The Medallion of the Kouri sat heavy in my cloak pocket, and I couldn’t decide which distressed me more—the fact that I’d taken it off Lia’s unconscious body earlier, or the fact that her mental state hadn’t changed much since then. She looked incredibly vulnerable lying here. I hated it.

Standing before the bed, I pulled the necklace out, taking care to keep the disk enclosed within the fabric scrap from Lia’s ruined nightgown.

One touch, and the Medallion would know I was not its true bearer—the Kouri heir. It would rebel, attacking much like a virus might lay siege to a body. Nausea. Headache. Fever. Endless other symptoms of discomfort intending to force the misguided wearer into removing what did not belong to them. And if they still refused? Sanity was the cost.

Who said the Medallion couldn’t be a thief, too?

So why did Lia have it? And why had it been covered in blood?

I’d found her crumpled at the bottom of the temple steps, half a mile from the palace. The blood covering her body was the first and only thing I saw. I didn’t know what’d happened to her, nor did I immediately care. My mind centered on a single task—getting her aid.

But in her flicker of awareness, she refused to let me bring her into the temple’s asylum.

“No,” she’d croaked in a weak voice. “Not Ellede.” Her consciousness had faded again soon after that last syllable.

So, here we were, in Vounor, miles away from Ellede.

And there she was, unconscious in a stranger’s bed.

I’d used soulfire to slow her bleeding as best as I could during our mad dash away from the city, but with so little soulfire in my veins, I was nowhere near strong enough.

Although my body was exhausted, sleep was the furthest thing from my mind. As I approached the chair beside the bed, it took more effort than necessary to sit, rather than collapse into it. A hiss of glorious relief escaped my mouth once the weight left my feet.

 I traced my thumb over the embossed lines of the covered Medallion’s face and recalled what I could about this evening’s events.

A banquet at the palace

.
A king’s toast, celebrating a foreign nation’s proposed alliance through uniting their Crown Prince with his eldest daughter.

A newly betrothed’s tight smile that didn’t reach her eyes.

I had heard the festivity’s music in my ears long after I’d departed to tend to the eastern shrines. Guilt rippled through me. Only a handful of hours separated from when Lia looked elegant in a deep green gown, when her red-tinted lips curled into a feline smile, when her mass of brunette hair fell in gentle waves over one shoulder, to…this. The filthy nightgown she’d arrived here in had been exchanged for one of the men’s spare shirt and linen pants. Her mouth was just as relaxed as the rest of her face, her body. Her hair remained in tangles, matted beneath her head.

I tucked the Medallion back into my pocket and reached for her hand.

“What happened to you?” I whispered, knowing she wouldn’t respond.

She hadn’t opened her eyes since the man—Maqui—seared her wound closed. The scent of burning flesh lingered in my nostrils, and my eyes watered at the thought of it.

Until tonight, I hadn’t realized just how much I appreciated Lia’s friendship over the years. No matter how forbidden it was. No matter how I was jeopardizing my very existence. Lia had always effortlessly masked our social calls as official Kouri-Daluyan business, and while it terrified me the first time she’d used that lie, I’d never been more grateful for it.

I had stood behind my father as he loosely tied a ribbon around the infant’s wrist. I’d never attended a naming ceremony before, or any ceremony for that matter, but finally, I was old enough. It was different from what I expected. So…public. Without moving my head, my eyes scanned the palace gardens. A sea of nobles stood before the gazebo, their eyes fixed as my father spoke a prayer and tied the ribbon to the new parents as well. The satin band formed a relaxed circle between the three, and he took the child into his arms.

“That baby’s uglier than the last one,” someone whispered in my ear.

I flinched, my mouth falling open. I looked to my side and recoiled again at the sight of the princess beside me. Remembering my lessons, I dropped my head into a bow.

“Your Highn—”

“Shh…” Princess Talia looped her arm around mine and pulled me several paces away from my father. The sudden movement almost made me stumble, but she kept me from drawing attention to myself. “Call me Lia,” the princess said, keeping her voice low. Her hand was still clutching my arm. “What’s your name?”

I peered at my father. He hadn’t yet noticed I was no longer standing with him, but it was only a matter of time. I was supposed to be watching him—learning the role I would one day be responsible for. Instead, I was huddled in the back of the gazebo with Princess Talia

.
An applause erupted as the name ‘Elek’ was chanted throughout the crowd. My father passed the newly named child back to Lady Gavras, and both parents turned to face the guests with the widest of smiles. The applause thundered again.

“Well?” Princess Talia said over the cheers.

My father slid his eyes toward the spot where I’d been standing. Nausea rushed through my stomach. I wanted to jerk my arm away from the princess and run back to my position, but Princess Talia held me in place, waiting for an answer.

“I’m sorry, Your Highness—I mean, Lia.” Calling her by such a familiar designation went against everything I was taught, and it felt purely wrong. Tasted like mud. “What did you say?”

The princess grinned. “For a priestess, you don’t listen all that well.”

