CHAPTER 3
1551 Words
Forty-Seven Feet
SLOANE's POV
He left the fire burning.
He took the guards with him, locked the door behind them, and walked away like the door would be enough to keep me there.
It wasn’t enough.
Here is the thing about ice shackles.
Yes, they tighten when you fight them. Everyone knows that part. But there is something else most people don’t mention.
Ice reacts to heat.
I noticed it earlier while sitting near the fire. The edges of the shackles had softened just a little whenever I leaned closer to the flames.
Just a small detail.
But small details keep people like me alive.
I stood slowly and walked to the fireplace. The room was quiet except for the soft crackling of burning wood. My wrists throbbed with that steady pulse of magic.
I ignored it.
The fire stand beside the hearth held a long iron poker. I picked it up and slid the end of it deep into the flames.
Then I waited.
Four minutes.
I counted every second in my head.
The iron slowly turned dark red.
“Come on,” I whispered under my breath.
When the metal looked hot enough, I pulled it out and pressed the shackle on my right wrist against the glowing iron.
The ice hissed.
Water formed instantly along the edges.
The magic resisted at first, tightening painfully around my wrist, but the heat kept pushing against it.
“Break,” I muttered.
The ice thinned.
I twisted my wrist and pulled hard.
The shackle snapped.
A sharp edge scraped across my palm when it broke, slicing skin open fast and deep. Pain shot through my hand, hot and sudden.
I sucked in a breath but didn’t make a sound.
No time.
I pressed my sleeve against the cut and moved toward the window.
The north wall had those frozen formations I noticed earlier. Decorative ice shaped like jagged crystals. They formed a narrow ledge if you stepped carefully.
I tested the first one with my boot.
It held.
“Good enough,” I murmured.
I climbed.
Slow at first, then faster. My fingers grabbed the window latch. Cold metal bit into my skin.
The window opened with a quiet creak.
Night air rushed in, sharp and freezing.
I didn’t hesitate.
I dropped.
The fall wasn’t far enough to break anything. I landed hard in the courtyard grass and rolled to absorb the impact.
A guard nearby shouted immediately.
“There! Stop!”
Too late.
I was already running.
My legs moved before my mind caught up. Across the courtyard. Past a stone arch. Toward the darker edge of the palace grounds.
Forty feet.
Forty-five.
Forty-six—
I ran straight into someone’s chest.
“Oof—”
Strong hands grabbed my waist instantly to keep me from falling.
My knife was already out.
The blade was pressed against his throat before my feet even fully stopped moving.
“Easy, wildcat.”
The voice was warm.
Amused.
“Where’s the fire?”
I looked up.
He looked about my age. Maybe a little older.
If Kael Frost had the kind of beauty that made people step back carefully, this man had the kind that made you forget things for a second.
Golden skin. Dark hair falling in loose waves around his jaw. His eyes were bright amber, glowing in the courtyard firelight.
And he was smiling.
Not nervous.
Not threatened.
Just… smiling like we were friends meeting at a festival instead of strangers in the middle of a palace escape.
“Let go,” I said.
“Normally I’d ask you to dinner first.”
His eyes dropped to my wrists.
The broken shackle. The blood on my hand.
“...but you look like you’ve had a complicated evening.”
“I’m going to ask one more time.”
“Prince Darian,” he said, tapping his chest lightly with one finger.
Still holding me.
“Technically. Also known as the brother nobody talks about. The exile. The disappointment.”
He shrugged casually.
“I wear many titles.”
My knife stayed at his throat.
“Who are you?” he asked. “Besides the woman who just escaped my brother’s most secure room.”
“I didn’t escape a room,” I said. “I escaped a parlor.”
He laughed softly.
“That’s even worse for him.”
He glanced toward the palace wing behind us.
“You have about three minutes before the corridor alarm reaches the outer gate,” he said. “After that, they lock the entire palace.”
His eyes came back to mine.
“I know a way out.”
I didn’t lower the knife.
“Border passage. Lower vault. Kael doesn’t know I know about it.” His grin widened slightly. “I can take you there.”
“Why would you do that?”
For the first time, he studied me properly.
His eyes moved over my face like he was measuring something.
“Two reasons,” he said.
I waited.
“One, watching you run circles around my brother is going to be extremely entertaining.”
He paused.
“Two, what he’s doing to you is wrong.”
His shoulders lifted slightly.
“Both things are true. I’m not pretending the first one isn’t.”
I watched him carefully.
His breathing was steady. His hands were relaxed. His eyes didn’t shift away from mine.
He was telling the truth.
Both parts of it.
The selfish reason and the honest one sitting side by side.
“Two minutes,” I said.
“Less than that,” he replied.
Then he let go of me and started moving.
I slid the knife back into its sheath and followed.
Every instinct in my body told me not to trust the smiling prince who appeared exactly when I needed help.
But every instinct also reminded me of the alternative.
Going back to that room.
Going back to Kael.
So I followed.
Darian moved quickly through narrow servant corridors, cutting through side passages that twisted deeper into the palace. I stayed two steps behind him, counting turns, watching doors, memorizing exits.
Old habits.
“You seem calm for someone helping a criminal escape,” I whispered.
“Allegedly criminal,” he corrected quietly.
We turned down a staircase.
“Why were you out here tonight?” I asked. “Watching the courtyard.”
“The vault entrance,” he said.
He checked the corner ahead before waving me forward.
“I had a feeling someone interesting was going to happen tonight.”
“That sentence didn’t make sense.”
“You understood it.”
I sighed.
“How long have you known about me?”
“Long enough.”
He glanced back briefly.
“Kael told me about the contract a year ago. Not because he wanted to. Because I found the records and confronted him.”
We turned down another staircase.
Colder down here.
Stone older too.
“I refused to help him,” Darian continued quietly. “But I also didn’t stop him.”
Something uncomfortable settled in my chest.
“That’s not exactly noble.”
“I know,” he said.
His voice lost its humor for the first time.
“It’s not good enough.”
He stopped at a door and pressed his ear against it.
After a second he nodded.
“Clear.”
We stepped through.
The air grew colder again as we went down another stairwell. The stone smelled old and damp. Like a place forgotten for decades.
Finally we reached a large underground room.
A dead forge sat in the center.
And across the room, a heavy door covered in frost.
Darian pointed.
“That’s the border passage.”
“How far?”
“Half a mile.”
“Exit?”
“At the edge of the court lands.” He leaned against the wall casually. “Once you cross the border, Kael’s tracking magic won’t follow.”
I was already moving toward the forge.
The metal was cold, but I pressed the remaining shackle against it anyway, hoping for any leftover heat from when it used to burn.
“It’s going to hurt,” Darian said quietly.
I glanced at him.
“When the contract fully breaks. The bond pulling away from your body.”
“He already told me.”
“Three days.”
“Then you should get somewhere safe,” he said. His voice had changed again. No teasing now.
“Do you have someone you can trust?”
“Yes.”
“Then go to them.”
He stepped closer.
“Sloane.”
The first time he used my name.
Strangely, it didn’t bother me.
“When you need help again—”
“SLOANE.”
The voice exploded down the stairwell like cracking ice.
Both of us turned.
Prince Kael stood at the top of the stairs.
Even from this distance I could see the difference.
The control was gone.
His breathing was uneven. His eyes were locked on me like he had finally found something he thought he lost.
Then his gaze shifted to Darian.
“Brother,” he said quietly.
The word sounded dangerous.
“Kael,” Darian replied calmly, stepping forward.
“Don’t.”
I didn’t wait.
I ran for the door.
- Writer
