Jonas, the Liege who’d been waiting for us on the small airfield, is a tall man with warm, tawny skin and broad shoulders. I can’t see his full build, but I can see that he has a full head of thick, bright silver hair. It gleams in the darkness. He looks me over, his dark eyes assessing and shrewd. “She gonna make it?” Samira shakes her head as if to say not to mention it, but the Liege ignores her. “Need to know if she can run on her own if we get attacked on the road.”

“Bree’ll be fine,” Gill mutters, resentment sharp in her tired voice. “She needs food and rest. Time to get this serum out of her system.”

Samira rolls her eyes. “Jonas is one of the senior Lieges, Bree. He manages the safehouses in this region, makes sure they have supplies and remain secure in case we need them.”

“He’s off active duty and put out to pasture, you mean.” Jonas scoffs, but his eyes are fond when he looks at Samira.

Samira grins. “That too, old man.”

Jonas isn’t old at all, but by now I know that time works differently for Lieges. I’d thought earlier tonight that they’d gone prematurely gray, but it’s not premature at all. Not with the Abatement on every Legendborn’s horizon. On mine. I shove the thought away. I can’t think about the next twenty years. The next twenty-four hours is uncertain enough.

“Jonas taught me how to use a dagger, believe it or not,” Gill says with a smile. “And then I taught Nick.”

“Can we reminisce another time?” Sel asks dryly, knocking the hood of the car.

Jonas nods, turning to climb into the car without looking back. “Agreed.”

Samira watches us load in. Lyssa and Ophelia say their goodbyes and jog back to the plane. Their strides are so in sync, I wonder fleetingly if they are bonded Scion and Squire, aged out of their inheritances but still Oathed.

Gill looks us over—me, William, Sel, and Alice—and then returns her gaze to mine. “Rest overnight at the safehouse. We’ll send Jonas the details.”

With that, she and Samira stride back toward the plane, and we climb into the car and take off into the night.

The safehouse is a large home on a flat plot of land surrounded by a massive, dense forest. Sel was right. It’s the middle-of-nowhere Georgia.

When we arrive, the moon is high overhead, a bright white crescent casting the world in silver and gray.

The house is a little dusty, but there’s power and running water. The entryway is chilly, and Jonas walks to a small gas fireplace in the corner of the main living room, calling over his shoulder, “Two rooms. One on the left, one on the right. Bunk where you want. I’ll take the couch.”