“I’m not a priestess yet,” I said, cheeks warming. “I’m a novitiate.”

“What’s the difference?”

“I don’t have my pendant yet.”

“And you won’t get one if you don’t keep to your studies,” my father said as he approached. A tingling shame swept across my face. “That includes paying attention,” he added.

I tried to step away from the princess, but still, I was held captive.

“It’s not her fault, Brother Jeno.” Princess Talia held her chin high. “I finished my lessons early and wanted to observe the Dekate.” The princess glanced at me. “This kind novitiate was just answering all my questions about the ceremony.” When my father looked between us, still linked, the princess gave him an easygoing grin. “With your permission, Brother, could I steal her away for a little while so she can finish explaining the significance of the ribbon being tied to a left-handed wrist and not a right-handed one?”

While my tongue felt like a dried-up leaf, the princess’s lie had rolled off her tongue as though there was no other truth. I stared at my feet because, somehow, I’d been made complicit in the deception.

“Very well, Your Highness,” my father said, brow raised. He darted his eyes at me before presenting the princess with a bow and pivoting to rejoin the crowd.
“You lied…” I blinked slowly.

The princess giggled. “Not exactly. I did need to finish asking you stuff, though.” She tugged on my arm and led me away from the horde. “Starting with the most important question you still haven’t answered.”

“Oh.” A grin wriggled at my lips as I remembered, and I flashed a peek over my shoulder. With my father no longer nearby to nitpick my actions, my shoulders relaxed. I let Lia guide me. “My name is Ayven, but um, what else did you need to ask me?”

The smile that had spread across the princess’s face couldn’t be contained. “Nothing, really. I just needed a friend.”

She had to get better. Had to.

I gripped her hand tighter, biting the inside of my cheek to keep the tears at bay.

A soft knock at the door startled me. The long-haired man’s—Nik, I think Maqui had called him—entire presence filled the doorway. His kind, brown eyes darkened beneath furrowed brows as he peered at me. “Don’t want to rest?”

I shook my head, dragging my gaze back toward Lia. “I’m not tired.”

His footsteps drew nearer, each step echoing in the room. Halting at the foot of the bed, he grasped the wooden frame, leaning against it with a heavy sigh. His gaze shifted towards Lia, a silent inquiry in his eyes. “Any change?” he asked, his voice tinged with concern.

It’d only been an hour since they’d laid her down here. An hour of silence from a mouth that usually had so much to say.

I shook my head again, begrudgingly jostling free a teardrop. I swiped it away before it reached my jaw.

“She’ll recover. Just give it time.” Even in the candlelight’s dimness, his eyes were bright with hope. I’d seen that same look even as he’d pressed rag after rag against Lia’s wound.

“You’ve dealt with injuries like this before?” I’d tended to hundreds of wounds at the asylum, but none had been stomach stabbings. People who were gutted rarely lasted long enough to seek our sanctuary.

“Not personally, no.”

“Then how do you know?”

The corner of his mouth tilted upward. “Because she has you looking out for her.” As he crouched down and crossed his arms over the wooden footboard, the grin disappeared, yielding to weariness. “But don’t forget to take care of yourself, too. It’s been a long night, and it’ll feel even longer if you don’t get at least a bit of sleep.”

I drew in a breath, releasing it slowly. No matter how gentle his eyes were, or how certainty hung on his every word, he had no clue what the gods had in store for Lia. But he was right about one thing. It had been a long night already, and the pounding ache at the back of my head grew with each passing minute. I held his gaze for a moment longer before giving a hesitant nod.

Reluctantly, I released Lia’s hand and stood. He rose, too.

“Do you have stationery first, though?” I asked.

A pensive expression creased his features as he considered. “Hmm, I think he has some around here somewhere,” he mused, his lips quirking to the side. Crossing the room, he reached for a small wicker basket resting on a shelf and retrieved the needed items, extending them toward me. “But,” he continued, “the general post runs slowly here, though, so you’d have better luck with a private messenger to get a letter delivered quickly.”

I nodded graciously, although the information was useless.

“You can take my bed when you’re ready.”

As I prepared to voice my objection, he swiftly departed through the door, leaving my protest hanging in the air. His footsteps faded down the hallway, toward the front of the house. The soft murmurs of speech stirred the silence.

I set the supplies on the nearby dresser and uncorked the bottle of ink, filling the pen with a wavering hand. Black droplets fell onto the parchment as I wrestled with the weight of my words. How could I say what I needed to say without causing my father even more distress? Certainly, he’d already noticed my absence by now.

After a torturous moment of contemplation, I scrawled a brief note containing the scant information I possessed. I carried the note toward the bedroom door, pulling it shut just enough to conceal my presence behind it.

Closing my eyes, I summoned the soulfire coursing through my veins. A surge of warmth enveloped me as my eyes blazed white and my skin prickled with energy. Keeping the note’s destination in mind—the nightstand between mine and my father’s beds—I sent the note on its way, the parchment igniting to nothingness in my hands.