Free Ice Like Fire by Sara Raasch

tapping lightly on the stones. Right, left, right again, until I reach a short hall with three doors, all locked tight.
    Or . . . they should be locked.
    One stands open on my right, catching me in a brief spurt of worry before I compose myself. We just got back from Gaos—the soldiers haven’t yet finished depositing our newest resources yet. It’s only them.
    But when I step up to the door, everything drains out of me.
    “Mather?”
    He doesn’t rise from where he sits on the floor before a crate, a paper in one hand, quill in the other. The stones, still jagged clumps of rock coated in dirt, haven’t yet been polished into the multifaceted, brilliant pieces they’re meant to be. The sconces behind me reflect orange andyellow onto the spoils: eerie, dancing light that touches each piece and darts away.
    I didn’t expect him to be down here. And seeing him sends ripples vibrating through me, because aside from Conall and Garrigan, who linger down the hall a few paces, we’re alone.
    Mather looks up at me, his expression pinched like he expects me to be someone awaiting orders. But when he sees me, his face spasms. “You’re not a Cordellan.”
    I frown. “Should I be?”
    He collects himself, his eyes sweeping from my head to my feet so fast I could have blinked and missed it. “I—why are you down here, my queen?”
    I scoff. This is the closest we’ve been to each other in months—and that’s what he says?
    “Why are you down here?” I throw back.
    “Helping. You shouldn’t be here—it’s dangerous.”
    “Dangerous?”
    “You could be crushed.” He gestures to the stacks of crates around him.
    None are higher than my hip.
    His focus drops back to the paper and he scribbles notes, his hand shaking ever so slightly as he writes.
    “Dangerous,” I repeat. My jaw tightens. He stays quiet, feigning distraction, and the stillness lets the past hour—the past week, the past months—creep over me.
    “You’re worried about me?” I snap. “You’ll have to forgive me, since the only interactions we’ve had in the past three months have been in meetings with a dozen other people. So you can see why I might be confused that you think of protecting Winter’s queen, when for the past couple of months, you’ve acted as though you didn’t give a damn about her. But don’t worry, I have plenty of other people in my life who have perfected the ability to pretend to care. You don’t owe me any favors.”
    That wrenches his attention back to me. “I didn’t—and— what ?” He gapes, glancing around the room like he’s trying to find an explanation in the crates. “I was just sitting here, taking inventory for your kingdom, when you come swooping in. What should I have said? Ice above, do you just need someone to yell at?”
    “Yes!”
    He flinches and my mouth falls open and all of my anger drops away beneath an onslaught of far stronger emotions.
    I miss him. So much my chest aches, and I can’t believe the ache hasn’t killed me yet. All I want is to say the right thing, to hear him laugh and joke about sparring with Sir. I need to talk to him, for us to be the way we were—two children standing together against a war. That’s how I feel now, but this time . . . I’m not a child. And I’m not standing with him—I’m alone.
    I stagger. “I shouldn’t have—”
    But Mather’s eyes close in a scowl before he sets down his quill and rises to his feet. Something about his demeanor breaks a little, and he widens his legs as if preparing for a fight.
    “Okay,” he says, arms crossed, the paper crinkling in his fist. “Yell at me.”
    I squint. “Yell at you?”
    Mather nods. “Yes. Do it. I’ve—” He stops, jaw clicking shut with an audible pop . He shifts away from me, back again, lips pursing in nervous frustration. “The least I can do is let you yell at me. We both know I deserve it. So,” he waves me on, “yell at me.”
    I square my shoulders, open my mouth, but nothing