Kiefer glowered across the table. “What would you know about any of this?” he hissed. His question shattered the cloak of ignorance that the others had been holding on to, and everyone shifted in the sudden crack of discomfort.
Mather swirled the ale around his glass. “Nothing,” he confessed.
Kiefer held still. He hadn’t expected that answer and, after a moment, dropped his gaze.
Feige leapt up in the silence that followed. She strode across the floorboards, the old wood not even moaning under her small frame, and stopped just beside Hollis.
“Go back to your stool,” her brother snapped.
Feige ignored him, her eyes on Mather, calm certainty turning her youthful face into a dare. She was so small, yet Mather saw in her the ferocity that came when someone had seen years of bloodshed and battle. This girl couldn’t have been more than thirteen or fourteen, but she was . . . weathered. That was the only word Mather could think of to describe her, but even that didn’t entirely fit. Some awkward combination of worn and fragile.
“Why?” Feige asked. “I’m not in denial.” She glared at Phil and he instantly dipped away. When she was satisfied that he had surrendered, she turned to Mather. “What do you have to be in denial about, Once-King?”
Mather’s grip tensed on the goblet. Hollis dropped back against his chair, his muscles coiled, bracing himself. All of them braced themselves, gulping ale and avoiding eye contact and holding their breath. For what? Feige?
Mather gave the only answer he could. “Failing you.”
Feige laughed, her white hair bobbing in clumps that had likely never seen a brush. “At least you can admit it. No one else running this kingdom can.”
“He isn’t running this kingdom anymore,” Kiefer mumbled to his lap. His eyes shot up, daring, challenging. “You may be a lord, but you’re just one of us now. You’re here instead of dancing the night away with the royals. They kick you out, Once-King?”
Mather dropped his eyes from Kiefer. No challenge here.
“But maybe that’s why they don’t let him do more than train the army now.” Feige dug for something in her pocket, a wooden object she closed in her palm. “Because he’s not the king, but the older ones know he can admit what happened.”
Mather wanted to agree with Kiefer. He wanted to say he wasn’t leading this kingdom, not anymore. But tonight should have been a chance at forgetting, so Mather stayed silent, his fingers tightening even more on the goblet.
After a long pause, Feige’s amusement vanished. She tossed the object in her hand into the air, a chunk of wood that smacked onto the tabletop with a dull thunk. “I think you know we aren’t really Winterians. We’re different from them—we can’t forget our pasts because it’s all we’ve ever known. And I think the older ones realize you know that, and that’s the reason they don’t want you around. Because the people who are running this kingdom can’t bear to have anyone around who might remind them of their great failure.”
All the blood in Mather’s body rushed downward, leaving him light-headed and gaping at this girl. This was why Phil had called her a ghost; it was too hard to believe she was real, this child throwing insults and truths with more accuracy than any adult.
Everyone at the table remained quiet, bodies slack. Mather tipped his goblet, the ale sliding down his throat in a bitter wave as Feige returned to her corner, curled on her stool like nothing had happened.
“Isn’t enough ale in the world,” Phil murmured. “Your sister will be our downfall, Hollis.”
Mather reached for the carving in the middle of the table, cradled it in his palm. “No.”
“My lord?” Hollis glanced up.
Phil rolled his eyes. “Suns, Hollis. He’s one of us now.”
The alcohol hit Mather’s empty stomach and made him a little warmer, a little lighter, as if his body might float up out of the holes in the ceiling. Phil started drinking again, urging everyone else to start up before Mather could expand on his disagreement. Back to their evening, as if Feige’s interlude had never happened. They could be just as good at pretending they didn’t hurt as all of the older Winterians.
Mather joined them. He wanted this, or thought he did, and forced himself to laugh at Phil’s imitation of a Cordellan soldier. He wanted to focus on jokes and being around boys his age—the only person he had ever interacted with his age was . . . Meira.
She needed to know there were others who felt as she did, apart from Mather. That things were wrong, that they didn’t fit here as perfectly as they should. He should storm back into the ballroom and swoop Meira into his arms and let everything tumble out.
Mather emptied another glass.
Feige faded to nothing more than a shadow in the corner, whittling and rocking back and forth. Mather kept her carving in his lap, and though he toyed with the idea of pretending, he made sure he still had that small reminder that this wasn’t real happiness.
Trace recounted Phil’s failed attempt at sword fighting earlier today. Mather laughed and offered details, but kept his hand on the carving. No bigger than his palm, half a wildflower, half a snowflake, with four words etched on the back.
Child of the Thaw.
He wasn’t sure why that mattered so much to him. But the more he drank, the more he could pretend Feige’s words hadn’t slammed into some hollow place inside of him. The more he could pretend he didn’t see how the boys gazed into the air when they thought no one watched, their eyes distant as if they saw the horrors of their pasts raging toward them.