Firefrost: A Flameskin Chronicles Novel

by Camille Longley

  Oscar grabbed Sol’s arm and yanked on her, but she held tight. Her mother looked on, her features curled with disgust, her arms crossed over her chest. The matron’s face was set in hard stone.

  “Josef!” Sol screamed. He was the only one whose features had not been carved from granite and ice. His frown wavered, and he stepped toward them. Carol rushed to Sol’s side and shoved the man that held Kelan’s left arm.

  “Let him go. Do you want to hurt Sol?”

  Josef stepped closer and put a hand on his knife hilt. “Leave her.”

  The men shifted back, their eyes downcast. Kelan sat up, and Sol held him tight.

  “He’s a demon,” Oscar said gruffly.

  She buried her head in Kelan’s shoulder. How could he have thought to leave without her? This was all that awaited him if he were alone. He would have no one to stand beside him and fight for him.

  Oscar left out a heavy breath. “Sol—”

  “I won’t let you hurt him. You’ll have to kill me first.”

  She glared at each of the men in turn, daring them to turn their blades and their large hands against her. Josef turned on his heel and left. Her mother followed. One by one the villagers shuffled away. Even Oscar sheathed his knife with a sigh and returned to his house.

  Kelan dropped his head into his hands and took a ragged breath.

  She placed a hand against his cheek. “They’re gone. You’re safe.”

  He gripped her wrist hard and met her eyes. “I won’t use your body as a shield.”

  “But it was the only way to—”

  “I will not let you sacrifice your life for mine.”

  “I told you, I’m not letting go.”

  “You have a life and a home. You have a place to come back to. If something ever happens to me—”

  “I won’t let anyone hurt you.” She put an arm around his neck and brushed the curls away from his forehead with her other hand.

  “There’s nothing for me if you’re gone.”

  “Don’t say that.”

  He brushed his thumb across her lower lip. “You know it’s true. You saw what I left behind. It was nothing like this.” He gestured to her house, to her sisters standing in the doorway.

  “Wherever our journey takes, even if it be to the City of the Dead, I’ll go with you.”

  He took her hand and kissed her palm. “I’m honored, love. But I can’t allow that.”

  “Kelan—”

  “I’m a Flameskin. I don’t know what this war will bring. How it will end.”

  “We’ll fight together if we have to.”

  He took her face between his hands. “No. If it comes to that, promise you’ll let me go.”

  “I won’t.”

  Carol braided Sol’s clean, wet hair while Kelan bathed in the next room. Dorit had already fallen asleep in Sol’s lap, and Grete was nodding off on her seat beside the fireplace.

  Carol laid her head on Sol’s shoulder when she finished. “I’m going to miss you.”

  Sol squeezed her eyes shut. It was an impossible choice, to give up her home for her heart, her past for her future. Already she ached knowing that she would leave them so vulnerable. “I’ve let everyone down. You and the girls. Pa. Tokkedal.”

  “You haven’t let us down.”

  “I abandoned you for Solstice, and everyone’s been starving here. I was supposed to keep us fed and safe, and I failed. And now I’m leaving.”

  “I’ve been feeding them.”

  “Then why is there no food here?”

  Carol let out a frustrated breath. “My traps were bad at first, but they’re getting better. I can take care of our family just fine.”

  Sol wrapped her arms around Carol and rested her chin on Carol’s shoulder. The firelit kitchen was filled with all the familiar sounds of her sisters sleeping. “I wish they would let him stay.”

  “Me, too.”

  “How could they have wanted to kill him? They’re wrong about Flameskins. Pa was wrong, too.” She shivered. Her pa had committed an unthinkable crime.

  Carol sighed. “Pa was wrong about a lot of things. I think you were the only one who thought he had no faults.”

  Heat rose to Sol’s cheeks. She really had. She had grown up believing Pa could do no wrong. She had always taken his side, always obeyed without question, always listened when he spoke. He was the reason she had fought her feelings for Kelan for so long.

