“Rise, Clio, rise,” the king said.

Standing again, she straightened the short, fluttering skirt she wore and wished she’d chosen something more formal. The king, in comparison, looked like … well, like royalty. He was lean and limber like most nymphs, with age lines creasing his face and long silvery hair braided down his back. His garments were simple but very fine—a sleeveless tunic with silver embroidery and sapphires beading the collar and hem, fitted trousers of woven fabric in muted blue, and soft boots.

Behind him a dozen advisors and bodyguards crowded in, but he waved them away as he came into the room.

“Your Majesty,” she greeted him.

“Your arrival is unexpected, my dear,” he told her, throwing quick gestures at her escort. The daemons exited the room, with the nymph who still held her tracking spell lingering just outside the threshold.

She tensed at the ambivalent welcome. “I couldn’t send advance word of my return, but …”

“Well, we’re relieved to have you back. You’ve been missed.”

“M-missed?” she stammered. Someone had missed her? Really? “I’m here because of something urgent. Is Bastian coming?”

“A messenger has fetched him.” Rouvin folded his arms and surveyed her with austere blue eyes the color of a winter sky. “What is the issue?”

“I—I’d like to discuss it with Bastian here. I’m assuming he’s kept you up to date on my … activities?”

“Generally he does, yes.”

She bit her lip. Had Bastian told his father about the spell Eryx had stolen from Chrysalis? Maybe he’d wanted to get it working first.

“You look exhausted, Clio,” Rouvin said before she could think of what to ask him next. “Sit down, child, and I’ll have someone bring water while we wait for my laggard son.”

As he snapped his fingers at an attendant waiting outside the room, she sank onto the bench again. Her hands were shaking and she twisted them together in her lap.

Her father stood beside her, as unreachable and impersonal as ever. She’d never been able to connect with him, never developed any camaraderie or even managed a comfortable conversation. In fact, she wasn’t sure she’d ever had a conversation with him without Bastian present.

The king cleared his throat, a sound that suggested he felt the awkwardness as much as she did. “Petrina will be pleased to have you back.”

“She will?” Clio mumbled.

“She was hurt that you didn’t say goodbye before you left.” A note of reprimand touched his voice. “You do plan to stay this time, don’t you?”

Her head snapped up. “Stay?”

“Petrina felt your absence keenly. Not that she would admit it, of course; she takes after her mother that way.”

Clio stared at him, struggling to read his regal features. “You want me to stay?”

“I never wanted you to leave.”

Her hands clenched and tears spilled down her cheeks. “I—I don’t know what to say. Thank you.”

His brow furrowed as though he didn’t understand her reaction, but he nodded, politely turning toward the fountain while she struggled with her emotions.

She quickly wiped her eyes. “I’m so glad to be back. I never wanted to leave.”

The king glanced at her, his frown deepening. “Then why did you go?”

“I … I had to.”

“So Bastian said,” the king grunted. “I still think we could have found a less drastic solution where you would have been more comfortable.”

A strange pressure closed over her chest like a cold clamp forming around her heart. The king hadn’t wanted to send her to Earth? Had that been Bastian’s idea?

“It was safer that way,” she whispered.

“Safer?” Stern disapproval hardened his tone. “In what way has your safety been threatened within these walls?”

She shrank in her seat. “It hasn’t yet, but the risk of—”

Bracing a hand on the back of the bench, he leaned closer and lowered his voice. “Though the only role I can fulfill in your life is that of your king, I have and will continue to be your guardian, as I am to every member of this household. Here, you are safer than in any Earth city.”

Her mouth opened and closed, but no sound came out. Never before had the king spoken to her like that. Never had he even suggested he cared about her in the slightest.

“You—you are King Rouvin, aren’t you?” she blurted.

His eyes widened and he straightened with a bemused expression. “I assure you I am, though with the look you are giving me, I wonder if I should check my reflection.”

“I just—I mean—” Her cheeks heated. “I didn’t think my leaving would bother you.”

“How would you know my thoughts when you never gave me a chance to dissuade you?” He shook his head. “Fleeing in the dead of night without the slightest farewell wasn’t helpful in that regard.”

She tilted her head as though rattling the words in her skull might make their meaning clearer.

“Petrina was crushed,” Rouvin added. “You may have some work ahead of you to win her trust again. She felt abandoned.”

“I didn’t run away,” Clio protested, finding her voice. “I had to leave. To protect you.”

“To protect me? Whatever from, child?”

“From … from …” Her brain fizzled, thoughts scattering. “I had to leave because of the Ra threat.”

“The Ra threat?” The creases in his forehead deepened. “Tensions are higher than usual with the upcoming renewal of our trade agreement, but I would hardly describe it as a threat.”

“Trade agreement?” she whispered.

“Irida and the Ras have a long-standing agreement that’s renegotiated every decade. The politics are complicated and, yes, there are tensions and a certain amount of posturing involved in the negotiations, but I’ve successfully renewed the agreement every ten years since I took the throne.”

“But what about … what about the threat of invasion? The possibility of war?”

