Prologue - Asher
Frantic with denial, Prince Asher raced through his parents' palace, still clutching the letter he’d found waiting for him upon his return from a hunt, a hunt he had not wanted to go on, but the author of the letter had insisted he attend.
She had to have planned this! he thought as denial and devastation turned to feelings of betrayal. The last time he’d seen Talia, she’d been heavily pregnant with his child, her belly so swollen she could barely move, and yet the letter in his hand suggested she’d fled the palace. He couldn't bring himself to read the words written on the parchment again, but he could almost hear Talia saying them in his head, 'I wasn't made to be a mother, let alone a queen.'
"Where is she? Where is Talia?" he demanded of several servants as he passed, but most of them shook their heads, some looking fearful, others simply sympathetic.
"Brother?" The voice was tentative, almost questioning, but when Asher looked up, he could see knowledge written plainly on the face of his older brother, Blake. His charcoal and white hair caused him to look much older, though he was only in the early years of his thirties.
"Come with us, brother," Blake's twin brother, Drake, suggested as he appeared from around the corner of the hallway. The same sympathy dripped from his tone, and Asher felt the urge to grab his hair, charcoal laced with crimson, and remove a few handfuls just for the knowing look on both their faces.
"Where is she?" he demanded. His strength had begun to fade and his voice grew weaker with every word. His arms lowered to his sides. Suddenly, even the piece of parchment in his hand felt like a lead weight between his fingertips.
The twins glanced at each other and then shook their heads before addressing him again.
"Mother and Father wish to see you," Drake announced. Though they had two elder brothers, Drake was clearly taking his responsibility of being the eldest brother in residence seriously.
"What are you two doing here? Shouldn't you both be off ruling your own islands?" Asher demanded, making no attempt to follow either of his brothers as they began to turn in the direction of the throne room. As the only brother who hadn’t yet reached thirty, Asher had always been treated like the child of the family, and he certainly felt that way now with the way his brothers were looking at him.
"Asher, please, there’s something you need to see," Blake insisted. He had always been the gentlest of the brothers, and Asher had always wondered how he would get on as king of the Winter Isle with all its harshness, but the firm tone of his voice now caused Asher to follow.
As they rounded the corner, into the hallway that was open to courtyards on either side, Asher was almost certain he heard the cry of an infant break the tense silence. He glanced at his brothers, but if either of them had heard, they gave no reaction. The sound of infants crying was not a sound often heard in his parents’ court unless they were graced by the presence of a royal baby, and there hadn't been one of those since his own birth almost thirty years earlier. Occasionally, noblewomen were invited to bring their children, but none so young as to cry like a newborn.
The sight that met Asher upon entering the throne room took Asher's breath away. Though it was a sight he’d seen often, his parents sitting atop their thrones, there was one subtle difference. Resting peacefully in his mother's arms was a pink-cheeked baby wrapped in the finest yellow silk blankets.
The burst of love that filled Asher's heart the moment he saw the child told him all he needed to know. He found himself glancing in every direction, hoping to find the mother waiting somewhere close by.
"Where is she?" Asher demanded. "Why was word not sent that Talia had gone into labor?"
King Lucius and Queen Lyra glanced at each other, both their expressions unreadable, before the king turned back to his son and began to rise from his throne. Asher's stomach clenched and he waited, biting the inside of his cheek to stop himself from questioning them as his father came down from the dais to stand before him. He was all too aware of the eyes of his mother, brothers, and the palace guards upon him as he awaited news of his beloved.
The moment his father placed his hand upon his shoulder, Asher knew to expect the worst. His father's eyes, usually unreadable, were now filled with sympathy as he gripped both his son's shoulders and sighed, "I’m sorry, Son, but she’s gone."
Grief ripped through Asher's chest like a shattering arrowhead, and he suddenly knew how the stag he’d brought down just the day before must have felt. His blood turned to ice in his veins and every limb grew heavy.
"When...when did she pass?" he asked, his head lolling forward, his neck barely able to support the weight. The parchment in his hand fluttered from between his fingertips and bile rose in the back of his throat.
"Oh, goodness! No!" Queen Lyra gasped from where she remained in her throne, cradling the newborn infant. "Talia is not dead!"
Asher's head whipped up and he glowered angrily at his father. Anger and frustration threatened to overwhelm him, and he felt as though he might be blinded by it, forced to do something he might later regret once his wits returned to him.
Just before he could throw himself at his father and demand to know the truth with his fists, another hand landed on his shoulder.
"She has fled the palace, brother."
Asher glanced to his left to find Drake looking down at him. The pity in his slate grey eyes only made Asher's stomach hurt more. He shrugged his brother's hand off along with his father's and took a step away, shaking his head in denial once more.
"That can't be true," he snapped at them, even though the letter that now lay discarded on the throne room floor said as much. "She...she wouldn't leave me. She wouldn't leave...him."
His gaze flickered to the babe in his mother's arms, and he found he could not bring himself to look away. The baby was here, and his mother was not. How could she not be here? Asher thought. It was almost too painful a thought.
"Her," Queen Lyra corrected him with a smile. She leaned forward slightly on the edge of the throne to allow Asher a better view of the baby nestled into her chest. Save for a small tuft of navy-blue hair, the baby was entirely bald, and without looking closely, it was easy to assume the child was a boy.
"A girl…" Asher breathed and his heart swelled, before sinking down into his stomach once more. What did the gender of the child matter if its mother was not here?
"How can you be sure that Talia fled?" he asked, averting his gaze from his daughter so as not to be distracted by her cooing. The sweet sound was almost impossible to ignore, but he had to get his head on straight and get all the facts.
"Talia told me of her fears, that she didn’t wish to be Queen of the Mystic Isle, and of her fears of motherhood," Queen Lyra admitted. She carefully got to her feet, using her elegant wings to help her with the babe still in her arms. "I thought she was simply having cold feet, and all would change once she’d held her baby in her arms for the first time."