The Stolen Heir

His eyes shine with horror. “I should never have asked you to come back here.”

“And that was when I realized I was never going home, but by then the tears wouldn’t come, no matter how much I willed them. And I never cried again.”

“You will have this every day if you cease your crying, he said.

I poison everything I touch.

Oh, I do not want to be here. I hate this place. I hate everything about it and everything it might teach me about myself.

“Poison in my blood. I poison everything I touch.”

he is madder than the troll king

Written on the stake are the words: My blood was spilled for the glory of the Kings of Stone who rule from beneath the world, but my body belongs to the Queen of Snow.

“He tried to kill the High King.”

“Then why not just let me leave last night?”

Oak gives me a slightly guilty look. “Because I don’t like being the fool who’d been tricked. I like games, but I hate to lose.”

I blink at him in surprise. “What?”