“Burn steady and burn true.”

“Think,” he whispered, “of the ones you love.”

“Burn clean and burn bright.”

The ones I love.

Ludivine. Tal.

Audric.

Fresh warmth touched her fingers, her toes.

From overhead came Atheria’s piercing cry—part horse, part hawk. A distracted part of Rielle’s mind recalled the discarded firebird cloak. Her vision flooded with a thousand shades of summer.

“Burn steady,” she whispered.

“And burn true,” Tal finished, his voice a mere thread.

“Burn clean.” She opened her eyes to a room of soft gold. Gold fire, gold ashes, golden shimmering Tal. “And burn bright.”

She blinked. She inhaled.

The gold shifted, gathering in twisting knots that hovered, waiting.

Rielle breathed out. Hot points of energy surged away from her fingertips, like needles stabbing their way out of her skin. The gold flooding the room careened away in spinning whorls of light.

All at once, the heat crowding her vanished.

She blinked, gulped down a breath as if surfacing from water.

The world returned to her, dull and ordinary.

Except for the thousands of feathers floating down from the rafters, gusting along the walls, coating the ruined floor. Everywhere that flames had been, now there danced among the diminishing curls of smoke long needlepoint feathers of tangerine and gold, violet and vermilion. Firebird colors.

“Rielle…” Tal swept his arm across the floor. Feathers flew up at his touch before drifting back down to rest lightly among the piles of simmering embers.

He looked up at her, wonder turning his face soft. “How did you do this?”

She retrieved a feather of a particularly brilliant red and watched with a thrill of delight as the fine downy barbs flickered at her touch.

“I don’t know,” she whispered, caught between exhaustion and the most perfect joy she had ever felt. “I think—”

But the words died on her lips. For at that moment, a familiar touch scraped down her spine.

Corien? She looked through the house, her grip tightening on Tal. Are you there?

Silence was his answer. But she was not fooled. She sensed his nearness like a familiar shape in the dark.

Distant horns blasted—staccato, frantic. Warnings. With the flames gone, Rielle could hear the crowd’s terrified screams.

Oh, God.

“What is it?” Tal searched her face. “Rielle, say something.”

And thus, Corien murmured, we begin.

Rielle touched her mouth, chasing the sensation of lips brushing against her own.

With a small smile, she whispered, “He’s here.”

46

   Eliana

“Dearest brothers and sisters, please do not grieve my absence. Know that I was of sound mind when I left for Ventera. As the youngest of five, I have often felt dim in the shadow of your brilliant light. Now, it is my turn to shine. In the belly of the beast, I will serve Red Crown’s cause of justice and freedom and strive to earn your admiration. May the Queen’s light guide us all home.”

—Letter from Princess Navana Amaruk of Astavar to her siblings

December 13, Year 1014 of the Third Age

They moved through the cold forest for hours—all through the night and into the next day.

The ground became rockier the farther north they went, soft earth giving way to pale sand. The trees were strange here, short and spindly, with brittle leaves that hissed spitefully in the wind. Long, misshapen barrows crowned with crumbling stones snaked through the forest like veins.

“These trees reek of death,” Hob whispered as they crouched near one such mound. “I’ll be glad to leave them behind.”

Eliana agreed—but where to go after this? Simon’s contact, their path across the Narrow Sea, was now lost to them.

They stopped at last to rest, huddling beneath a moss-draped overhang on the side of a slight hill. Navi had lost much of her color, her skin slick with sweat. They settled her on the ground, piled leaves atop her shivering body.

She raised one feeble hand. “Eliana?”

Eliana took it, settled beside her. “I’m here. You’re all right. We’re going to be fine now.”

Navi smiled weakly. “Don’t lie to me.”

“Fine. We’re quite likely all doomed.”

“That’s better.”

Remy wedged himself against Eliana’s other side, his arms crossed over his chest. He had spoken not a word since leaving Simon behind.

Eliana glanced at Hob. “Do you know who Simon could have been talking to? The contact he went to meet.”

Hob pulled a few wrapped pieces of food from his pockets—dried meat, hard rolls, all he’d managed to grab before fleeing the fire—and passed them around. “No. According to Simon, I am not high-ranked enough an ally to be privy to such information.”

“There must be smugglers that cross the Narrow Sea.”

“A few. But we haven’t the money for that.” Hob yanked a berry off a nearby bush, chewed it, spat it out. “Rotberries. This forest is useless.”

“Can we go back to Rinthos? Ask Camille for help?”

“I don’t think Navi would survive the trip. If we can get to the port of Skoszia without someone seeing us and killing us on the spot, I can send a message to Camille from a place there, but it will take time.”

“That’s time we don’t have.”

“We left him.” Remy shifted to look up at Eliana. “We left him to die with Rahzavel.”

“Yes, we did,” said Eliana, refusing to meet his eyes. “He would have wanted us to.”

“That doesn’t make it right.”

“Hey, you know what?” She slid her arm around Remy’s shoulders. “I have something to tell you. I wish I could show you, but I can’t. You too, Hob.”

Hob raised an eyebrow. “Don’t talk to me like I’m a child.”

“I met a friend,” Eliana said, “in the laboratories where they held me and Navi. Her name is Zahra, and…she’s here with us. Right now.”

Some of the sadness left Remy’s face. “Really? How? Where?”

Hob was staring at her. “Have you lost your mind?”