IT TAKES BLAISE LONGER THAN I expect to find his way to me, though my sense of time is heavily skewed. I can’t honestly say whether moments are passing or hours. For all I know, he isn’t coming at all. I have to believe that Heron escaped after he couldn’t get Elpis out of the palace; otherwise, the Kaiser would have killed him in front of me as well. It’s a small comfort, but it’s a comfort all the same.
He and Artemisia might be far away by now. I hope they are. But I know Blaise well enough to know that he would have come back, and it wouldn’t have taken long for him to have gotten word of the Kaiser’s announcement.
Still, it feels like half an eternity before I hear footsteps again, heavier this time. He doesn’t risk carrying a candle with him, so I don’t see his face until it’s mere inches from mine, separated only by the bars of the cell.
He looks more haggard than usual. There are dark circles beneath his eyes, his jaw is covered in stubble, and his clothes are dirty and damp.
“You took your time,” I say, getting to my feet.
“I had to wait for a change in the guard.” He rakes a hand through his messy hair, eyes roving anxiously. “There are two of them posted at the entrance to the cells. We have twenty minutes before they’ll do rounds.”
“You used the entrance to the cells when there’s a perfectly good tunnel hidden down here?”
He shakes his head. “That’s the escape route—no need to risk exposing it before then. I was going to come earlier, but your friend messed up that plan.”
I don’t have to ask who he’s talking about. “She’s not my friend,” I tell him. It isn’t the first time I’ve said that to him, but it’s the first time the words have been true.
“What happened?” he asks. His attention is on my dress, which is now more red than violet.
“I’m fine,” I tell him, but he doesn’t believe me. I can’t meet his eyes when I tell him about Elpis.
I wait for the blame to come. He didn’t want me to give her that responsibility and I insisted. Her blood is on my hands and he has every right to remind me of that. I deserve to hear it, though it might break me.
He’s quiet for a moment, and though I still can’t meet his gaze, I feel him looking at me. He reaches a hand between the bars to take mine. It’s a comfort I don’t deserve.
“You are not allowed to fall apart, Theo,” he tells me. “Not now. Or else she died for nothing.”
I press my lips together to keep my protest down. I know he’s right, but I don’t want him to be. I want to wrap my guilt around me like a cloak, but that doesn’t help anyone but me. It certainly doesn’t help Elpis.
“Her family?” I say after a moment. To my relief, I manage to sound like a queen again instead of the mess of a girl I know I really am.
“Safe. Already with Dragonsbane,” he says.
“And Artemisia and Heron?”
“They’re staying nearby, waiting for a plan.”
“Do you have one?” I ask.
He lifts a shoulder in a shrug. “I can get you out of here easily enough,” he says, placing his hands on the bars. With Glaidi’s strength on his side, how easy will it be for him to pry them apart? The muscles of his arms flex and the steel begins to arc without him shedding a bead of sweat. “The tunnel out of the dungeons leads to the coves on the western shore.”
I turn the idea over in my mind. It’s simple—an escape, perfectly easy with no risk. And yet…
“Something’s bothering you about that plan,” he says, reading my expression. He takes his hands away from the bars. “What?”
I sigh and rest my head against the bars. “It isn’t enough. We were always to strike and run, but we aren’t striking,” I say.
“We killed the Theyn,” he points out.
I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter. The Kaiser isn’t weakened and there isn’t enough for the Kalovaxians to turn against him. And after Elpis…”
“There will be time to avenge Elpis—all the time in the world once you’re safe. But today isn’t that day.”
I don’t want to admit that he’s right. There is nothing to be gained by rushing things, but when will we have a chance to get close enough to strike the Kaiser again? I’ve seen the Kaiser’s war strategy enough to know that it involves hiding behind others more than fighting himself. This very well might be our only chance to weaken him, and I don’t want to waste it.
“Maybe it is,” I say to him as a plan begins to form in my mind.
“Theo.” Blaise says my name like a warning. “You tend to get that look on your face before you do something reckless.”
I can’t help but laugh.
“That might be true, but in your experience, Blaise, is there ever anything you can do to stop me?” His silence is all the answer I need. “Good. Because we’re pressed for time, so let’s skip the part where you tell me how reckless it is and list all the dozens of things that can go wrong, and instead just agree to do what I need you to do.”
Blaise’s mouth twitches, but whether it’s with amusement or frustration, I can’t tell. I suspect it’s a bit of both.
“All right, Your Highness. What do you need me to do?”
“For starters, you can fix these bars,” I say. “I’m not leaving just yet.”