And when she noticed that Biana’s patch was bordered in purple, she realized that each of their patches’ colors matched the colors of their spotlights—which made her wonder if the Council had somehow known that her spotlight would be Inflictor red before she’d gotten there, or if their gnomes had set to work as soon as she stepped foot in the Seat of Eminence. She also realized that the jewels in the centers of their circlets were color-coordinated to their spotlights—ruby for her, pink tourmaline for Stina, opal for Wylie, emerald for Dex, and amethyst for Biana.

The Council had truly thought of everything. And Sophie had been so busy studying her friends that she’d forgotten they weren’t the only ones who’d been waiting for her—until Grady lifted her into a crushing hug, spinning her around a couple of times before he set her down and leaned back to study her.

His eyes took in every detail of all her new accessories, lingering the longest on her cape’s patch.

“Apparently I’m not just a moonlark anymore,” Sophie told him, too embarrassed to share the Council’s reasons for choosing her mascot while the rest of her friends were close enough to hear.

“I guess not,” Grady agreed, his voice thoroughly choked up. “You okay with that?”

The best answer she could give him was, “We’ll see.”

He pulled her back into a hug. “How are you really holding up?” he whispered in her ear. “I know this must be a lot.”

“It is,” she whispered back. “But… I think you were right. It’s time to take this step. We’re going to need all the allies we can get to stop the Neverseen.”

He hugged her tighter. “I’m so proud of you, kiddo. Wait—can I even call you ‘kiddo’ anymore? You look so grown up.”

“There’s always Lady Kiddo,” Dex suggested, striding up beside them and earning a chuckle from Grady. “Or you could join the cool kids and call her Lady Fos-Boss.”

Grady’s eyebrows shot up.

Sophie shook her head. “Don’t ask—and that’s not happening.”

“It so is,” Dex insisted. Then his dimpled grin faded, and he reached up to adjust his circlet. “All of this is really happening, huh?”

Sophie nodded.

And as she listened to Sandor lecturing the Councillors for taking his charge into space without his protection, and to Biana telling Della all about her light leap with the Sources, and to Tiergan quietly assuring Wylie that he was so incredibly proud of him—even to Vika promising Stina that she was sure to be the most famous of all the Hekses—she was hit with the rare sense that for that one moment, things were exactly the way they ought to be.

They had a ton of work and drama and problems ahead—and probably lots of bickering and almost dying. But they’d deal with all of it, because they all had one thing in common.

“I know what our team name needs to be,” she realized, having to repeat the words louder for everyone to catch them.

“Oh yeah?” Dex asked. “Hit us with it, Lady Fos-Boss.”

Sophie sighed. “Seriously, that’s not my name.”

“Keep telling yourself that,” Dex, Wylie, Biana, and Stina all said in unison, because of course the first thing they’d all agree on would be the need to continue annoying her.

But she’d deal with her title issues later.

For now, she turned to the twelve Councillors and told them. “You wanted something respectable. And we wanted something that fits who we are—”

“And something that isn’t an epic fail,” Dex jumped in, earning himself glares from all of the Councillors. “I’m still particularly fond of ‘Team Dex-Is-the-Greatest.’ ”

Sophie cleared her throat, giving Dex a please-not-now look. “So I think,” she continued, “we should be Team Valiant. It sounds official. It means brave and heroic. And if we want, we can always shorten it to Team V.”

Silence followed, long enough that Sophie started to worry she’d gotten it wrong.

Then Dex applauded.

A slow clap—but still genuine.

And when Biana, Wylie, and—reluctantly—Stina joined in, Team Valiant was officially born.

Biana even made sure to repeat the name a little louder than necessary as they stood on the steps outside the Seat of Eminence, making plans to head home for the night and meet up the next day to discuss all the huge problems they needed to start tackling.

They pretended not to notice the elves that had stopped to stare—exactly the way the Council had hoped that people would. But Sophie could already hear the whispers starting.

“Is that Sophie Foster?”

“And Dex Dizznee?”

“And Biana Vacker?”

“And Wylie Endal?”

“And Stina Heks?”

“It looks like they’re part of the nobility!”

“They can’t be!”

“But they’re wearing circlets.”

“And what’s that symbol on their pins?”

“One of them said something about a team—what do you think it means?”

Sophie held her breath, waiting to hear the answer.

And it made her heart swell, even if it also made her stomach extra twisty and sour.

“Looks like the Council’s finally doing something.”

TEN

WHOA, EDALINE WASN’T KIDDING about the whole ‘Lady Sophie’ thing,” Keefe murmured, making Sophie jump—and then reel on Sandor for not giving her a heads-up that she had people waiting for her in her bedroom.

Sandor shrugged. Clearly he was still annoyed with her for leaving the planet without him—as if the edge of the earth’s atmosphere was somehow the perfect spot for a Neverseen ambush.

Then again, Bo hadn’t warned her about her visitors either.

His white-knuckle grip on his sword—and the satisfied smirk on Ro’s face—probably had something to do with that.

And Edaline must’ve gotten sidetracked by all the hugging and crying and asking fifty thousand questions and forgotten to mention that there were a smirking boy and an ogre princess waiting upstairs.

All Sophie knew was, she was going to yell at all of them later, because now she had to face a Keefe-and-Ro Inquisition while still wearing a crown.

Sandor and Bo were wise enough to wait in the hall.

Keefe whistled as he crossed her flowered carpet and made a slow circle around her. And Sophie braced for a record-breaking amount of teasing. But his voice actually sounded serious when he asked, “Sorry, was I supposed to bow?”

“If you had, I would’ve flung a pillow at your head,” she told him with a grin he didn’t return. “And you can forget the Lady Sophie thing, too.”

“Thank goodness,” Ro said, dropping her feet from where she’d had them propped on Sophie’s desk. “I never would’ve been able to pull that off with a straight face. And, uh, please tell me this isn’t your permanent new wardrobe.”

“Parts of it are,” Sophie admitted, pointing to her new cloak clasp as an example. “But I’m done with the dress. And this.”

She tried to yank the much-too-conspicuous circlet off of her head, hoping the humiliating way it got tangled in her hair at least proved that she was still the same clumsy mess she’d always been.