His wounds back then had been nothing like what he had suffered in Dahlgren. Healers had wrapped him from head to toe and he had lain unconscious for days. To her shock he had refused to see her upon awaking and left in the back of a wagon without saying goodbye. At Hilfred’s request, no one would tell her where he had gone. She could have pressed. She could have ordered the healers to talk. For months, she looked over her shoulder expecting to see him, waiting to hear the familiar clap of his sword against his thigh. She often wondered if she had done the right thing in letting him go. She sighed at yet another regret added to a pile that had been building over the past year.

Taking stock of the mess around her increased her melancholy. This is what came from refusing to have a handmaid along, but she could not imagine being cooped up in the carriage with anyone for so long. She picked up her dresses and laid them across the far seat. When she spied a document crushed into a ball and hanging in the folds of the far window curtain, her stomach churned with guilt. With a frown, she plucked the crumpled parchment and smoothed it out by pressing it in her lap.

It contained a list of kingdoms and provinces with a line slashed through each and the notation IMP scrawled beside them. That the Earl of Chadwick and King Ethelred were the first in line to kiss the empress’s ring was no surprise. But she shook her head in disbelief at the long list. The shift in power had occurred virtually overnight. One day nothing, the next—bang! There was a New Empire and the Avryn kingdoms of Warric, Ghent, Alburn, Maranon, Galeannon, and Rhenydd had all joined. They pressured the small holdouts, like Glouston, then invaded and swallowed them. She ran her finger over the line indicating Dunmore. His Highness King Roswort had graciously decided it was in his kingdom’s best interest to accept the imperial offer of extended landholdings in return for becoming part of the New Empire. Arista would not be surprised if Roswort had been promised Melengar as part of his payment. Of all the kingdoms of Avryn, only Melengar refused to join.

It all happened so fast.

A year ago, the New Empire was merely an idea. She had spent months as ambassador trying to strike alliances. Without support, without allies, Melengar could not hope to stand against the growing colossus.

How long do we have before the empire marches north, before—