“Invasion? War? Clio, unless you know something I do not, I assure you we are at no risk of war with any territory.” He stepped closer and crouched to peer into her face. “You’re white as a snow lily. What is going on?”

“Ra wants to invade Irida,” she said blankly. “They’ve been pushing our borders for over a year. They’ve been commissioning special magic and preparing for war. You’ve been avoiding confrontation but you know that a conflict is coming.”

“What are you talking about, Clio?”

The invisible bands around her chest tightened. “Their spies are looking for ways to undermine you. I had to leave the Overworld and go where they could never find me.”

Rouvin stared at her, then gently grasped her hands. His skin felt fiery hot against her icy fingers.

“Take a deep breath, child. Inhale. Exhale. Good.” He squeezed her hands. “Why didn’t you tell Bastian about your fears?”

“Wh-what?”

“He tracked you down after you left, yes? He’s been checking on you for two years now, but you never told him your real reason for leaving?”

Her brain wasn’t working. Why didn’t his words make sense? “My real … reason?”

“He never mentioned your fear of spies. All I knew was you’d decided you needed time and space. I had assumed, or perhaps Bastian implied, that I … bore some of the responsibility for driving you away.”

She stared at her father, deafened by the sound of crashing stones in her head—the roar of her entire world falling apart around her.

“Bastian told you I ran away?” The words caught in her throat, and she had to choke them out. “He told you I wanted to leave Irida?”

Rouvin nodded cautiously.

“There is no threat from Ra? There are no spies? There isn’t an impending war?”

“Not at all. Child, where did you get such an idea?”

She couldn’t breathe at all. “Bastian.”

“What?”

“Bastian told me about the increasing threat. He talked about it for over six months before he asked me to leave Irida for the family’s safety.”

“He asked you to leave?”

She barely heard him, her eyes wide. Rouvin’s hands were her only anchor in the storm of realizations. “Everything I know about Ra came from him. No one else ever mentioned it, but he said it was confidential information, only discussed by the royal council. And he said—he said not to mention it to you because you were already stressed about it.”

A hundred memories flashed through her mind. “On Earth, all Kassia and I knew was what he told us. Eryx never contradicted anything he said. Even though … but why did he have me spy on Ra spell commissions?”

“Spy on Ra?” Rouvin squeezed her hands again. “Clio, breathe. Breathe, child. Come now.”

She realized she was hyperventilating. “There is a Ra threat,” she gasped. “There has to be. Otherwise—otherwise—”

“Otherwise my son has been lying to you for well over two years?” the king finished for her, his voice quiet. “And lying to me.” He released her hands and rose. Turning, he strode from the room, his voice ringing out. “Bastian!”

Clio scrambled to her feet and raced after him. He was marching across the reception hall, his advisors clamoring around him.

“Find the prince!” Rouvin barked. “Immediately! I don’t care what you interrupt. Drag him here naked if you must.”

Clio hunched her shoulders, aware of the confused, critical stares snapping over her. “Your Majesty, what …”

“We will learn the reason for my son’s deceptions shortly, Clio,” he assured her, grim anger vibrating in his voice. “I am certain he has a reason.”

She didn’t understand the way he growled that last word. A reason. Could Bastian have a reason for his cruel deceptions? Was there an explanation that could make everything right again? He must have a reason, one so crucial and profound she and the king would forgive him—protecting her, protecting his father and his family, protecting his kingdom.

She and the king, surrounded by advisors, waited in the center of the grand hall. No one said a word; the king’s anger held them all in silence.

A door slammed and running footsteps pattered across the hall. A nymph guard raced to the king and dropped to one knee.

“Your Majesty,” the guard panted. “Prince Bastian’s suites are empty. He was last seen an hour ago when a messenger informed him of Lady Clio’s arrival.”

“Where has he gone?” King Rouvin demanded. “He’s here somewhere. Bring him to me.”

“Your Majesty, he appears to …” The nymph cleared his throat. “He appears to have left the palace … covertly.”

The pounding silence sucked all the air out of the hall.

“Find him.” At those two quietly spoken words, every daemon in the hall leaped into action.

Clio shivered where she stood, arms wrapped around herself. Bastian had received a message that she was here—that she was alive after being taken prisoner in Chrysalis—and he had left the palace? Why?

“Huh?” The muttered exclamation came from behind her. “What—”

Clio turned as the nymph guard dug in his pocket, his brow furrowed in confusion. He lifted something between two fingers: a green gem pulsing with soft golden light.

Lyre’s tracking spell.

It was active? He had triggered the twin spell? But he wasn’t supposed to use it until nightfall.

Sickening dread swept through her and she snatched the gem from the guard’s hand. As soon as she touched the cool stone, sensation flooded her mind—a pulse calling her forward. The signal beat like a drum, coming from a point north-northeast of her.

A point much farther from the garden where she had left Lyre.

“How long?” she demanded, clutching the gem. “How long ago did it activate?”

“I—I don’t know,” the guard stammered, caught off guard by her urgent intensity. “I was paying attention to—”

He broke off and they both looked at the gem in her hand. With a stuttering flash, the light blinked out and the pulse in her head vanished.

The tracking spell had gone silent.