Aurora was not sure how long she had been watching the ecosystem below her, studying the way it worked and thrived, before a tall form cut off her view. “What are you doing?” Kiran muttered, crowding her under his arm and shuffling them both back toward Zephyr’s office door. Before Aurora could argue, he had her through the door and shut away again. “You know you cannot be out there. If you are seen, you could be in tremendous danger. I told you that the patrols have been dramatically increased since the palace breach. All it takes is one person to recognize you.”

Aurora sighed, trudging through the office and into the bedroom next door. “I cannot stay in here forever. I need to do something.”

“Try resting.”

She snapped her head around to glare at him. “I am rested.”

Kiran held his hands up.

“What about a book?”

“I am tired of reading.”

Kiran raised an eyebrow. “You? Tired of reading? Are you ill?”

“No, but it does not help my mood when the only book in my possession is about a royal from a city that fell to vicious storms, especially when he at least got to do something. Finneus Wolfram braved an ocean looking for safety. I am braving a bedroom, while those women out there, complete strangers, mind you, risk themselves to gain information for us. I could be doing that just as easily.”

Kiran balked. “That’s ludicrous. There are some high-level people out there, from both the Locke and Pavan command hierarchy. They have most certainly seen you before.”

“I can wear a disguise. Those men are clueless. I watched them. They do not really see those women. They see what they want to see. And unlike the women working down there, I know what to listen for, and I will know whose conversations are worth my time.”

Kiran opened his mouth, his brows already set in a familiar straight line, and Aurora continued, “And don’t you dare forbid it. As if you have any right to rule over me because you are male, and I am not. If I am to rule a kingdom, surely that begins with the right to rule myself at the very least.”

Aurora stared at him, her chin tilted up slightly, and for a few long moments he said nothing. He just looked at her with the most confusing mix of anguish and frustration and something that might have been pride. Then he inclined his chin slightly and said, “You will have to convince Zephyr, but I am sure you will. You are remarkable in that way.”

A raspy voice broke in from the other side of the room. “She really is, isn’t she?”