The water was too hot.
Rowan sat in the center of the copper tub, her knees pulled tight to her chest, watching the steam rise toward the vaulted ceiling of the guest chamber. She hadn't felt hot water in ten years. Her body didn't know how to process it. The heat felt like a threat, biting into her half-frozen skin, stinging the cuts on her legs and the lye burns on her hands.
She flinched as a washcloth brushed her shoulder.
"Easy," a rough female voice muttered.
The woman's name was Breeda. She was a captain in the king's guard, built like a brick wall, with a jawline covered in faded silver scars. She wasn't gentle. She didn't coo or offer pitying looks. She scrubbed the ten years of grime off Rowan with the clinical efficiency of a soldier cleaning a rusted broadsword.
Rowan appreciated that. Pity usually came right before a backhand.
"Lift your arms," Breeda instructed.
Rowan obeyed blindly. The water in the tub was turning a murky brownish gray, the physical evidence of her existence as a scrub melting away, swirling down the drain. But the deeper marks remained. As the dirt vanished, the landscape of her survival was laid bare.
Breeda paused. The rough washcloth hovered over Rowan's ribs. There were burn scars from the kitchens, pale jagged lines from the times she hadn't dodged a hunter's whip fast enough, a dark ugly bruise spreading across her left hip from Beta Holden's boot, and beneath it all the jutting architecture of starvation, her ribs pushed against her pale skin like the bars of a cage.
"Who gave you the bruise on the hip?" Breeda asked. Her tone was flat. Casual.
Rowan stared at the water. "Does it matter?"
"The king asked me to take an inventory of your condition." Breeda dropped the cloth into the water and reached for a bar of actual soap. It smelled heavily of pine and fat, devoid of perfume. "He likes to know exactly who owes him a debt."
"Holden," Rowan rasped. Her throat still ached from where the guard had choked her in the hall. "The beta. I dropped a bundle of kindling in his path."
Breeda grunted. It wasn't a sound of sympathy. It was a soldier logging a target. "Rinse."
When Rowan finally stepped out of the tub, the cold air of the room hit her violently. She shivered, wrapping her arms around herself. Breeda tossed her a heavy woven linen towel. It wasn't soft, but it was thick, and it trapped the heat against her skin.
There was no silk dress waiting for her, no delicate slippers or corsets. The king's camp traveled for war, not pageantry. Breeda handed her a pair of dark woolen trousers, a thick linen undershirt, and a heavy charcoal-gray tunic meant for a man of smaller stature. It swallowed Rowan whole, the hem falling past her mid-thigh.
"Put these on," Breeda said, tossing a pair of thick woolen socks and worn leather boots at Rowan's feet. "Lace them tight. They'll have to do until the cobbler in the capital can fit you."
Rowan stared at the boots. She traced the worn leather with her eyes. To have boots was to have a future, to survive the winter. For a decade she had walked on frostbitten toes, wrapping her feet in whatever burlap she could steal. She pulled them on. They were heavy, grounding.
"Why is he doing this?" Rowan asked, her voice cracking. She didn't look up from the laces. "Kings don't save scrubs. Even if I have a mark on my neck, I'm broken. I have no pack. I have nothing to offer him."
Breeda stepped into her line of sight, her hand resting lazily on the pommel of her dagger. "You think King Cassian operates on charity?"
"No. That's why I'm asking."
"You are the bloodline of the north, princess." Breeda said, the title tasting strange and heavy in the small room. "Cedric holds this territory through fear. The outer villages hate him. The supply lines are failing. Frost Peak is a strategic nightmare for the crown right now, because Cedric is a butcher, not a ruler. You aren't just a girl he pulled out of the dirt. You are the key to locking down the entire northern border."
Rowan tied the laces tight. It made sense. It was cynical, cold, and entirely logical. She wasn't a fairy tale being rescued. She was a political asset.
Oddly enough, that made her feel safe. Assets were protected. Assets were fed. Love and pity could vanish in a heartbeat, but a king's need for military stability, that was ironclad.
Rowan stood up. The boots clunked solidly against the stone floor. She looked at Breeda, her dull gray eyes hardening just a fraction.
"Take me to the king."
The great hall looked different from behind a wall of royal guards.
Two hours ago, Rowan had been invisible, a ghost hauling ale. Now, as she walked through the heavy oak doors flanked by Breeda and three armored soldiers, the silence in the room was absolute. The hearths were still roaring, casting long, dancing shadows across the ancient tapestries. But the feasting tables had been shoved against the walls. The center of the room was clear.
King Cassian sat in the high chair. He had not changed his clothes. He still wore the scuffed leather and dark iron, looking less like a monarch holding court and more like a predator waiting by a watering hole.
Kneeling on the cold stone floor in the center of the room were Alpha Cedric and Beta Holden. Their hands were bound behind their backs with heavy iron chains. The royal guard surrounded them, polearms resting casually against the floor. The remaining members of the Frost Peak pack, the warriors, the servants, the elders who had turned a blind eye for a decade, were huddled along the walls. They looked terrified.
Rowan walked down the center aisle. Every step felt heavy. Her heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic, bruising rhythm. She kept her chin level. She did not look at the people she had scrubbed floors for. She did not look at the kitchen maid who had thrown the apron at her. She only looked at Cassian.
The king watched her approach. His amber eyes tracked her movements, noting the oversized tunic, the heavy boots, the way she held her shoulders stiffly to hide the pain in her ribs. When she reached the base of the dais, she stopped.
"Come up here," Cassian said.
Rowan hesitated, then climbed the three stone steps. There was a smaller carved wooden chair placed to the right of the king. Cassian gestured to it. She sat down. The wood was hard.
The seat of power was not comfortable.