The soldier used a length of chain attached to the manacles to pull her toward the door. She stumbled, her feet dragging clumsily against the stone. The man was impatient as she regained her balance, but made no move to touch her again, for which she was grateful. She shuffled behind him as they stepped out of the cell, and her heart pumped with manic hope as her bare feet cleared the threshold. “Where are you taking me?”

“Wherever Prince Cassius wants you.”

They shuffled past a few more dark stone cells. She tried to discern if there was anyone else being held down here with her, but if there were other prisoners she saw no trace of them. Nor had she ever heard anyone in the dungeons but the guards who brought her food on occasion.

She stared at the back of the guard’s head and wondered at how callous human hearts could be. How easy it was for a man just to avert his eyes in the face of someone else’s pain or fear. What had the prince told everyone about her? Did they all truly believe her to be the criminal mastermind behind the princess’s kidnapping? Her best friend? Or did it matter to them if she was guilty or innocent? She was not a Stormling, so perhaps in their eyes she had little worth at all.

They came to a set of stairs, and Nova was surprised to find that she was beyond exhausted already. Her legs quaked with weakness as she took the first step.

The soldier jerked on her chains. “Come on. It will be nightfall again before we get there if you move this slow.”

She felt some of her fire leech from her skin into the manacles, and quickly pulled it back. As satisfying as it might be to see him scalded by the chain he held, it was too reckless. There was too much she didn’t know. Even if she incapacitated this guard, she had no idea what waited on the floors above, or if she could even reach them on her own.

She might only get one chance to escape. And she knew timing would be everything.

By the time the soldier jerked her up the last step to the landing, she was near tears from fatigue, and the weakness made her heart swell with fury. At the prince, at this world, at herself. And yes, at Aurora too.

They entered the main floor of the palace, and the familiar sounds of her former workplace and home slowly came back to her. They were near the entrance to the kitchens, and she could hear the clang of pots and the murmur of voices. The smell of fresh baked bread made her stomach clench painfully. When had she last eaten more than a few scraps? She could not recall.