He didn’t say anything for a long time, but finally, he spoke. “Ever since I was a sprout, I’ve been a burden. First to my grand, then to the rest of Greenwood. I was a lackie who was only good for shoveling straw for the horses. But then everything changed for me. I was Historian Fray’s assistant. I’m the one who woke Queen Estelle. Now I’m a prince!” His breath hitched. In the moonlight, he looked vulnerable. Fragile.

“All I wanted,” Thorn whispered, and Claire couldn’t be sure if he was speaking to her or not, “was to prove to everyone that I could be a hero—even if I didn’t have magic. That they had misjudged me. That I … that I matter.”

In the last word, there was enough sorrow that Claire could feel its weight. Like the moon, it tugged on her own currents of emotion, stretching and pulling them into a different shape. She recognized the loneliness in Thorn’s voice. It had clung to her both in Windemere’s halls and in Stonehaven’s corridors. Claire looked at the pink marble in her palm. She had changed so much since she’d climbed up that chimney … Why couldn’t Thorn change, too?

Pulling her feet in closer, Claire first removed one boot and then the other. Then she took off the Hollow Pack and reached into its limitless belly. Wiggling her hand around, she felt what she thought was a squishy package of oatmeal mix and then the smooth, thin metal of the ReflecTent before her fingers finally brushed against something sticky. She grasped it tightly in her palm, a tiny grin playing on her face.

“Hey, Thorn,” she called softly over to where he still had his head buried in his knees. “What do you know about Spydens?”

Chapter Fourteen

CHAPTER

14

The next morning, Claire woke to a crinkling tap on the outside of the ReflecTent.

“Hey, are you awake?” Thorn called softly. Blearily, she opened her eyes to see a Thorn-shaped shadow outlined on her tent by the newly risen sun. The shadow raised a hand and tapped again. “Claire?”

“I’m awake,” Claire mumbled and, stifling a yawn, she pulled herself up. She had tried to stay awake to help Thorn, really she had, but after two nights of almost no sleep, the world had gone fuzzy around the edges. Thorn had been the one to pull the ReflecTent out of the pack and tell her to rest. Claire had been too groggy to argue.

Claire yawned again. “Everything all right?”

“It’s done,” Thorn said simply.