Another twist cut her curse short as Riverion slipped into a current and drifted over the stone walls of Lunaria. Glowing streets unfurled below like satin ribbons peppered by low-lit lanterns.
Riverion’s route was pure muscle memory from there, giving both of them a chance to catch their breaths as he wove around the city gates and into the towering roost above the amethyst palace. The roost housed dozens of dragons much smaller than him, but his space still sat empty as he crashed into the wooden nest. His claws hardly brushed the hay before quick steps rumbled up the steps and through the door, bouncing yellow energy, preceding a voice Astra had missed every second of every day she’d been gone.
“As!” Ameera’s lungs puffed as she shoved her way through the royal roost’s endless stalls. She must have sprinted from whatever library she spent her morning in when she spotted Riv. “You’re home!”
Her lips broke into a wide smile, a soft point of relief in her golden, angular face. Astra slid off her dragon, pushing at the split silk on her arm. She held up the scrap of parchment that brought her here.
“I had little choice, and I barely made it!” Astra wiped at the blood still weeping from the wound. “Gods dammit, I liked this dress.”
Ameera brushed her fingers over the sleeve, examining the cut. “Who did you piss off?” Her musical laugh lit something inside Astra as she wrapped her in a desperate hug. Her warm honey scent soothed the sting in Astra’s arm.
“That’s how you greet royalty now? I leave for a few years and everyone’s manners go to shit?”
“Oh, my apologies, Princess,” Ameera muttered as she bowed comically low, rolling her eyes.
“Better. And I didn’t get a feel for who they were. No one I recognized. Whoever it was had damned good shot. We were mid-flight over the forest.” Astra tossed one more glance out of the roost as if she could spot the offender through the stone walls.
“Does it hurt? It could be poisoned! There are rumors of rebels in the woods. The queen should have sent someone to escort you,” Ameera grumbled, fussing with Astra’s satchel.
Astra winced. “Please, we both know I wouldn’t have taken kindly to a babysitter. Besides, if she forbade you from visiting Celene all this time, there’s no way she would have sent someone even less tolerant of my… quirks. What do you mean, rebels?”
Ameera’s smile tightened, an expression Astra knew well from years of prodding at whatever it concealed. She’d worn it many times over the nearly two decades she’d served as Astra’s Head Maiden. “It’s a long story. We can fill you in later. Your mother is waiting for you in the Celestial Hall.”
Astra’s shoulders fell—she wouldn’t even get a moment to let Lunaria’s salty sea breeze rehydrate her lungs before facing the court.
“I’ll alert Archera about the arrows. She’ll want to send out the sentry.” Ameera eyed Astra’s soiled sleeve. “Change first. The council is assembled.”
A whirl of amber anxiety flickered through Ameera’s lungs. Astra tried not to flinch. Not three minutes back in Lunaria and she was already causing Ameera heartburn. As if the guilt of leaving Celene wasn’t enough, now she’d have to face what sent her there without a second to adjust to court life.
Astra followed Ameera down the stairs. “I presume you kept my council robes? Or did the queen burn them in effigy after shipping me to Celene?”
Ameera snorted. “Don’t be ridiculous. She let the stable maidens use them to keep the hatchlings warm in the Winter.”
Astra let out a laugh, but they both knew that her mother at least considered it.
She muttered, “So good to be home.”
Chapter
Three
Nothing about the palace had changed in her absence.
The same dark halls glittered with clusters of opal and amethyst under the glass ports in the arched ceilings. The same metallic threads wove tales of goddesses and wars in the same tapestries lining the walls. The same ancient busts of queens with full lips and proud eyes watched as she darted across the courtyard to the wing of the palace she shared with her sister.
The same palace maidens shuffled from room to room in their silver robes, carrying out their daily tasks with wide eyes as Astra zipped between them.
Some of them smiled and some of them pretended not to notice her altogether. Both reactions seemed fair.
Ameera left Astra in her dressing room with her council robes already laid out in a strange silence. In Celene, the quietest it ever got was in the dead of night—and even then, the patrol units giggled together over stories from their home courts. Their tinkling laughter would float into the open windows of her tower apartment. Astra searched for any evidence that her space had been deemed off-limits, but no dust settled on the shelves. No cobwebs caught the moonlight.
Her council robes tied at her waist, complementing her curved hips and soft belly. Gold always flattered her more, but one can’t help being the first flame in a thousand years of ice queens.
Second, she reminded herself. Her Autumnal hues perfectly mirrored her late Aunt Leona’s, the very reason she’d ended up second in line to the throne. Perhaps the resemblance to her ill-fated sister was the reason Astra’s mother struggled to meet her eye without a pained grimace.
Astra poked her head into the hallway, catching a maiden as she rushed from one chore to another.
“Sorry,” she interrupted. “Could I trouble you for some help? I need a bandage.”
