Queen Aurora had her gaze averted from Drakkar’s shrewd eyes, her expression hidden but what he could see of her face, it was carefully blank.

Neither reaction to their daughter’s grave actions was a surprise.

King Atticus didn’t often hide his emotions. He did not need to. He was king and those around him catered to his whims.

Queen Aurora was another story.

Atticus turned from the window, his openly wounded eyes finding Drakkar’s and he whispered, “This is… this is… this travel to another world… it is… it’s akin to –”

“Treason,” Aurora finished for her husband, her voice cold, emotionless and Atticus turned to his wife.

“Aurora, my love –”

She cut him off. “I told you, time and again, Atticus, I told you not to raise our girl as,” she leaned toward her husband, “a boy.”

Atticus’s jaw got tight. “I did not raise her as a boy. She simply enjoys those things, it’s her nature, and she enjoys being with her father doing them. But even so, that has nothing to do with it and you know it.”

“It doesn’t?” Aurora shot back and crossed her arms on her chest, turning fully to face her husband. “You always wanted a son. Always. And not having one, all her life she’s been taught as you would have taught a son, a future king. And that is to be headstrong and do whatever she can to get her own way, when, of course, she doesn’t naturally expect her own way. These, my love, are not traits of a girl. These are most assuredly the traits of a boy.”

“Aurora –” Atticus started, color rising in his face as his anger did the same but Drakkar was done.

“Does your conversation, at this point, have any meaning?” he asked and his king and queen turned eyes to him. “Princess Sjofn has done it and in so doing she betrayed her parents, which means she betrayed her king, queen and country, the House of Wilde and she betrayed me. I’m sure we’re all agreed that this action is unforgiveable.”

Both king and queen stared at him and Drakkar was surprised to see the flash of pain in his king’s eyes was mirrored, though hidden far more quickly, in his queen’s.

They loved their daughter. Although everyone knew this to be true of Atticus, that flash in Aurora’s eyes and the fact she had not been able to hide it meant she, too, cared deeply for her girl.

Atticus lifted his chin to Drakkar in assent. Aurora’s eyes drifted to the floor, her way to show she, too, agreed.

Drakkar went on. “There is more.”

Aurora’s eyes moved back to him. Atticus moved closer to his wife and stood beside her in front of his desk. Once there, he leaned into a hand.

“More?” Atticus prompted.

Drakkar nodded. “I have had a message from the elves.”

Both husband and wife’s gazes grew sharper and the tension in the room, already wound tight, stretched taut.

“I assume they are even less happy you’ve wed a Sjofn from another world,” Atticus guessed wrongly and Drakkar knew his king was concerned about the elves being troubled or, worse, angered by this occurrence. This could mean another century of retreat.

And they most definitely did not want the elves, again, to retreat.

Not now.

Not with a Frey and The Drakkar both embodied in one man and what that occurrence might mean for Lunwyn.

Atticus knew, for Drakkar had used it on numerous occasions to refuse the arranged marriage with Atticus’s daughter, that the elves were against the match. And he was not wrong to assume they would be violently opposed to his union to a soul from another world.

“On the contrary,” Drakkar stated, “they are well-pleased.”

Atticus blinked. Aurora’s gaze grew even more intense.

“Well-pleased?” she asked quietly.

“The elves told me the Sjofn upstairs is my true Ice Bride. They were against the match to your daughter but they are delighted I am bound to her twin. Apparently, Keer’s wishes for me have come true through my Finnie. She is my destiny.”

“By the gods, man, how can that be?” Atticus asked incredulously. “She isn’t even of our world.”

“She carries the blood of the elves, as do I,” Drakkar informed him. “They are the elves of her world but she inherits her eyes and hair from those of that realm. Because of this, we will mate, create a child and fulfill Keer’s demands that the blood of the elves and the blood of the dragon unite and sit yet again on Lunwyn’s throne throughout eternity.”

“This is… this is… shocking,” Atticus breathed.

“This is destiny,” Drakkar returned.

“So, clearly, it was destiny for our Sjofn to make her decision and then take her action,” Aurora put in smoothly, as she often did in an attempt to soften the circumstances her daughter’s actions caused and Drakkar looked to her.

“She had no idea her leaving would be to the will of the gods,” Drakkar retorted. “She had no thought for anyone but herself. She also did not explain to my Finnie why she was leaving or what Finnie would be facing the very moment of her arrival. As I told you, the switch was accomplished right before she left this Palace to ride to the Dwelling of the Gods to be bound to me. Sjofn orchestrated it that way, throwing my Finnie into what I know was a frightening situation for, not knowing who she was, I behaved in ways that terrified her but Sjofn would take as a matter of course. I know this because Finnie admitted this to me.”

Aurora pressed her lips together and Atticus was smart enough not to speak at all.

“The gods will has been done but it is not Sjofn of the House of Wilde who assisted in seeing destiny fulfilled,” Drakkar stated firmly and Aurora pulled in a delicate breath. Drakkar continued, “And it is partly for that reason that I’ve commanded the elves to bind my Finnie to this world which, in turn, binds your Sjofn to the other. Neither will return to their home world, not again. And this command is everlasting.”

Aurora shifted, her arms uncrossing so she could lay her hand palm flat on the desk, a casual stance that many would misread as thus but Drakkar did not. There was nothing casual about it. She did it to hold herself up in her sudden grief for her lost daughter.

Atticus did not hide his reaction. He flinched and his face paled.

Drakkar felt for them but he did not feel much. This was because Sjofn’s actions were, indeed, reprehensible as treason always is. This was also because Sjofn was what they created as any child always is. And lastly, this was because he was still enraged at what their daughter had done to Finnie.