The art district looked as it sounded. Most of the artists who lived here worked and set up shop out of their own cottages, which were all decorated according to each artist’s particular style. Soria, the vendor who sold decorative plant arrangements, had a cottage that seemed almost overgrown with vines and flowers, though overgrown in the most flattering sense of the word. I often wondered if she had spent years teasing each vine into the perfect shape to decorate the face of her home.

Moran, who sold brass wind chimes, had a home that burst to life with music with every gentle breeze. Then there were the houses owned by the painters, each face boasting a mural, some of colorful Alondrian sunsets, others of epic battle scenes often including dragons—which were always said to be extinct by some and thriving in caves by others.

But Evander didn’t take me to any of these. Instead, we stopped by a small cottage at the edge of the district that I had never noticed. Most likely because it appeared abandoned.

“You ready?”

“Ready? For what?” I asked, trying not to sound too disappointed that he hadn’t taken me to any of my favorite shops.

He flashed me a grin that informed that me he was proud of himself and I should be concerned, then flung the door open.

He wheeled me in.

I gasped in horror, though judging by the grin spreading across Evander’s face, he’d clearly interpreted it as indicating pleasure.

It was a storefront. One lined with tables and shelves. And on the tables and shelves sat the most beautiful pieces of glasswork that I had ever seen. Far finer than I had accomplished in my years of working in my shop. There were plates perched upon golden stands that sparkled in the light of the suspended candles from the ceiling. The intricacy of the designs I could pick out even from a distance. On one shelf was a beautiful array of glass figurines. Fire-breathing dragons that looked as though they were living and had simply been cursed to abide in glass form. A human woman, her forehead wrinkles caught in a laugh. A fae male whose ears appeared to twitch, though it could have been a trick of the light. Even the glass chandeliers above had been crafted with far more intricacy than my current skill level could have mastered.

In the back of the store was a large window, painted with a mural of the Adreean Sea. As the light danced through the glass, the waves rippled with delight, providing the illusion of tumbling waves.

And on the center counter was a pair of glass slippers, much like mine except that a floral design had been etched into the glass so that when the candlelight shone on them, a symbol of a daisy sparkled silver and gold on the adjacent wall.

“Do you like it?”

My heart sank. Recoiled. Shriveled. Whatever.

I swallowed, but the burning lump in my throat remained. My eyes stung, and I rubbed them, hoping Evander would think I was tired and not notice me crying.

This too, Evander misinterpreted. At the sign of my tears, he beamed.

“I knew you would like it,” he said. “I had Father’s master craftsman start working on it the morning after your…umm…accident.”

Accident. The word flared within me. “They did all this in a week?”

He beamed. “Like I said, they’re the best in the land. They were so thrilled to do it, too. Something about the artistic beauty of being able to create something extraordinary from such a plain substance. Apparently, working with crystal and fine gems wasn’t doing it for them anymore.” He rolled his eyes.

Something inside my chest had gone numb. “I would like to go back to my room now.”

Evander’s grin faltered as confusion swept over his expression. But then he cleared his throat and straightened. “Of course; it was a long walk from the castle. I’m sure you’re exhausted from sitting upright for so long.”

As he wheeled me out of the house and locked the door, he took the brass key and placed it in my palm, closing my fingers around it. “It’s yours. I thought you could run it once you get better. Only if you want to, of course.”

I opened my palm and stared at the key. “Thank you.” The words came out flat, lifeless.

Evander opened his mouth, his enthusiasm fading with the daylight as the sun slipped behind a cloud. “You don’t like it.”

The lump in my throat grew, and I felt as though it might cut through my skin at any moment. “Thank you. I would like to go back to my room now.”

He frowned but returned to pushing me. After we had cleared the art district and were halfway up the path to the castle walls, he spoke. “Clearly, I’ve offended you. But I can’t seem to figure out why.”

I couldn’t bring myself to answer. He halted my chair halfway up the hill.

“I thought you would like it. I wanted you to know I was listening to you that night we had dinner, and you told me that it was your dream to own a shop that sold beautiful glassware.”

My heart went numb at the explanation. The one that took my dream and diluted it and made it sound so, so bland. “You weren’t listening at all.”

He rounded my chair to face me, holding onto the wheels from the front to make sure I didn’t roll right back down the hill as he kneeled in front of me.

That would be the perfect cap to my week, at the rate it was going.

His green eyes flashed with anger, though the rest of his face was subdued. As if he genuinely wanted to understand what he had done wrong, although his feelings were clearly hurt.

Rage unfurled in my chest at the thought. That he should dare to have his feelings hurt after he’d crushed my dreams.

“It wasn’t about owning a shop, or selling pretty glass,” I said. “It was about building something with my own two hands. About the hours I’d have to put in, the glass I’d have to toss, just for that moment of euphoria when I’d figured it out. And it was about other people admiring the beauty of what my hands had made, witnessing the innovation of what my father only ever saw as a material to make windows.”

Evander’s brow furrowed. “There’s a workshop in the back of the cottage. You can still work there, or you’re still free to use the one on the castle grounds.”

“You’re still not listening.” My voice trembled, and I sank to a whisper in a failed attempt to conceal that fact. “Do you know how long it took me to make a pair of glass slippers I was proud of?”

“Two years.”

I bristled. I hadn’t expected him to remember, but it did nothing to diffuse my agitation. “I threw away almost forty different prototypes. I worked by lamplight so many nights just to get up at the crack of dawn the next morning to do it all again, just so I could catch a few hours before I had to work with my father. But you—you said a few words, and then your father’s craftsman had it made in a matter of days. All you did today was prove that my dream, my years of hard work, could be done so much better by someone else. That feeling—the accomplishment, the one where I could finally hold something in my hands, something I’d carried in my imagination for so long, and the knowledge that I’d made it with those two hands—you stole that from me.”

Evander’s mouth opened as if to retort, but then his teeth clenched.

I flicked my wrist. “See? You can’t even bring yourself to apologize. Because you don’t get it.”

“No, I don’t get it,” he said, his knuckles bulging as he held onto my armrests. “I tried to do something thoughtful for you, but you can’t even see that. By Alondria, you can’t even give me the benefit of the doubt, or admit that at least I tried. So no, I don’t get it.”

“No. The reason you don’t get it is because you’ve never worked for anything more substantial than a lay a day in your life.”

Evander’s jaw tightened, and his eyes went wide with hurt. Then his cheeks softened and went sallow. “I’ll take you back to your room. I’m sorry for getting you out just to make an already horrible week worse.”

The bitterness of my harsh words landed in my stomach, souring and churning as I processed the weight of them. “Evander, I—”

“No, you’re right. You don’t have to apologize for simply speaking the truth.” He forced a smile, but his eyes didn’t partake. “Maybe your mother was referring to salt in wounds after all.”

As he pushed me back to my room in silence, the wheels of my chair grinding against the uneven road, I couldn’t help but notice that the gnawing in my stomach hurt way worse than the moment I’d seen my dreams realized by someone else.

CHAPTER 35

EVANDER

I had a pretty good idea what Ellie was doing.

We were seated around the dinner table, and she was ignoring me, while simultaneously flaunting how well she got along with my mother.

Man, she irritated me sometimes.