“What’s happening here?” says Jacob.

I pull away from the townspeople and reclaim my sword from where it’s fallen. “We need to get to the woods.”

The cheering has stopped, but I’m gaining more attention. A murmur runs through the crowd. Torches swing close, sending a flickering light across dozens of faces. I long for the days when I was invisible because all eyes were on the royal family. I keep my eyes down and push through the crowd. Hands reach for me and people press close as I pass, brushing against my bare arms, my clenched hands, my back. Every instinct I have cries for me to draw my sword and force these people to disperse, but I cannot. They drove away the soldiers. They helped me.

Jacob is not as patient. He falls back a step and yanks his sword free. “Hey! If you think he might be your heir, then back off.”

It earns us a circle of space in which to move, and I stride forward.

I glance at him. “My thanks.”

He holds my eyes a moment too long. “No problem.”

Ahead, a group of people is clustered around someone on the ground. More torches flicker in the night, along with a few lanterns. A woman is crying. Blood coats the road.

As we draw closer, I realize the crying woman is the one on the ground. Her clothes are soaked in blood, her hands clutching her swollen belly. Even in the torchlight, I can tell her skin is ashen. Behind me, Jacob swears.

A man and a girl are kneeling beside the pregnant woman. The girl has the woman’s hand clasped between her own.

When the girl looks up, I realize it’s Lia Mara.

She did not run. She did not hide.

“Grey,” she says, her voice wavering. “Grey, you have to help her.”

“I’ll find Noah,” says Jacob.

I drop to a knee beside the woman. Tears have formed tracks through the blood on her face. Brown eyes blink up at me. “The baby. I’m going to lose the baby.” She clenches her eyes and more tears flow.

“No,” says Lia Mara softly. “No, the baby will be fine.”

A knife hilt protrudes from the woman’s abdomen, buried just below her rib cage.

Lia Mara’s eyes meet mine. I see the plea there.

Breath eases from my lungs. This is more than a slice across the wrist. This is more than half-healed whip marks.

Jacob reappears, skidding on the blood- and mud-slicked cobblestones. “Noah is helping a guy who got trampled by one of the soldiers’ horses.” Then he must see the knife hilt as well, because he lets out a breath and says, “Whoa.”

I look at the woman. “May I touch you?”

She nods. Her eyes are wide and glassy. “Please,” she whispers. Her breathing is ragged and fast, and I suspect her lung has been nicked by the blade. “Please.”

I watched my mother bear eight other children. This woman does not seem large enough to be far into her pregnancy, though I am far from an expert. I am better at taking lives than preserving them. I place my hand near the knife hilt. Throwing blades are not very long, but they’re long enough to do some damage. If I pull the weapon, she could bleed to death.

Under my hand, her belly twitches and shifts. The woman gasps, and fresh tears roll down her cheeks. “It moved.”

Lia Mara smiles. “See? Your baby will live.” She saves the worry in her expression for me. For this baby to live, the mother needs to live.

The stars in my blood sit ready, flickering beneath my skin. I try to remember the way it felt with Lia Mara or with Tycho, how the magic leapt from my skin to theirs. I press both hands around the hilt and try to clear my mind. The woman whimpers.

“Shh,” Lia Mara says. She leans down close and presses a hand to the woman’s cheek. “Look at me,” she croons softly. “Your baby will be fine.”

“Jacob,” I say, my voice low.

“Yeah.”

“Pull the knife.”

He does not hesitate. The blade slips free. The woman cries out. Blood pours over my hands. The stars under my skin spark and flare and swirl.

Blood continues to flow.

“It’s not working,” says Jacob.

I take a breath and focus. I press my fingers against the wound, but it does nothing to stop the blood. The magic refuses to make the leap to save her. She’ll be dead in minutes.

“Gently,” whispers Lia Mara.

Gently. I think of Tycho in the loft. I think of Lia Mara whispering against my fingertips. The stars spin and sparkle and begin to crowd my vision, adding light to the world. I need them to be faster, to close this wound and save this young mother. Lia Mara compared this to swordplay, but she was wrong. This is like grabbing hold of a sunbeam and telling it where to shine.

But the sparks and stars swirl more readily now, moving where I direct. Blood no longer flows over my fingertips. A fluttering brushes against my hand. The baby moves again.

I blink, and the stars scatter. The woman’s chest lifts, and she lets out a sigh. Her eyes have fallen closed.

“The bleeding stopped,” says Jacob.

I move my hands and widen the tear in the woman’s clothing. No wound exists anymore.

I drag a wrist across my suddenly damp forehead and let out a breath.

“She is healed!” yells a man at my back, and a cheer goes up among the crowd. “He has magic!”

“It is the heir!” says a woman. Her voice lifts to cry out to the crowd. “His magic healed Mina!”

Then she drops to her knees.

I suck in a breath, but a man behind her does the same. Then another. A murmur runs through the crowd, and they all begin to kneel.

“We need to leave this place,” I say to Lia Mara. She nods quickly.

When I stand, I expect to have to push through the waiting people, but to my surprise, Tycho stands there. Blood is in his hair and in streaks on his cheeks, but he looks uninjured. A small boy hangs in his arms, wailing.

“The guards trampled people to flee,” Tycho says. “His leg is shattered.”

A woman pushes past Tycho to drop to her knees in front of me. Her clothes are mud spattered and her hair has pulled loose from a braid. She grabs for my hand, clutching at me with surprising strength. “Please, Your Highness. Please help him.”

I want to flinch at the title—but flinching feels like a luxury when people are truly suffering.

I nod at the woman. “I’ll try.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

LIA MARA

By the time night begins to give way to dawn, exhaustion has sunk its claws into all of us. We are given the finest rooms in the finest inn that Blind Hollow has to offer. I have a small room to myself, and a platter of food has been left beside a roaring hearth. The innkeeper brings buckets of warmed water for washing, along with clean clothes and a set of combs for my hair. After days of trudging through the woods, I am glad for the simple blue dress with a laced bodice.

Once I am clean and clothed, though, sleep seems to linger a long way off. I sit before the fire and press a trembling hand to my neck. Noah applied a bandage, but it’s still sore.

No man has ever put a weapon to my throat. Not even when Rhen’s guards captured me.

A soft knock raps at my door, and I jump. For the first time in my life, I regret my lack of guards—my lack of weapons. I’m frozen in place.

A voice calls from the other side, soft in the early-morning silence. “It’s Grey.”