Prologue
Sebastian, Eleven Years Ago
“This is our tree,” Henry proclaimed proudly, staring at the pine sapling in front of us. He brushed his hands on the sides of his pants, fresh soil falling to the ground.
The evening air was chilly, the kind of cold that signals months of winter ahead. We’d been outside in the front yard for hours, but the icy wind had just started. Henry’s sandy colored hair was whipping side to side in the gusts.
He never seemed to mind the cold. It was one of the many items on my endless list of Reasons I Loved Henry Denton So Damn Much.
“Our tree,” I repeated. I liked the way it sounded.
“Yup,” he said, putting his hands on his hips and surveying the front yard like he was a foreman of a construction site. All we’d done was dig a little hole, put the tiny tree in, and packed some soil around it. But it felt more special than that.
Everything else in my life, I’d never had to earn. The tree was small, but it was something we had done together.
Henry smiled. His cheeks were always slightly pink, but after being outside so long, tonight they were even ruddier than usual. We watched as the pine sapling blew to one side, its tiny branches shivering in the wind. The sun had just set, painting the sky a dusky grey-blue. It was going to snow tomorrow. Maybe even late tonight.
“You think it’s going to make it?” I asked, stepping to one side as if I could protect the baby tree from the wind.
“Of course it will,” Henry said. “It’s sturdier than you think.”
He pulled a packet of Cocoa Bites cookies out of his pocket, popping one in his mouth and chewing as he watched the tree. Henry always had the cookies. He loved them more than some people loved their own family.
“It’s going to be even windier and colder tonight, though.” I frowned as I watched the pine tree’s wiry branches bend, like they could buckle over at any moment. “The rosebush we planted last year only lasted a month.”
“We planted this better. Trust me, Sebastian. This tree ain’t going anywhere.”
I needed the tree to make it. I’d already grown attached to it, and somehow, it symbolized my life down here in Berrydale Village. I had to leave tomorrow, but this tree could stay forever.
“I’ll take good care of it while you’re gone,” Henry told me, his voice going softer for a moment. “I promise.”
I gave him a small smile. “The pine tree is going to be diabetic with all of those cookie crumbs you’ve put into the soil.”
“Cookies are an important part of every sapling’s diet.”
“Give me one of those,” I said.
He handed me a cookie and then shoved his hands into the pockets of his old, weathered army-green jacket. It was secondhand like all of his clothes, full of fraying holes, and yet it fit him like it had been made just for his body. It was unfair how these things seemed to find him, but it didn’t change the fact that the jacket was item number 5,829 on my list of Reasons.
I wished I could snap my fingers and make myself be more like Henry—someone confident, optimistic, and so sure of himself and the things he did. My life felt like a straitjacket constantly tightening around me, with my family’s legacy hanging over every single second of my life. Henry, to me, was magic: he had no money, barely any family, and no friends to speak of, other than me. But he acted like he owned the whole world.
My mother, Queen Charlotte Pearsen Stolvisse Ambrose, ruled over the kingdom of Frostmonte. Henry and I were in Berrydale, but the surrounding villages of Tilden, Deercrest, Aldwick, and Bleneth were also in Frostmonte Kingdom. At the center of them all was the mountain where Frostmonte Castle sat. Everything beneath Frostmonte Castle was ours. Mine, one day. The villages made their own laws, but the royal power of Frostmonte was something else. Mostly symbolic, but very real.
People cared about what my family did. Way, way too much. And I’d hated it for my whole life.
And of course, the good people of the villages also paid a small percentage of their taxes to fund the castle. Something my mother always sternly reminded me of.
“Sebastian? It’s getting cold out there,” my aunt’s singsong voice called from the small cottage house behind us. My mother let me stay with my aunt down here in the village during the school year, but even here, there were strict rules.
“Shit,” Henry said. “She’s going to hate me for keeping you out past your bedtime.” He used his boot to brush away a few brittle oak leaves that had blown near the pine sapling.
I didn’t want to go back inside yet.
In fact, if I had one wish, it would be to make it all go away. To wake up one day and stop being Prince Sebastian Nigel Fairleigh Ambrose, Prince of Frostmonte, heir to the throne of Frostmonte Castle. I even liked Henry’s name better than mine. Henry Denton. Simple. Two names. Easy to spell, say, and remember. He sounded like a normal fifteen-year-old. I definitely didn’t.
“It’s not even seven o’clock,” I protested. “I don’t go to bed at seven.”
“Right,” Henry said, watching me with a glimmer of teasing in his eyes. “But you need to go in, have a cup of tea with your aunt and uncle by the fireplace, make your phone call to queen mommy dearest, plan out tomorrow’s activities, lay out an outfit for yourself, take a bath, get in bed, do your nightly winding-down routine—”
“Shut up,” I said, giving him a small shove as he giggled at me. “You have routines, too.”
“Sure don’t.”
“You drink orange juice right out of the bottle, every single morning. Super gross,” I said.
“That’s not a routine, that’s just delicious,” he protested.
“And you definitely never go to sleep without turning on the hall light.”
He looked down at the ground, packing the soil with the toe of his boot.
“Well, yeah. Gotta have the hall light on in case I get up to pee.”
“In case a ghost is lurking in the hall, you mean?”
“Shut up,” he said, his smile widening.
“It’s okay to be afraid of ghosts,” I said. “I’m afraid of everything else in the world.”
“I’m only afraid of what your aunt is going to do if you don’t get back inside soon,” he said.
I let out a slow sigh. “Probably roast me up for tomorrow’s dinner. I do have a lot left to do tonight. I should get back.”
I had a momentary pang of longing for the days when my father was still alive. Even though he was the king of Frostmonte, he’d still come down to Berrydale on Sundays to attend church with his siblings, my aunt and uncle.
It was how I’d fallen so in love with Berrydale to begin with.
But my father was gone. Those days were gone. And now staying with my aunt and uncle only meant one thing: I got to be next door to Henry. f
And Henry made me feel like I was someone special because he liked me. The real me. Not just because I was a prince.
The air was silent between us, but I didn’t want to go home. I rubbed the back of my neck, my fingers icy cold against my skin.
I could tell he didn’t want to leave, either. If he’d been my boyfriend instead of a hopeless crush, I would have kissed him.