“Answer his question straight,” Malachite barks, raising his sword higher at me. Lucien exhales, his hand gently pressing Malachite’s blade lower.

“Put it down, Mal.”

“She could hurt you, Luc,” Malachite argues. “She’s fast, and I have to be faster—”

“Put it down,” Lucien quietly demands, his fingers clutching the sharp edge of the beneather’s blade with more insistence. I start at the rivulet of blood that seeps from between his long fingers. Why would he—?

“Your Highness—” I blurt. “You’re hurting yourself.”

Malachite’s irritated ruby eyes war with Lucien’s calm obsidian ones for a moment.

“You trust too easily,” Malachite finally mutters at him.

Lucien smiles wanly. “I know.”

It’s a joke between them, among the four of us. Even I know Lucien isn’t trusting in the slightest. Finally, the beneather drops his blade away from me but keeps it tight at his side, ready to spring into action. Lucien wipes his wound on his pants and looks to Fione, still aiming her crossbow at me.

“You, too, Archduchess,” he says. “Ease up.”

“No,” I start. “It’s smart to keep at least one weapon trained on a Heartless at all times. You never know when the monster will come out.”

The fear-etched lines in Fione’s face harden. Lucien’s composure weakens, his jaw going slack for one moment. He must be remembering the clearing, the sight of me, all fangs and claws and blood.

I smile at him. “So? What questions are burning up those precious mortal bodies of yours?” Lucien opens his mouth, but I hold up one finger to interrupt him. “Keep in mind that anything you ask me, any answer I give—all of it could be commanded out of me by Varia. What you say will be far from secret. And I’d hate for all your efforts to call me out here to go to waste.”

Lucien seems to think twice, then motions Fione forward. She doesn’t move, her cornflower blue eyes hard and on me over the sights of her crossbow.

“You’re Varia’s Heartless,” she says.

“Oh, c’mon.” I laugh. “We all know I am. Give me one of the harder questions. I can handle it.”

Fione’s frown only gets deeper. “You go to the South Gate and in that door. Varia’s told me you do it because you’re helping her train our soldiers on how to fight the Heartless. Is that true?”

I look up at Lucien, whose face is suddenly unreadable. Malachite is packed to the brim with equal parts suspicion and hair-threaded readiness.

I give another laugh, this one lighter. “You’re Vetrisian. You know a lie when you hear one. I’d say yes, but the three of you are smarter than that. Well, maybe not Malachite. People like him and me have to work to be smart. You two were born into it.”