Winter's Bride by Candace Wondrak

Author:Candace Wondrak [Wondrak, Candace]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-11-30T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Six – Winter

Everything had become too hard, I think. After all this time, I think I was finally growing tired of the never-ending game, the constant searching, never being able to find what I want. What I need.

Were gods supposed to feel this tired?

I stood on one of the castle’s many balconies, the wind blowing bitterly against my skin. My head was bent as I heaved sigh after sigh. These last two days, I’d tried. I really had tried to be more, to do more. I’d eaten every meal with her, tried not to snap at her when she took a tone with me or asked me questions which she had no right to.

But it was hard. It was so, so hard, and I felt so tired of this. It would only end up the same. Morana would join the ranks of the others, and my brother would hate me for it. He would hate me for it, because he wanted her. Somehow, someway, the same girl had become a focal point in both our lives.

I should simply let him have her. I should give her up, call it all off. There was no law that said I must marry every twenty-five years; it was something of my own making, and it could be canceled easily.

When I thought of canceling the whole thing, I pictured her face. The fire in her greyish blue eyes, the way her skin was sun-kissed in the most entrancing of ways. She was beautiful, surely, and she was every bit a child of Summer, not Winter. She’d never been mine; Morana had always belonged to Ishan, and my fool of a brother had taken his time in realizing how badly he wanted her. Only when she was in my grasp, when she was set to become my bride, did he see the truth of his feelings.

Could I take that away from my brother? Could I be so selfish?

Yes, I could, but I knew I shouldn’t.

Fate, it seemed, had more in store for me tonight than a simple self-loathing session, for the next thing I knew, I was not alone on the balcony. Morana appeared beside me, staring at me as if she both hated me and was confused by everything I was. To that, I’d say, you aren’t the first… and you probably won’t be the last.

“There are things you must answer to,” she started, appearing as if she wanted to rip me apart.

I was slow to stand straight, to hold my head up high—for I was the king of this castle. Though she would be my wife, she could not speak to me as if I meant nothing. A scowl crossed my face, even though I wanted to be left alone, to mope in silence. “I must answer to nothing if I do not wish to,” I told her, frowning. Never before had a frown felt so labored.

“If you want me to become your next bride, you do,” she said, refusing to back down.

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