Chapter 1
The woods had always felt like a playground,
But today,
They two girls felt restless.
The wind whipped through the branches, pulling at Emily's hair.
The air held a strange, metallic tang that made her skin prickle.
"Emily, wait up!" Anna called out, her voice trailing behind as she stumbled over a mossy log.
"I'm just going to the creek!" Emily shouted back.
She stepped onto the river bank, the mud slick and unstable under her sneakers.
She reached out to grab a low-hanging willow branch to steady herself, but the wood was brittle. It snapped with a sharp crack, and Emily lost her balance. She tumbled forward, hitting the water with a cold splash.
The current was stronger then it looked.
It pulled at her clothes, dragging her under, cold bubbles dancing past her vision.
She kicked hard, breaking the surface, but the air that filled her lungs wasn't the damp, earthy scent of the woods.
It was salt. Bracing, freezing, infinite salt.
Emily coughed, water stinging her eyes, and wiped her face with a shaking hand. She wasn't in the creek anymore.
She was washed up on a stretch of jagged, golden sand. Her heart hammered, but it wasn't fear.
It was recognition.
She stood up, her wet jeans clinging to her legs, and turned around. There, rising in the distance on top of a hill, were the white-stone spires of Frostfire Glade. She knew those towers, though they looked a bit different now. They were shining far less bright then they had before.
She had been here before. She had slipped while climbing through a window and ended up in the whispering woods. But she had never been to the coast.
"I'm... back...?" She whispered, her voice snatched away by the gale.
She looked back at the water, desperate to see her sister, to call for Anna, but the creek was gone.
There was only the vast, rhythmic pulse of the ocean, and the cold, undeniable realization that she wasn't visiting a memory.
She was in the middle of a kingdom that didn't know she had returned, but very much needed her to choose a side.
The salt air bit at Emily’s skin, colder then any winter she’d known before. Her breath hitched, turning into a plume of white mist that vanished against the backdrop of the sea.
She began to walk. The sand was coarse, but she barely felt it. She was drawn toward the spires of Frostfire Glade like a moth to a dying flame.
******
Inside the palace, the atmosphere was suffocating.
Prince Adam stood at the edge of the royal balcony, his hands gripping the stone railing until his knuckles turned white. Behind him, the low murmur of the court faded into an awkward silence as Queen Melody stepped forward.
"Adam," she said, her voice soft but immovable as She stood beside him. "Princess Seraphina is and kind and capable. She will be a strong Queen. This union... it is the only wall standing between our people and total annihilation."
Adam didn't look at her. His gaze was fixed on the horizon.
"A wall built on a lie, Mother. You ask me to trade my life for a border treaty."
"I asked you to be a king," Melody replied, her voice firming. She reached out, placing a hand on his shoulder. "If you refuse her hand tonight, the alliance dissolves. Their army will be at out gates before sunrise.
Adam closed his eyes, the image of the girl who had showed up out of nowhere and saved the kingdom with him and Keira flashing in his mind. He had spent a year trying to remember her face, keeping it alive in the dark recesses of his heart, waiting for a miracle he knew would never come true.
"I just want a choice." Adam whispered, more to himself then his mother.
******
Emily had found a servant’s entrance, the same one Adam had shown her a year ago. She navigated the corridors by instinct, the architecture feeling like a puzzle piece clicking into place in her mind.
She heard voices, familiar, rhythmic, and commanding, drifting from the throne room. She rounded the final pillar, intending to call out, but the words died in her throat.
The hall was filled with silver and Grey banners.
And then, she saw him standing on the dias.
He looked as though he had walked straight out of her memories and into this hall of silver. brown eyes that were once gaurded and unreadable were now calm and clear. And that jagged scar on his temple that seemed to tell a story he could no longer remember. Even here, surrounded by silk and armor, he wore that same black sweater he always did.
Adam.
Standing beside him was a girl who looked to be the same age as Adam.
She carried herself with the stillness of a marble statue, her shoulder-length brown hair framing a face that was almost hauntingly composed. Her most striking feature were her eyes. A startling, vivid orange that seemed to burn with a quiet, restless heat. She wore a gown of stark white that made her look ethereal, yet the heavy crown of deep, blood-red roses resting on her brow looked less like an adornment and more like a warning. There didn't seem to be anything wrong about her, but as she watched Adam, her gaze possessed a clinical precision that made it clear she didn't really care about the union.
Adam turned to the Princess, a forced, polite smile gracing his lips, and reached for her hand.
Emily took a step back, her heel clicking sharply against the floor. The sound was small, but in the tense silence of the room, it rang like a gunshot.
Heads turned.
Adam’s eyes snapped toward the shadow of the pillar, and the breath left him so violently he stumbled back, nearly knocking over the stand beside him. The room went deathly quiet. Adam’s gaze locked onto hers, his eyes wide with a mixture of terror, disbelief, and a longing so profound it made Emily’s chest ache.
"Emily...?" He breathed. The name hung in the air, shattering the royal composure of the room.
