My smile breaks in two. I know what I have to do now. No—I’ve always known, since that night at the Hunt, when my body reacted before I did. Something in me has always known.

“What makes us human is a feeling,” I start. “A feeling I get when I’m with you.”

Lucien’s eyes widen and then catch fire.

“If,” the old sage man croaks, “I may interject.”

Grateful for the spotlight off me, wanting Lucien’s burning eyes off me, I wave my hand at him. “Please.”

“There are a great many polymaths here in Breych. They study night and day the secrets of life, of nature, of the sky and the void beyond it.”

“And?” Lucien impatiently leads. Our proper prince, interrupting his elders? Since when?

“Recently, a very interesting theory has been put forth by Miralin’s sect, hypothesizing that some kind of energy is given off upon death. Mercurial energy, kinetic energy, heat energy—they aren’t quite sure what it is. But it seems to be there, for all species, across all ages. Perhaps—” He pauses, looking up at me. “Perhaps this is what you would call the ‘soul.’ Perhaps that is what makes us human. No…” He glances at Malachite thoughtfully and corrects himself. “Perhaps this is what makes us exist, here, in this moment on Arathess, feeling and thinking both sweet and terrible things.”

For a moment, nobody speaks. It’s a big thing, too big to shoulder. We share it all, in this room, the weight of it near-crushing on its own and only manageable together in silence. Until Malachite gives off a snort—the pleased kind. Lucien won’t stop staring at me. And I at him.

“Forgive me.” The sage taps his cane on the ground. “In my old age, I’ve become the rambling sort. Let us adjourn the meeting for now, Your Highness. We can resume in the morning when you’ve had rest.”

“Thank you, sir,” Lucien says, never once looking away from my face. “Until then, the way guide you.”

“And you as well.” The old sage nods with a wry grin.

Time behaves badly, again and again. Lucien’s steps over to me are so slow, so stretched out, and then the heat of his hand on mine is fast and all at once, and I’m walking, no—running, both of us running out the door and the tower’s main room and past the snow and ice and onto an empty bridge where no one walks, no one looks, and then warmth, all of it. Warmth blazing against the freezing cold, on one side of my face, around my waist, against my chest and lips.