  Kelan emerged from the bedroom in a pair of her pa’s clean clothes. His turquoise eyes were bright, and her heart swelled at the sight of him.

  “Where should I sleep?” he asked.

  “Take him to the loft,” Carol said, and picked Dorit up from Sol’s arms. “The rest of us can sleep in Ma’s bed.”

  Sol slid open the screen door to her parents’ tiny bedroom—Ma’s tiny bedroom—and Carol carried Dorit inside. Sol climbed the ladder, lifted the trap door, and pulled herself into the girls’ bedroom in the loft. The room occupied the entire second floor, and the steep pitch of the roof made it impossible to stand anywhere except beneath the central roof timber. Kelan climbed in after her, and Sol lit a candle for him with the pinch of her fingers. She should’ve gone down to light it with their candle downstairs, but she was getting careless with her emberstone. It was so convenient.

  Pa would’ve been so disappointed. But she found she cared less and less.

  The girls’ shared bed lay along one wall, and their clothes and Dorit’s toys and their belongings were strewn across the rest of the space. Everything was so familiar here, as familiar as her own pulse. This was where she had grown up. This was where she had slept since she had grown out of her parents’ bed. This was the sacred and sometimes war-filled space she shared with her sisters. It was a place without secrets or pretense or misery. It was a place she belonged so wholly she ached to see it after such an absence. How she would miss it.

  Kelan drew her in, one hand at her neck, the other at her waist. His lips met hers in the darkness. She reached up and ran her fingers across his temple and into his curly hair. It had gotten long and shaggy again after their travels. He smelled of the lavender soap she and Ma had made last summer.

  “I’m sorry to take you away from all this,” he whispered. His breath was hot against her cheek.

  “We’ll come back after the war is over.”

  He pulled back, and his face was pensive. “I don’t know if I can promise you that. I know I can’t promise you safety, or a normal life, or anything close to what you deserve.”

  “You’re all I want.” She kissed him softly, then met his eyes. “I love you.”

  He pressed his forehead against hers and laced his fingers behind her back. “I’ve loved you since Baarka.”

  Her mouth fell open, and her heart fluttered. “So long?”

  “When I realized how much I wanted you to really see me, to see I wasn’t like the others, I knew I was falling for you.”

  He smiled and kissed her surprised lips. She leaned into his kisses and fumbled for the manacle’s key in her pocket. She wanted to be warmed with his love; she wanted it to flow through her veins.

  But then his hands slid to her hips, pulling her in against him. His hands were gentle, coaxing her closer as his body moved against hers. He pressed kisses along the length of her neck, and her heart pounded loud in her chest, beating against his.

  She didn’t want to pull away—her body resisted the thought. She was desperate to lose herself in this, but—

  “Sol,” he murmured.

  She broke away. “We should—we should get some sleep. We have to leave early tomorrow.”

  He pressed his cheek against hers and hesitated before letting her go. “I know.” He pecked her cheek and blew out the candle. “Goodnight, love.”

  She felt her way to the hatch in the darkness and climbed down. Carol had banked the fire, and the embers gave a soft glow from the fireplace. She made her way across the kitchen, running her hand along the wooden shelf, gently tou
ching the ceramic jars filled with fragrant herbs, the wooden plates, the beautiful oakwood bowl. Saying goodbye.

  She squeezed into the bed alongside her sisters. From the soft rhythm of Carol’s breathing, she could tell she was already asleep. Sol lay there for a long time at the edge of the pallet, warmed by the closeness of her sisters and thinking of all that she would miss.

  But sleep eluded her. Kelan’s kisses had filled her with fire, and the burning wouldn’t stop.

  But they couldn’t. Not tonight. They had to wait until—

  Until what?

  There would be no wedding feasts, no bridal gown, no wreath of juniper or crown of holly. There would be no home for them to call their own, no hearthstone to lay or cellar to dig. There would be no gifts or well wishes from the neighbors, no sleigh to carry them to the temple altar with bells jangling in the frozen air.

