Heron’s brow creases as he watches me slip my shoes back on.

“And?” he says. “You can’t honestly be considering going. Do you remember what happened the last time she requested a meeting?”

“Of course I do,” I say. “She tried to kill me. I can’t imagine this time will be any different.”

“But you still think it’s a good idea to go?” he asks.

“She has a hostage,” I say. “A girl, eight years old maybe. Frightened.”

That gives Heron pause, but after a second he shakes his head. “You know, though, that if you do show up there, she’ll still kill her. She’ll kill the both of you, and your choice will have been for nothing. What reason does she have not to?”

I know he’s right, but he’s wrong as well.

I sigh, trying to put my thoughts into words. “This ends one way,” I say. “With one of us dead. I think she’s dangling this bait expecting me to come to talk, under the guise of a truce. I think she expects to ambush me. But there’s a flaw in her plan.”

“Which is?” he asks.

I tie my second boot and stand up, looking at him.

“I’m stronger than she thinks I am, and I’m not going in blind. I’m going in ready for whatever she has, ready to meet her in kind. She means to spring a trap for me, but this time we’re going to be one step ahead of her.”

“We,” Heron echoes.

I raise my eyebrows. “Unless you don’t want to come.”

“Of course I’m going with you,” he says, clambering to his feet. “But we should wait for the others.”

I wave the idea away. “They’re occupied,” I say. “If they haven’t come back yet, they’re in the thick of battle. I’m not pulling them out so they can be my bodyguards. Besides, the girl can’t wait.”

Heron shakes his head. “You think the two of us, alone, are going to somehow make it from here to the throne room? We don’t have to worry about Cress killing you—that trip alone will be enough.”

“Lucky, then, that you can make us both invisible,” I say.

“That won’t make us incorporeal. It won’t do any good if we get impaled by a sword meant for someone else,” he points out.

“There are three ways we can get to the throne room from here,” I say, before ticking them off on my fingers. “The clearest path, which you’re right, will likely be clogged with warriors. Then there’s a web of smaller hallways, usually used by servants. Less likely to be full, but you never know.”

“And the third?” Heron asks, though he sounds like he already regrets asking.

“Back through the dungeon, down the passageway we came in through. It forks—one direction leading straight into the throne room, which also prevents us from being seen by any guards Cress might have posted outside the room.”

Heron considers this a moment, eyeing me like he thinks I might have gone entirely insane. Finally, he sighs. “I don’t suppose you can be talked out of this?”

“It’s the only way to end this,” I say. “Before more people get hurt.”

* * *

—

Heron insists on leaving a note behind to tell the others where I’ve gone, which I know is a good idea, though I can’t help but imagine Artemisia’s scowl as she reads it.

They had one job—to stay put, she’ll snap.

But at least she’ll know we haven’t been captured or killed.

With that done, Heron takes my hand in his and lets his invisibility inch over our skin until we are both invisible.

“Can you hold this until we get to the dungeon?” I ask him as we slip through the door and into the empty hallway, careful to step over the dead bodies and piles of ash as we go.

“Easily enough,” he admits. “As you said, I only need air to reinvigorate my gift. As for my injury, as long as I don’t have to do any lunging or heavy lifting, I should be just fine. But it isn’t as though fighting is my strong suit anyway.”

We wind through the halls in silence, though they’re deserted. There’s no sign of life—only the bodies of the Kalovaxian warriors we left in our wake when we came through the first time.

It isn’t until we reach the door to the stairwell that descends to the dungeon that we hear voices, muffled and indecipherable, coming from inside.

Heron squeezes my hand, I squeeze his back, and we press against the wall, waiting to see how many warriors we’re going to have to face or if it will be best to just let them pass.

The voices grow louder, underscored by approaching footsteps coming up the stairs, and I let out a sigh of relief. They’re speaking Astrean.

“We don’t know what we’ll find,” a familiar voice says, making my heart leap in my chest. “But we’ll split up and disperse throughout the palace, stepping in wherever they need us.”

