“You are exhausted. Give your power time to recover,” Iisak says. “Try tomorrow night, perhaps.”

I am exhausted—but a bit energized, too. I almost want to ask him to lay my own arm open again, just to feel the rush and swell of magic.

“If we can spare another day to walking,” I say, “we should continue heading northwest without trying to secure horses. If soldiers are already searching the town here, a slow pace will work to our benefit. Rhen would expect me to find horses and weapons and move quickly, especially if he suspects Lia Mara is with me and our destination is Syhl Shallow.” I glance across the fire, and her gaze meets mine.

“How much do you think Princess Harper would tell him?” she asks.

“If soldiers are searching in this direction? Everything.”

“No,” says Jacob. “She knows I’m with you. She wouldn’t let him come after me.”

I jerk feathers from the goose’s neck. “She may have no choice.”

Jacob rolls to his knees. “Are you saying you think he’d hurt her?” His tone is vicious, and he doesn’t wait for an answer. “I’m going back. Right now. We should have made her come with us—”

“No. I do not think he’ll hurt her.” A dark part of my brain whispers that I never would have expected him to do what he did to me, either. “Even if we are found, his guards will not harm you. He loves her. She loves him. Rhen is afraid, but we are all safer if she is within the walls of Ironrose. If she had come with us … I do not like to think of what Rhen might have done to come after her.”

They go silent. I continue pulling feathers.

After a moment, Tycho says, “What is he afraid of?”

“Magic.” I pause and wonder how much to keep secret—but surely it makes no difference now. “Rhen was cursed before. He suffered much, and Emberfall was nearly driven to ruin. He fears being cursed again.” I glance up. “He fears me.”

“He knows you,” says Jacob. “You’re not Lilith.”

Noah is studying me. “It might not matter.” He pauses, and his voice is grave. “Getting free of the curse—then learning someone else might be able to hurt him again, someone he once trusted …”

I swallow.

You trusted me once. What have I done to lose it?

You left.

Perhaps I lost before I even began.

“Harper told me a little about what you went through,” says Noah. “And she was only here for a short while.” He glances at Jacob. “Rhen’s been tough to live with over the last few months.”

Jacob snorts. “Yeah, because he’s an arrogant jerk.”

Noah doesn’t smile. “Or because he has PTSD.” Before I can ask, he says, “Post-traumatic stress disorder. It happens when you’ve been exposed to something terrifying. I used to see it a lot in soldiers. Or abused kids. It’s like your brain can’t turn off the fear.”

I glance at Tycho and think of how he shied away from those soldiers in Jodi’s tavern. Rhen has always been cool and composed, the pinnacle of control. But I keep remembering the shadows in his expression in the courtyard and wonder how much of that hid what he was truly feeling. For the first time I wonder if he’s truly trying to protect his people—or if he’s trying to protect himself.

Either way, he wants me dead. It shouldn’t matter.

I look back at the goose in my lap. I hold the bird as close to the flames as I can, letting it singe the feathers dry. Once those are also stripped from the body, I stand, but Iisak is already there. He makes quick work of the poultry, and I lay the meat across the stones.

He’s licking the blood from his claws again, and I try to stop myself from wondering if he did the same with mine. It’s unsettling to think that he was trapped in that cage for so long, having conscious awareness of everything that was done to him. Kantor jabbed his sword into the cage that day, for nothing more than a bit of sport. It’s not the same kind of humiliation as what Rhen did to me—but it’s not altogether different either.

“If you have magic,” I say to him, my voice low, “how were you kept in a cage for so long?”

“My magic is not the same as yours,” he says. “Yours comes from within, while mine comes from the wind and the sky. I can breathe frost and borrow snow from the clouds.” He holds out a hand and blows air across his palm. Frost collects on his skin—but only for a moment. It melts almost instantly, and he shakes the water into the leaves.

“But it’s summer,” I say, understanding. He was nearly dead when Worwick rolled him into the tourney. I thought it was because of the canvas covering, but maybe it was more.

“Yes, Your Highness. Here, it is summer.”

Motion catches my eye, and I find Lia Mara has moved forward to turn the meat on the stones in the fire. For the daughter of a queen, she doesn’t seem to flinch from anything—not even the prospect of work. Her hair is lit with a red glow, her curves in silhouette.

She must sense my gaze, because she looks up, so I quickly avert my eyes back to Iisak. “Did you know what I was, when we were at Worwick’s?”

“I knew you were a magesmith the instant I tasted your blood.”

The words bring a cool wind, and I shiver.

“You so fearlessly put your hand in the cage,” he continues, “so I thought you knew, that your surprise was a farce for that foolish man. Our people were once great allies, as I said. I thought you would free me once night fell.”

“And then I didn’t.”

He smiles, teeth glittering. “You did eventually.”

“I freed you to free myself,” I say to him.

“And I would have cut your throat if it meant the cage would open.” Leaves rustle in the trees above us, and his wings snap open. He launches off the ground in search of new prey, his voice carrying back to me. “Do not fault yourself for choices you believed were right in the moment. It is not princely.”

I grunt and stare after him. “I’m not a prince,” I mutter under my breath. I drop my gaze to find the fire, but instead I find Lia Mara watching me.

“You are a prince,” she says quietly.

Maybe it’s the stars in my blood, or maybe it’s the lack of pain in my back or my leg. Maybe it’s the fact that I feel as though I finally did something right.

I don’t know if I’ll follow her into Syhl Shallow. I don’t even know if I’ll survive the next few days. But for the first time, the word prince doesn’t make me flinch.

And for the first time, I don’t say a word to correct her.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

LIA MARA

By the third day, Grey estimates that we’ve covered seventy-five miles, always staying close to the creek. Iisak reports castle guards and enforcers in the towns when we draw near. We may not have horses, but Iisak swiped an array of supplies and weapons in the dead of night. We each have a dagger now. Two bows, though only one quiver of arrows. Two more swords. An iron pot that allows us to boil water and cook more than just roasted fowl.

When we rest at night, Grey tries to use his magic to heal Tycho, but he’s been unsuccessful. I can sense his frustration, but he doesn’t share his worries with me—or with anyone. Tense exhaustion seems to be a companion that silently follows us through the forest, and it’s the only companion I have. We travel together, but there’s a clear division among our party: Noah and Jacob, Grey and Tycho. Iisak keeps to the skies, leaving me to walk alone.