  She and Kelan would have none of those things.

  No.

  The mountains would be their altar, the furs her gown. The trees would be their wedding party, and ice would make her crown. In the morning, they would depart into an unknown road, tying their fates together more tightly than any knotted wedding veil.

  Her heart beat fast as she slipped from the bed and silently slid open the screen.

  And there he was, standing outside the door with his hand raised to knock on it. She could barely see his outline in the darkness, but she didn’t need the light. She knew his face so well and loved the slope of his eyebrows and the curve of his jaw, and those enchanting turquoise eyes.

  “I’m not used to sleeping alone,” he whispered.

  She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him toward her, pressing her lips against his. He stumbled over her, and they lost their balance. He grappled and caught them, one hand shoved up against the wall, the other arm encircling her waist. He pressed her up against the wall, pushing his body against hers. His hands found the skin at her waist.

  Winter rattled its last cries on the wind outside, and cold tendrils of air snuck in through the chinks in the wooden slats, but she was warm against his body. She was burning.

  She led him up to the loft. The faint glow of his emberstone lit their faces as he lowered her onto the bed and pulled her close.

  She unhooked the buttons running across his chest, and his shirt fell open. The token he wore around his neck brushed her skin as it swung back and forth on its chain. She ran her fingers over his scars and guided his hand underneath her tunic to her waist. She sighed at the touch of his fingers on her skin.

  When she removed the key and her emberstone from her pocket, he pulled back.

  “What are you doing?”

  She pressed one hand to his chest and unlocked the manacle. The moment his emberstone came off, his skin came alive. Sparks burst beneath the surface.

  “I want you like this.”

  She pressed her cheek to his and gripped his fiery skin with burning fingers, leaning in against him. His lips stretched into a smile she couldn’t see in the darkness, but that she could feel.

  When he kissed her again, it was the kind of kiss that was heavy with desire and impatient for more and yet wanted this moment to stretch on forever. All of her was burning now. Every inch of her skin was filled with his fire.

  His want flooded her with sparks, but this fire had already been burning for a long time inside her. She could no longer contain it. It ran like wildfire through her veins.

  Kelan’s pyra burned hot and bright and fierce. She thought for a moment she wouldn’t be able to contain all the fire inside her, but hearts were made to expand. Sol’s blood surged with both her joy and his, the exultation and the flames and the intoxication of it. There were only the sparks inside them, and his breath on her skin, and his burning hands on her body.

  And then Sol’s eyes pricked with unexpected tears.

  Something had been gained, but something had also been lost.

  “Did I hurt you?” he asked. Worry and fear bled out of his heart and into hers.

  She shook her head, trying and failing to speak.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked, more anxious.

  She didn’t understand the tears. She was happy. She had never been happier.

  But this was her last night at home. This was the end of her childhood. This was the end of four sisters in a bed in the loft, the end of hanging clothes from the rafters to make a castle and dancing around the table after dinner. The end of summers spent swimming in the creek beside the house and making lavender soap in the kitchen.

  He swore quietly and rested his cheek against hers. “I shouldn’t have.”

  She took his head in her hands. “No. This is what I want. Only, I’ll miss all of this. And this place. Life was so good here for my family, and I want that for us.”

  “I’ll find a way to give you the life you want.”

  “No. We’ll find a way. Together.”

  Chapter 43

  Kelan

  It hadn’t been a dream.

  Kelan woke to find Sol nestled in the bed beside him. The morning light coming in through the small rice paper window illuminated her form. His shackle was on again, but he was warm. He put an arm around her waist, trapping her against him, and his whole body came awake as he brushed his fingers across her skin.

  His mountain queen.

  The legends said that dryads slept with men and then plucked their victims’ hearts out of their chests. The dryads would disappear into the mist and the trees and never return, leaving their lovers to wander the mountains in search of their hearts.

