pride in his little sister, in her ability to still dream beyond these bars.

"Or a seamstress," she amends, her face flushing red. Whatever blip of happiness she managed to hold on to vanishes, and she looks at me with a sad shrug. "Like our mother."

"Quiet," Cressen growls, a bite of warning as keys rattle in our door.

I pin my body to the back wall. No matter how Nesta and Troy tried to reassure me, or how uncaring I was last night at the thought of Lorgen coming for me, dread still churns in my stomach, a flicker of survival that's impossible to snuff out entirely. They can't take me. Not until I figure out... something. Some way to escape a long, slow death at Lorgen's hands, a way to help the others around me escape the same fate.