As soon as the leader steps into the hall, I let go of Heron’s hand and throw my arms around his neck, knocking him off balance.

For an instant, Blaise goes tense, but then I fade into view once more and he sighs, hugging me back.

“Thank the gods,” he murmurs into my hair before pulling back and looking me over. “Queen Theodosia,” he says to the group of warriors behind him, so many that I can’t see all of them. They crowd the stairwell, stretching out back as far as I can see.

“What’s happening? Where are the others?” Blaise continues.

I look back at Heron for help explaining, but he shakes his head. “Oh no, this isn’t my plan. You’re going to tell him.”

I shake my head and quickly tell Blaise about everything that’s happened since we entered the palace, skimming over the details of Heron’s injury and my own bout of weakness. When I tell him about Cress’s message and the girl, though, he frowns.

“You can’t be serious.”

“That’s exactly what I said,” Heron tells him. “But it turns out she is.”

Blaise sighs but he doesn’t look entirely surprised. Instead he turns to the warriors behind him.

“Gerard,” he says to one of the men at the front, broad-shouldered and fierce with a face that’s been badly burned. “You’re in charge now. Find the others. Start at the edge of the palace and work into the center. Kill anyone who fights; imprison anyone who doesn’t.”

Gerard nods but doesn’t speak.

“You don’t have to come with us,” I tell Blaise.

Before I finish speaking, he’s already shaking his head. “Of course I do,” he says, but doesn’t elaborate. He doesn’t need to say any more, I suppose—he belongs at my side, and I am happy to have him there.

Blaise, Heron, and I stand aside so that the warriors can file past. I try to keep a count of them as they go, but there are too many.

“A little over two hundred,” Blaise says to me before I can ask. “The fire at the Earth Mine wasn’t as bad as the one at the Air Mine. The Guardians there were able to put it out quicker, working together to create a storm of dirt that smothered the flames.”

I nod, barely trusting myself to speak. When the last of them leaves, Blaise, Heron, and I make our way down the stairs into the flooded and deserted dungeon.

“I’m glad you’re here, Blaise,” I say to him. “I’m glad you’re alive. I’m glad you’re coming with me.”

His hand comes down on my shoulder and he squeezes it.

“Me too, Theo.”

We hurry down the dungeon corridor in silence until we arrive at the tunnel entrance once more. I try to ignore the bloated corpses of the guards as we pass. When Heron pushes the door to the tunnel open, Blaise and I follow him through it. The water gets higher the closer to the ocean we get, until it’s up to my hips. Finally, we come to the fork in the path. The way we came heads deeper into the sea outside now that the tide has come in, but the other tine of the fork goes uphill, careening toward the throne room. It isn’t a path I’ve taken before, but Blaise seems to know it and he leads the way. The walk lasts only about fifteen minutes before we reach what at first appears to be a dead end.

“It’s that stone, there,” Blaise says, pointing to a rock in the bottom corner of the wall, barely bigger than a pebble.

“Cress needs to think I’m alone,” I tell them. “You two stay behind me, invisible, until I attack.”

Blaise nods, offering his arm to Heron, who takes hold of it. I wait until the invisibility fades them from view completely before I crouch down by the rock Blaise pointed to and press it.

It gives easily enough, and when it does, a doorway opens up in the wall.

I only hesitate for a second before stepping through.

THE THRONE ROOM IS ABLAZE with candles, casting it in a light that is almost blinding, even though the glass dome roof shows the stars and moon shining down from above. On the throne at the center of the room, Cress sits with her legs primly crossed, in the same silver chiton I saw her wearing earlier, her eyes fixed on me. The girl I saw earlier is still at her side, sitting on the dais with her knees pulled up to her chest.

Cress isn’t surprised at my entrance through the wall. She isn’t angry to see me. She doesn’t even look pleased that I accepted her invitation. Instead her expression is unreadable.