Frost Kisses (Bitter Frost #4: Frost Series) by Kailin Gow Read Free Book Online Page A

control.
     
    Suddenly, a sword materialized in my hand, a ray of white light that hardened into steel. Delano’s eyes opened wide with shock, and I too had to work to hide my surprise! Was this what I was capable of with my new powers? I didn’t stop to think! I rushed straight to the bed, where Delano had been lying, defenseless, and pushed the sword straight against his chest.
     
    “How did you….” Delano’s eyes were bulging.
     
    “Someone else was glamoured as Kian before, you know…” I prodded the sword point into his flesh. “When I was stabbed. I don’t suppose you know who it was, do you?”
     
    Delano stared at me, his green-gold eyes blazing and defiant. His leer had twisted. “So what?” Delano smirked. “Maybe I did glamour as Kian before – maybe I didn't! But if I did, I'd certainly say you're better off for it.”
     
    “What do you mean?” I drove the sword in harder.
    “Well,” said Delano, warily watching the point of the sword as it pressed against his pale, ivory flesh. “Now you're free of the Summer Court, aren't you? No more worrying about peace between Winter and Summer. No more stress. No more heartache – do I want Kian? Do I want Logan? None of that. Instead, you get a beautiful chamber in a gorgeous palace, with a loving pixie king who wants nothing more than to please you and give you a life of ease and luxury.”
    “You call that helping?” I scowled at him. “I was fine before!”
    “Really?” Delano gave me a look of mock surprise. “So let me guess. You were perfectly able to marry Kian, despite the fact that his mother and his people would never have agreed to the match. Or perhaps you were happy to marry Logan the Wolf – even though your heart belonged to the Winter Prince...”
    “That is none of your concern.” And then it hit me. Wort's pixie heritage – the glamoured Kian that had stabbed me...the Summer Knights...or were they Summer Knights at all? Pixies had the power to glamour into fairies – the whole attack, the whole siege, had been a setup by Delano! “You’re the one behind all this, not Wort!” From the look on Delano's face I could see that it was true. “You set up my assassination; you set up the siege in the Great Hall. Just to get Winter and Summer fighting again.”
    “I wouldn’t take all the credit,” shrugged Delano. “I believe you met my half-brother, didn't you? Wort. You didn't treat him very kindly, did you? You see, I may be Pixie King of most Pixies, but he is in charge of the Pixies of the East, close to the fairy Autumn lands. Unlike you fairies, we Pixies work together. He convinced me to create this rift between you seasonal fairies. And now you've got your just desserts. And fairyland is unstable once more, making this an awfully ripe time for me to put my oar in, as it were. Perhaps with Winter and Summer so distracted with their own wars, they won't notice the real threat...”
    “The Pixies!”
    “How will the Summer Court survive when its Queen is dead?” Delano smirked. So, it hadn't been about lust at all – at least, not mostly. Delano wanted to topple the Winter and Summer Courts alike and rule all Feyland with his pixie brood.
    “Not so fast,” I said. “The Summer Court has a ruler – my consort, the Wolf.”
    “While my half-brother Wort is quite nasty, he's awfully clever. I'm sure he'll make sure that the Wolf doesn't reign too long...”
    I'd had enough of this conversation. I had no time to waste in pleasantries. I'd found out what I needed to know, and that was enough. I had to get back to my kingdom, to figure out what had happened. Logan was alive, that much Delano had revealed to me, even if it sounded like he was in danger. My hands clenched down on the sword, instinctively. I wanted to run Delano through for what he had done to me, what he had done to Kian, what he had done to all those fairy knights who lay dead on the battlefield now, both Winter and Summer, because of his