Without their interactions during pack animal duty, the only time Sev saw Kade was at night with Trix. He remained frowning and distant as they discussed plans and strategies, and sometimes he didn’t turn up at all.
“Were you one of her generals?” Sev asked Trix a few nights after she’d revealed her plans, the pair of them sitting together around a rare fire. It was very late, with everyone but the perimeter guard asleep, and Kade was nowhere to be found.
They were camped in a deep gorge, with steep stone spears rising above them, completely blocking the sky. Giant boulders were scattered in random heaps and piles, as if tossed there by a god’s careless hand. To the west, the ground fell away steeply, giving Sev the impression that their entire campsite was perched on some precarious ledge and one good gust of wind could blow them clear off.
Luckily, their fire was tucked up against one of the large stones, far away from the cliff and protected from view of the campsite.
“No . . . I was never much of warrior. I served my queen in other, less obvious ways.”
Sev stared at her thoughtfully. “You said it’s been your business to know things for a very long time,” he began, thinking out loud, “and that you advised Avalkyra Ashfire. Before you claimed that being famous ‘would have quite defeated the point’ of whatever you were doing in the war. Now all this stuff with poison . . . You were a spy, weren’t you?”
It seemed obvious, all of a sudden, with her penchant for scheming and blackmailing and all her talk of information as power. Trix managed Captain Belden’s messenger pigeons, and Sev suspected she spent as much time reading the captain’s messages as she did sending them. She’d already mentioned that Belden was in constant contact with scouts higher up the mountain, and Sev had no doubt that was how she had so much information about his plans.
“I traded in secrets,” she said, not addressing Sev’s assumption directly but confirming it all the same. “My life began in the Aura Nova slums, and I will have the touch of it on me for the rest of my life, the same as you. Back then, joining the empire’s military was a great honor, not a forced conscription. It was a guarantee of food, shelter, and work—and of course, joining the Phoenix Riders meant being a part of its most prestigious ranks. I almost flunked out of training,” she said, chuckling as she poked at the fire with a stick. “But my aptitude for codes, patterns, and puzzles set me apart from my fellows. I’d learned to write thanks to my time serving Hael, god of health and healing, and was able to put my knowledge of herbs and medicines to use as well. My queen saw something in me and elevated me to serve at her side. War has a way of making regular people into heroes.”
“Or fools,” Sev said before he could stop himself.
Trix laughed loudly at that. “One and the same, are they often not? But this is why I need you, Sevro, animage soldier and common thief. Heroes have their uses, but we have ours, too. We’re not popular, people like us,” she said, her shrewd expression soft at the edges. “Too many deceptions, too many whispered secrets and mysterious missions. But we’re useful. That’s what it comes down to at the end of the day. Be useful, boy, and you’ll never want for a position in this world. Find what you’re best at and use it. If you’re sneaky, then sneak. If you’re a liar, then lie. If you’re wicked as the south wind and devious as a deathmaiden, then, well . . .” She shrugged helplessly, arms wide, and Sev snorted.
Her words had made an impression on him, though. Maybe he wasn’t a lost cause after all.
“What do you know about the informant?” Sev asked. It had been on his mind ever since Trix first told him about Belden’s meeting. He couldn’t help but wonder who would sell out their own people that way—what they had to lose and what they had to gain.
“Not much,” Trix conceded, her mood turning dark. “I’ve not been able to intercept a letter since we were in the capital. I have no idea what happened at their meeting outside Vayle or if this traitor is still in play. That is why this battle cannot happen—why we must stop Belden’s plan before it can be carried out. I don’t have the network and resources I once did, and my blind spots nag at me.”
Her expression was brooding. Sev tried to change the subject.
“What was she like, Avalkyra Ashfire?”
Trix seemed startled by the question at first, then considered it for a while. “She was . . . terrifying. Avalkyra Ashfire didn’t need a crown of metal and jewels—she was a born queen, and no piece of gold could change that. People in the empire used to call her the Crownless Queen, trying to dismiss her claim to the throne, but Avalkyra would not be dissuaded. She was a ruthless fighter and a fearless leader—a more natural Rider I never saw. Like poetry on wings, soaring through ash and flame.”
She held out her hand, dipping and curving it, as if her palm were a phoenix gliding on the wind. She dropped it.
“Soon our glory will be restored and our people made safe. If I can see them once more before I die, I will consider it a life well lived.”
“Phoenix Riders?”
“Yes. There are . . . Well, I’m certain I have friends and loved ones among them. That is what sustains me—that and devotion to my queen’s cause.”
“How did she lose?” Sev asked, leaning back and stretching out his legs before the warmth of the flames. “She had the Phoenix Riders, the best part of the empire’s military, and the support of Pyra and Ferro.” Stel was rumored to be involved in the plot against Avalkyra, putting all their funds and forces behind Pheronia, whose mother was of Stellan descent. The governor of Ferro was a Rider and so supported Avalkyra Ashfire’s claim, while the governors of Arboria North and South remained reluctant to join the fray.
“She was single-minded to the point of obsession, and vengeance was all she cared about. She made rash decisions and put her warriors in vulnerable positions. She flew her entire force to Aura Nova for the Last Battle, leaving their families and their non-Rider allies vulnerable. It was all or nothing with Avalkyra. There was no middle ground.”