Gathering Frost (Once Upon A Curse Book 1) Read Online Free PDF

once, then folds them together, decision made.
    "Leave us," she orders. The commander twitches, but then salutes in parting. His boots stomp like thunder in the silence. 
    "There is no need to lie, Jade," she soothes, voice nurturing, caring, like a mother's might be.
    Silence is my answer.
    "Come," she says, waving her hand as she spins, skirt shuffling against the floor.
    I do.
    Behind the throne rests an open door, and she leads me through, out onto a stone balcony. The wind is not gentle from this height, and I can feel hair slipping loose from the top of my head, falling from my messy bun. Still, she walks farther, until both of our hands grasp a thick stone railing, smoothly filed so it does not scratch my skin.
    "What do you see, Jade?"
    My eyes drop below, to the vast city at my feet. Our view points west. To one side are the farmlands, green and lush, extending as far as my eyes can see. To the other, the broken city of New York. The dried up waters of the Hudson River create a path my gaze follows to the ocean, a warm blue compared to the sky. Shifting up, I take in the massive expanse of air floating above me. I never realized how closely it matches the color of the queen's eyes, as though the clouds might be the only things stopping her from gazing upon the entire world.
    "I see Kardenia, Your Majesty." I am not sure what she wishes me to say, but the obviousness of my answer seems almost rude. Still, she smiles as though she expected nothing else.
    "Would you like to know what I see?"
    "Please, Your Majesty." My fingers tighten on the rail. What does our queen see as she watches over us, barely leaving her towering castle, ruling from a distance?
    "I see thousands of people, each one a little beacon of light, calling out to me, pulsing for me. Candles. The city always seems decorated in candlelight, the world even, as though the stars have sunk from the sky to dance in my eyes. I see my magic connecting all of us, connecting all of you to me."
    "That sounds beautiful, Your Majesty."
    "Does it?" She releases a light breath, a minute laugh. "I thought the same once, I suppose, when my mother described her sight to me. But it is not, it is terrifying, because hiding at the edge of all of that light, is the darkness. The rest of the world is a dangerous place, which is why I hold on to all of you, my children, so tightly. It is to keep you safe, to protect you from the dangers that lay just outside my hold."
    "Like the rebels, Your Majesty?" I ask, trying to see the world the way she does, failing. The edges of the horizon are a mystery to me, one I wish more than anything to unveil, to discover with my own eyes. The world waits for me, right in that spot where sea turns to sky, where trees and clouds mold together into an infinite line of light—that is where my soul waits for me.
    "Yes, Jade, like the rebels who stole my son, who stole your mother. The rebels who sit at the edge, waiting for the day my power weakens, waiting to destroy us all." The queen turns to me, placing her palm on my arm. Her fingers are icicles against my skin, yet they do not feel cold. "Now, will you speak the truth, Jade? How did you meet my son?"
    "I was exploring the bomb site when he held a gun to my head," the words spill out, uncontrollable, because somehow she knows them anyway. Somehow she was with me, watching through my eyes as I let her son go free. No surprise flashes across her face, only satisfaction. "I fought to disarm him, but he was strong, and he threw me away. When I landed, the floor began to give out beneath me, but your son saved my life rather than escape. Once outside, I heard voices, and tried to knock him out, but he was too fast, and I thought it better to make my way back to the wall so I could report the news, rather than allow myself to get captured."
    My voice remains even as the last little lie slips out. But I know I cannot tell the queen that I just let her son escape without a fight, without any real