The ride feels endless.
Brenno’s horse thunders through the misted countryside, its hooves beating a rhythm against the earth that mirrors my racing heart. Dew stings my cheeks; wind snatches at my cloak. Every hedgerow blurs, every mile an unanswered prayer with Aldric’s name inside it. We pass a shepherd lighting a morning fire; smoke lifts straight as a spear, and I tell myself it’s a good omen. I do not let myself think of omens that bend.
We reach the palace before the sun fully rises. Pennants hang limp in the dawn gray; torches gutter in iron brackets. The gates open without question—steel sighing, chains rattling—and the guards bow as soon as they recognize Brenno. I dismount first, legs trembling, eyes raking the courtyard as if he might simply step out from behind a column, alive and waiting.
“Ysabet will follow before nightfall,” I breathe. “Mira is safe?”
“With the healers,” Brenno answers. His hand lands gently on my shoulder, steadying. “Go.”
I nod, clutch my skirts, and hurry up the steps.
The palace is chaos—crowded corridors, rushing servants, whispers thick as fog.
“They say the prince won.”
“He’s wounded.”
“Barely breathing, they said—”
“Seraphine’s already here—”
The words cut like knives. A page darts into my path, a boy with flour on his cuffs. “You can’t—”
“I can,” I say, and something in my face convinces him. He steps aside. Faces turn—recognition, disdain, curiosity. The seamstress who rose too high. The scandal stitched in silk. Let them talk. Let them choke on it.
By the time I reach the infirmary, my lungs burn.
Inside smells of comfrey and vinegar, sweat and candle smoke. A thin-curtained window sieves pale light across a row of cots. I freeze in the doorway.
Aldric lies on the bed—half-naked, his chest bandaged, breath shallow but steady. Bruises bloom along his ribs like spilled ink. His hair spills dark across the pillow, his mouth slack, his face too pale beneath the wedge of morning light creeping over the stones. A copper bowl sits on a stand beside him, water pinking at the rim.
I move to him quietly, afraid a sound will break the image. He’s here. Alive.
My knees nearly give. I sink beside him and rest my palm to his cheek. Warm. My breath shudders out.
“Wake up, Aldric,” I whisper, voice cracking. “Please… you have to wake up. For your sake. For mine. For your daughter.”
The words hang between us. “She needs you. I need you.” I touch the pulse in his throat. Slow. Stubborn. Royal.
A voice slices through the hush. “Do you really think that will magically help?”
I whirl, breath catching.
Seraphine stands in the doorway.
Silver takes the light wherever she moves. Her gown spills like quicksilver; her beauty is cold enough to cut glass. She steps closer, lips curving into a knowing smirk, heels tapping out command on the stone.
“What are you doing here?” My whisper rasps like torn cloth.
She tilts her head. “Checking on my betrothed, of course. The future king.”
“Your betrothed?” The word tastes like iron. “You cursed his child.”
Her smile doesn’t falter. “You think he’ll believe that when he wakes?”
“He already knows what you are.”
“Oh, darling,” she sighs, pity sweet and poisonous, “he knows what I allow him to know.”
She drifts to the bedside. Her hand hovers over his chest, fingers drawing invisible sigils. The air thickens—hums—and Aldric’s breath stumbles, then evens, too even, like a held note. The hairs lift along my arms.
“What did you do?” I step forward.
Her green eyes glow faintly. “He’s in a deep sleep. I made sure of it. When he wakes, he’ll remember nothing—not your name, not your face, not your child.”
I stumble back, disbelief clawing up my throat. “No… that’s impossible.”
Soft laughter. “Impossible is my favorite hobby.”
She leans close, perfume dizzying—jasmine laced with stormmetal. “You truly thought you could compete with me? I am his future. You were only his distraction.”
“You can’t take his memory.”
Her gaze hardens. “Watch me.”
Green fire gutters between her fingers. I flinch, arm up—but she stops a breath from my skin, savoring the fear instead of striking. “You’ll learn what happens when you touch what isn’t yours,” she murmurs. The candle by the window gutters sideways; his chest rises and falls once like a ship on a black wave.
A hand clamps my arm and yanks me back.
“Lara—move!”
Brenno.
I gasp as he pulls me behind him. His sword lifts, and light runs along the blade—silver, bright, alive—as if it remembers dragonfire. The metal hums in my teeth.
Seraphine’s smirk tilts. “Sir Brenno. I wondered when you’d appear.” Her gaze lingers on the weapon. “Ah, that one. Wyrm-scale in the temper. Dangerous, yes. Useless against me.”
Brenno’s jaw knots. “We can find out.”
“You’d strike your prince’s betrothed?” she purrs.
“I’d strike anyone who poisons his bloodline.”
A linen-robed healer peeks around a screen, sees the tableau, and retreats like a shadow. For a long breath the room narrows to magic and steel. I feel the pressure of her power, the grounded weight of Brenno’s stance, the fragile thread of Aldric’s breath between them.
Seraphine’s smile returns, colder. “Maybe another day.”
She glides two fingers along the edge of Aldric’s pillow. Silver mist blossoms from her hand, curling up and around her like smoke. In a blink, she’s gone—only the scent of jasmine and rain-on-iron remains, clinging to the sheets like a threat.
Silence drops. Aldric breathes. In. Out. In.
Brenno exhales, lowering the sword. He turns to me, eyes like flint. “We have to go.”
“I can’t leave him,” I say, fingers locking around the bedframe.
“You can’t help him if she turns back and finds you here,” he snaps, softer than the words. “We regroup. We fight smart.”
I look at Aldric—at the line of his mouth, the stubborn crease between his brows even in sleep. “He hates being kept from battle,” I whisper. “Even now.”
“Then give him a war to wake for,” Brenno says.
Reluctantly, I let him pull me toward the door, casting one last look back. Aldric lies motionless, peaceful in a wrong way—as if locked in a dream he can’t escape. I tuck the blanket tighter at his waist, a useless act of guardianship, and follow.
In the corridor the world surges loud again—orders barked, boots drumming, a bell tolling the hour like a slow heart. As Brenno steers me through the crush, I whisper, half prayer, half vow, “You’ll remember me, Aldric. You have to.”
Somewhere deep in the thickened air, I swear something answers—soft as a thread drawn through silk. I will.