  No. Sol’s skin was warm and soft. She was real. This was real.

  But she had fallen asleep with tears in her eyes, and that was because of him.

  If he loved her, should he have set her free and let her hide in these mountains and forget him?

  If he loved her, shouldn’t he do anything to remain by her side?

  She was giving up everything to be with him, and he loved her the more for it. But he didn’t want her to resent him for everything she had lost.

  Even if he couldn’t bring himself to regret what they had done, he couldn’t be sure of what she would think this morning when the fire that had warmed them all night was banked, and all that awaited them was the cold reality of the journey before them.

  Sol stirred and woke, and his heart raced within him.

  Please, please still love me. Please don’t disappear into the woods.

  She turned and met his eyes. “Oh,” she gasped as she yanked at the blankets to cover her body.

  He hugged her to him. “Morning, love.”

  He kissed her forehead and her cheek and her lips and her stiffness softened.

  “How do you feel?” he asked.

  Her cheeks pinked. “I’m fine. I’m better than fine.”

  “Are you really?”

  She sighed. “I just—Yesterday was a lot. Soldiers and coming home, and Josef, and—”

  He cut her off there with a kiss. “Don’t be sorry about anything.” His hands trailed over the curves of her waist and her hip.

  She put her hand over his heart. His heart still beat inside his chest; she hadn’t plucked it out.

  “I just wish everything about this didn’t have to be so difficult.”

  “Maybe we’ll be hungry, and maybe the journey will be long, but I’d travel any distance and climb any mountain to be with you.”

  She smiled and kissed him.

  Sol.

  This mountain queen was his.

  Chapter 44

  Sol

  Sol wasn’t sure how her heart could be so full and so broken at the same time. She spun in a slow circle, memorizing the line of the mountains, the colors of their peaks, the pale morning sky and the frost-laden trees. She breathed in the smell of the pines and the woodsmoke.

  Ma hadn’t come to say goodbye.

  Carol was helping Kelan pack Sol’s bag with food she insisted they didn’t need, but Sol knew they did. Sol was grateful
anyway.

  “You’ll smell the smoke before the Flameskins arrive,” Kelan was saying. “That should give you one- or two-days’ warning before they come. Make sure you have a place in the woods to retreat to with most of your food stores, because if they do come, they’ll burn down the house.”

  “Will they come looking for us?” Carol asked.

  “No. The only people that ever get hurt in a Flameskin raid are the ones who fight back.”

  “Maybe we should fight back.”

  Kelan’s eyes were lidded. “The only thing you can do is hide and wait until it’s over.”

  Sol’s heart twisted within her. She was leaving her family while the Flameskins marched on their heels. It would be years before she and Kelan would be able to return.

  Kelan grabbed Sol’s pack and pulled out the jeweled letter opener. “Would you be able to make good use of this?” He dropped it into Carol’s waiting hands, and she stared at it with wide eyes.

  Sol smiled. “Take it to Skive. You’ll get a better price for it, and a better price for seed, too.”

  Carol closed her hands around the gift. “I’ll take care of them, Sol. I swear it.”

  “We’ll miss you,” Grete said. “I don’t care what Ma says about you.”

  Sol tried not to let the words sting. She could guess what Ma had said.

  “You’re really not our sister?” Dorit asked.

  Carol pulled Dorit away. “Hush. That’s not true.”

  Sol clenched her fists. “She’s disowned me?” Lisbet had said as much yesterday, but Sol had prayed she hadn’t meant it.

  Carol bit her lip and wouldn’t speak.

  “Carol—”

  “No, it’s not that. She said—It doesn’t matter. She was just angry. She’ll miss you.”

  “Carol, tell me.”

  “She told us you weren’t her daughter,” Grete said. “She told us you were left on the doorstep in that oakwood bowl. The one with the leaves carved on it.”

  Sol breathed in sharply and took a step back. “That’s not—”