All of me wondered what was about to happen.

He moved then, reaching for my gloved hands and clutching them in his. I watched silently, not caring that Zafir could see us, that he was watching my every move.

“I’ve waited so long,” Niko said on a crystalline puff, his eyes holding mine as he leaned toward me. “And I would’ve waited forever.”

I tipped up on my toes then, everything inside me straining to be near him. Needing to feel him.

A sound shattered the air, first one ear-splitting boom, followed immediately by another.

That was when I heard him—Zafir—screaming my name, “Charlie!” just as he collided with me, shoving me into a soft mound of snow.

I blinked so many times I felt like I was having some sort of seizure or fit. For the first few moments it was the snow that blinded me. And then it was something black and oily—something close to rage—as Sabara erupted within me, furious at being interrupted just as she was about to get her way.

Sick shame choked me as I remembered what I’d been so close to doing for the second time. I would have let Sabara take control.

Max’s face appeared behind my eyes as I blinked again, rubbing away the ice and trying to blot out my humiliation. How could I?

“Your Majesty? Are you hurt?” Zafir asked as he dragged me up, curling his entire body around mine. He hauled me, clutching me like a rag doll, toward a low wall near the edge of the garden.

I tried to focus, but the world tilted sideways. “Hurt? Why would I be hurt?” I noticed the chaos then. The teeming clots of bodies running toward us, filling the space around us. The barking shouts. Soldiers formed around us like a barricade. “Wh-what happened?” I thought of the sound, like an explosion of thunder, and remembered what Brook had said last night: There’s never thunder.

“Someone tried to shoot you.” Zafir answered, scanning the

perimeter and nodding to Brooklynn as she raced through

the snow in our direction. “The first two missed by a mile. The third one . . .” He glared at the splintered tree trunk I’d been standing in front of. If Zafir hadn’t tackled me, I wouldn’t be here now.

I didn’t even remember hearing a third shot. But I had heard Zafir. “You called me Charlie,” I told him, brushing snow from my face.

“I did no such thing,” he denied.

I grinned, my concentration shifting elsewhere as I searched for Niko. “You did. I heard you.”

I found Niko, standing just inches from the tree, exactly where he’d been when I’d nearly let him kiss me. He stared back at me, concern etched in every feature of his face.

A small part of me, a part of me I didn’t want to listen to, couldn’t help but wonder if he might have some hand in all this.

But Sabara heard me.

He would never hurt me, she countered.

She wasn’t lying, I knew. He loved her. I held that truth somewhere that even I couldn’t reach. And even though I didn’t understand it—didn’t understand him—I knew it in a way that made it more real than anything I could hold in my hands.

Sabara settled down as she sensed my acceptance, and a part of me hated that she could read me so easily.

“What were you thinking, coming out here without an escort?” Brook scolded as she knelt beside me.

“I am her escort.” Zafir’s voice boomed from above us.

“Yeah, well, nice job, escort. How ’bout next time we try not to get her shot?” She reached beneath my shoulder and pulled me up, none too gently. “C’mon, Chuck,” she jeered, using the nickname she knew I hated. “Let’s get you someplace safe before Round Two starts.” She jerked her head around to face Niko then. “You,” she shouted. “Meet us inside, I have some questions for you.”

Just as we were disappearing beyond the garden’s walls, she bellowed to the soldiers who were still behind her. “And someone better find the bastard responsible for this mess!”

Brook was a champion pacer.

I’d never seen anyone pace and mutter, and then pace some more with so much vigor.

I paced too, but less enthusiastically, stopping to warm my hands, my feet, and my face in front of the fire. I was still shivering, even after nearly an hour of being indoors.

Brook stopped only when Avonlea and Aron came into the enormous library.

The library of Vannova was the most incredible place I’d ever seen. Like any library, there were books. But unlike other libraries I’d been in, this collection was vast, seemingly unending. Haphazardly they lined shelves in stacks and double rows that reached all the way to the ceiling and covered every square inch of wall, almost without order or reason.

I’d plucked several free from their spots, and found myself perusing topics from art to war to animal husbandry, and pretty much everything in between. The variety of languages was just as diverse as the topics themselves. I suddenly wished I had time to spend days—maybe years—flipping through the tattered volumes to discover the secrets of the world beyond the borders of Ludania.

When Avonlea burst through the library doors, she practically knocked me to the ground as she thrust herself at me, throwing her arms around my neck. “I heard what happened,” she breathed against my cheek. “I’m so glad you’re okay.” She turned her teary gaze toward Zafir. “Thank you,” she whispered, and I thought I saw his chest puff up ever so slightly.

“Oh, brother,” Brook said, rolling her eyes. “Don’t you dare thank him. If he hadn’t let her go out there in the first place, none of this would’ve happened.”