“By foot, we should arrive at the castle a little after sundown. Less time if we can find a ride.” She nods and, without a word, walks past me. I quickly reach her side, and we walk in unison. My neck itches as the wool tunic from the cottage pricks at it, and I pray that no looming magic crawls within the stitches. I don’t want to carry an ounce of the Florian Wood with me.

“Look!” Idalia smiles and points. Ahead, horses graze in a small, fenced pasture. My heart aches. Did Braxton make it out safely? Can he track the paths as well as we did and exit the Wood? I pray Torrent finds him and leads him to safety, that they all make it to safety. The alternative…

No.

I shove down the dread and bury it deep. They’re all safe. They have to be. Torr and Lin alone could have finished off the wolf and Lorna…She’ll be fine, too. I can’t spend another second imagining otherwise because I know a second will be too long, and I’ll surely break.

Idalia sprints towards the pasture, waving wildly at a man standing by the gate. “Good sir,” she cries, and I see his eyes immediately light up, even from a distance. A feral, oddly dressed, yet outstandingly attractive woman is flailing her way toward him. Of course, he’s excited.

The tall, lanky male holds a lute but lowers it as Idalia draws near. He reaches out a hand. “Milady! Are you all right? You look like you’ve just escaped a dungeon!” His eyes move to me, and his dark brows furrow. He pulls Idalia behind his back and lifts a cautionary hand. “Is this man causing you distress? If the answer is yes, I’ll have to show him that a lute is a powerful weapon if swung hard enough!” He rears back his instrument and braces himself.

I laugh, and his brown eyes sizzle.

“I’ll have you know, to laugh at a musician is a dangerous gamble! We often have nothing to lose,” he says.

“No, no!” Idalia finally chimes in, moving around him to join me. “I’m with him!”

A gust of euphoria waves through me at her words, then Idalia continues. “I mean, I came here with him. I’m not with him, with him. We’re friends. Well, not even that, really. We’re together, but not together in that way.”

“We escaped the Florian Wood together,” I interject, crossing my arms. “Is what she’s trying to say.”

“Ah, I see,” the man says with a grin. “Survivors of The Wood, are you? That’s no easy feat! They say there’s a path that the Verdanians sometimes use, but even that’s perilous, no? Tell me, are you Verdanians?”

“I am Princess Idalia of Verdana,” Idalia announces, smoothing the loose fringe on the front of her dress.