“Please,” he is saying. “We mean no harm. Please allow us passage.”

Nolla Verin is already through the panels of our tent, and I am quick to follow.

Our guards have built a fire, and a few hare hang on a spit above it. No one is paying attention to the food, though. Tik and Dyhl have their crossbows trained on a middle-aged man who is on his knees, crouched over a young girl, blocking her with his body. A thick beard covers most of his face. A few brown pelts lie in a pile beside him.

My mother stands in the firelight, tall and lean and striking, her red hair hanging straight to her shoulders. “What is your business here?” she says.

“I am a trapper,” he says. “I saw your fire and thought—” He breaks off with a gasp as Dyhl moves close enough to drive the point of his crossbow into the man’s back. From where he stands, if Dyhl pulls the trigger, the force of the weapon will drive the arrow into both the man and the girl.

“I-I-I am unarmed,” the man stammers.

“You wear a knife at your hip,” says my mother. It’s right there in plain sight. She doesn’t suffer fools.

His hand shifts as if to go for the weapon, but Tik, standing in front of him, lifts his crossbow just a hair. The man’s hand goes up as if to prove he’s harmless. “The knife is dull!” he cries. The girl whimpers underneath him. “For skinning. Take it. Take everything I have.”

My heart thuds in my chest. We’ve ridden past the remains of towns—destruction caused by our soldiers. The population here is sparse, but we are also trying to make our way to the prince’s castle under some veil of secrecy. If we allow this man to leave and he spreads the word, we could be attacked before our arrival. As my sister said, we are in hostile territory.

Hostile because of our own actions, my thoughts whisper to me.

If I did not want to see the result of our attacks on Emberfall, I most certainly do not want to see slaughter before my own eyes.

At my side, Nolla Verin does not look affected. She looks curious. She is waiting to see how our mother will handle this invasion.

To my surprise, Mother turns to look at Nolla Verin. “My daughter will decide your fate, trapper.”

My sister straightens. This is not the first time Mother has looked to either of us for a decision, but it is the first time real lives have hung in the balance.

The man’s eyes lock on my sister. From below his arm, the girl peers out. Tears streak through the dust on her cheeks.

“Please,” the man says, and his voice is rough. “We have no part in the quarrel between your people and ours.”

I cannot see my sister’s expression, but the man’s eyes fill with sorrow at whatever he finds there, and he turns his head to speak softly to the girl cowering beneath him. A sob breaks from her chest.

I reach out and grasp my sister’s hand. “Nolla Verin,” I whisper. “We are here to find a path to peace.”

She squeezes my fingers, then glances at me. I want there to be a flicker of indecision in her eyes. Of dismay at having to make such a choice.

There is none. She looks back at Dyhl. “Kill him.”

The girl screams. The crossbow fires. The man collapses. The girl is no longer visible. The bolt must have gone right through them both.

Silence envelops the forest.

It does not last long. Nolla Verin looks to the guards. “Double the number of lookouts through the night. I do not want another trapper stumbling into our camp.”

She turns on her heel and returns to our tent.

I cannot follow. Every guard in this clearing can probably sense my unhappiness.

Mother surely can.

I turn from the bodies as well. I cannot go back to our tent, but I can walk. Sorra and Parrish will follow, though I do not feel as though I deserve guards. Not now. I step into the heavy darkness surrounding the camp.

A bit of gold glints between the trees, barely caught by the firelight. I freeze, narrowing my eyes.

Not gold. Blond. Hair. A girl, larger than the one who was pinned beneath the man. Her hands are over her face, her shoulders shaking. A long strand of pelts hangs from one shoulder.

She is crying.

Her eyes meet mine, and she gasps. She goes still, panic washing over her face.

I give a brief shake of my head. So brief it’s almost invisible. No, I want to say. Stay away.

Run.

“Lia Mara,” my mother calls.

I should not care about one man and his daughter. Daughters. I swallow.

I should not care.

Mother will not call my name twice. I turn, awaiting a rebuke.

Parrish, my guard, is right there, almost beside me. He followed me into the trees, as he should, but one look at his eyes and I know he’s seen the girl, too. His own crossbow hangs ready in his hand, and a swell of fear rises in my gut.

He gives a brief shake of his head, the movement as minute as mine was. “You should not walk into the forest,” he says. “Who knows what other dangers hide among the trees.”

I fight to keep from gasping in relief. He will not pursue her.

My gaze returns to the spot where the girl hid. Only darkness waits there now.

If I look back at Parrish, Mother will know something is amiss. I straighten my shoulders. “Yes, Mother.”

“Come join me.”

She is sitting by the fire. Near the bodies.

This will be my punishment. For being too soft. For begging mercy.

This is why Nolla Verin will be queen.

CHAPTER FOUR

GREY

Since we saw the soldiers at Jodi’s tavern yesterday, I’ve been tense and irritable. I keep expecting their captain to appear at Worwick’s and drag me back to Ironrose. Or worse, to drag me into the shadows behind the stadium, where they can separate my head from my body.

These worries are irrational. So few people know who I truly am and what I know.

The enchantress Lilith—who is dead. I cut her throat myself.

My mother—who is not my mother at all. I walked out of her house with nothing. I left her with all the silver and coppers I had, and every warning I thought to give. Hopefully she took the money and left. But if anyone went to her seeking me, she’d have no answer to give beyond the truth: I showed up and I left.

Karis Luran—who, if Lilith’s threats were to be believed, would use this information to destroy Rhen, if he’d believe her at all.

My surly attitude has rubbed off on Tycho, made worse by the ongoing heat wave. Today’s weather brought a thickening cloud cover that seemed to promise storms, but only delivered a cloying humidity that makes everything sticky and everyone miserable. He’s raking the space between the stadium seats and the arena, making each drag of the tool an attack on the dirt. Dust floats into the air, settling on everything, including the expensive cushioned seats that I’ve just wiped down.

“Hey,” I snap.

He whips around, cringing a little.

“Put the rake up,” I say, forcing the edge out of my tone. I dip my rag in a bucket and wring it out to wipe the seats again. “It’s just making a mess.”

He must feel bad, because when he comes back, he brings another rag to wipe down the railing. We work quietly for a while, relishing the late-afternoon silence.

When he’s quiet like this, he reminds me of my brother Cade, who was thirteen when I was sixteen. I don’t know why, because they’re not at all alike, really. Cade would talk my ear off about nothing, while I sometimes go hours without hearing a word from Tycho. But Cade could put his head down and work when he needed to. He helped run the farm after I was gone.