By the time we’re creeping down the midnight halls and across the wet grass, weariness gives way to unease. Sinora could be crouched anywhere.
We relieve those on duty and hunker down against the wheels of a fighter, cement floor cold beneath us. Have to find a distraction. Anything to keep me from looking at my watch, or into the darkness beyond. Shadows shiver along the walls, sinister patterns with teeth for ends. They grow in size, twisting, coming closer, and I keep reminding myself I count for nothing in this game.
Never thought that would be a relief.
“Vintage weapons for parade,” Cyar muses eventually. “Did one of your brothers tell you that?”
I don’t confirm or deny.
“Do you think he’ll actually try something now?”
The he in this doesn’t need to be explained. Cyar never calls him my father. He’s always the General. Or he. Or him. Vague things that keep it distant.
I shrug, fighting a yawn. “Doubtful. He doesn’t rush things.”
Cyar is silent a moment. “I don’t think it’s the whole kingdom’s fault what Sinora did.”
His observation sits uncomfortably between us in the chilly air. Cyar and his honesty.
“Then Sinora better cooperate,” I say, covering my own uncertainty. “Hopefully she cares about Etania as much as you.”
Cyar sighs. He doesn’t like that answer, but he says, “Either way, no more airplane stunts. Don’t crash yourself before you’re off the runway.”
“I won’t.”
And I won’t, for his sake.
The cement numbs my legs and we shift closer for warmth—it stopped being awkward long ago, after nights of field training. The hours drift by, indistinct. A grey haze appears above the mountains. They’re not jagged and snowcapped like the ones in northern Savient. These are round and welcoming, green and full of life. What I’ve always hungered for. I walk to the wide hangar doors, and the air smells like wet cedar in the dawn mist.
I want to disappear into those woods and never come back.
On the far hill, the gardens hold pinpricks of colour. Bright on dark, like the ruby pins in the Princess’s hair. Thoughtless flecks of wealth. How can I smile at her? I don’t want to, and maybe that’s my problem. She gets this beauty, every day spent in ease, no struggle from beginning to end, and all while her mother’s a devil gambling with lives. A traitor who tried to hurt my father by taking my innocent mother.
I lean on the cool door.
A devil who gambles with lives.
All right, perhaps we have that one sliver of a thing in common.
16
AURELIA
The stables are my escape in the morning. It smells like grain and leather and mud, the most beautiful scents in all the world. But today I’m here to face my guilt—Liberty. I force myself to peer into his stall, to see him standing there and hobbled on three legs. Those lovely, strong legs. They’re meant for galloping, for leaping obstacles, and the sight of him confined to this cramped space, riddled with pain, breaks my heart. I offer him an apple, and he nudges it with a soft nose, then turns away.
His heart is broken, too.
An hour passes quietly with Ivory, currying and brushing her, then feeding her the apple that Liberty refused. I step out of the stall, latching the metal tight, and spot a yellow-eyed barn cat skulking through the grass outside. It’s crouched with tail twitching, hunting some poor little animal. Vicious thing. I run over, hissing, and it bounds away. The baby sparrow on the ground makes no effort to move, so I kneel down and nudge it lightly once. Then twice. On the third push, it flutters up and away for the forest beyond.
The cat barrels after it.
Stars, maybe it’s me that’s cursed.
“Princess,” a familiar voice calls.
I turn on my knees in surprise.
The fair-haired daredevil is suddenly standing there, looking down at me curiously.
I hurry to my feet, embarrassed, and we’re very alone, no sign of the stable boy with his pails of grain. The pilot wears the same peculiar expression as the night before, watching, waiting, but what’s he waiting for? He approaches me.
“Yes?” I ask, attempting an air of authority.
He nods to the trees beyond. “I’d like to explore the woods. Which way do you recommend?”
This must be a lie. Some kind of game, though it makes no sense. He can’t think it’s fine to just walk up and ask me this, like I’m a footman with directions. But he’s still standing there, expectant, so I think he does. “There are many trails,” I say. “Five hundred acres of them. You’ll certainly get lost if you go on your own.”
“Oh.”
“And you wouldn’t want to get left behind after dark. We have wolves.”
“Wolves?” He sounds intrigued. “Here?”
It’s my own invented lie, hoping to strike some sort of fear into a Safire heart, but it seems that has failed, too. I stride past him, in the direction of the palace. Best to leave while I can.
I hear footsteps on the grass behind me.
Is he actually following me?
“Princess, I was dishonest. I didn’t wish to only ask directions. I wanted to apologize.”
His Landori is polished and gently accented, not what I expected from a lowly pilot. It’s like the tide along the seashore, rising and falling on different words.
“Apologize?” I ask over my shoulder.
“Yes, for yesterday. I shouldn’t have flown without permission. I was hoping you might be willing to overlook it. Or better yet, perhaps you might ask your mother to overlook it?”
I stop and turn. We’ve reached the eastern gardens. “You should have thought of that before you climbed into the plane.”
His eyes are an earnest grey, surrounded by dark lashes. “I know. But I’d rather not die for a crime I didn’t commit. I’m only seventeen.”
“Die?”
“Yes, doesn’t the Queen hang foreign spies? Or is it the firing squad? If it’s something worse than that, please don’t tell me.”
Amusement lurks behind his words, but I won’t give in. “If you weren’t spying, then what were you doing?”
“Flying. That’s it. Those pilots of yours, they insulted our reputation, said we wouldn’t be able to do a single maneuver in this mountain wind.” He steps closer. He smells like something warm from the runway. Petrol, maybe. “And that isn’t true. I had to prove it.”
“That’s a terrible excuse for recklessness.”
He smiles, near enough now I could touch his arm. “You’re right. Can I try again?”
“No,” I say, but it’s a bit less forceful.
He reaches down and plucks an orchid from the garden. He holds it out to me, the russet-coloured watch on his wrist flashing in the sun. “I’m truly sorry for what I’ve done. It was thoughtless.”
I stare at the flower, at the soft pink petals, then at his chest, the simple stitching on a less formal uniform, the unbuttoned collar, and then again into his face. Blond hair brushes his forehead, more windblown than messy, his fair skin sprinkled with a few faint freckles across the nose. Again the grey eyes and dark lashes. He’s all the colours of the seashore. Elegant, but in a shadowed sort of way, like he’s seen most of life and knows already how it goes.
It doesn’t match his sweet smile.
“What’s your name?” I ask.
“Lieutenant Erelis.”
I take the orchid from him. “I’ll admit that was some fancy flying yesterday, Lieutenant Erelis.”
“I graduated at the top of my class, Princess.”
“Ah, I’ve heard that before. But the real test comes in battle, I think.”
“You’re very right,” he agrees. “But since I’ve already shot down three enemy planes…”
Three! I take him in from head to toe again. Perhaps that explains the shadows.
“Possibly four,” he amends. “The last one wasn’t proven, but I like to count it. The fuselage was smoking. I’m certain the pilot had to bail.”
“Does your friend fly, too?”