“Just a little.” I smile at him.

“With any luck, you can sleep soon,” he says. “And lure Varia to Pala Orias.”

“If she isn’t on her way here already,” Yorl murmurs. “The Bone Tree having her cunning brain at its disposal is a terrifying thought.”

“‘Cunning’ coming from someone like you truly means something,” Lucien interjects. Yorl looks over at him with massive, terse green eyes.

“Don’t feign innocence, Your Highness. You d’Malvanes have cunning in excess. It’s how you’ve held on to power for all these generations.”

“So we did,” Lucien agrees softly. Past tense. The King and Queen are dead, for all we know. If Varia dies, that means he’s the last d’Malvane. “And for what purpose?” he continues. “To lose the faith of our people? To tax them into starvation? To decide only the nobility worthy of care and respect? We were a family of a thousand years who did nothing but rot from the inside, who drove our people to kill one another in fearful wars of religious difference.” His laugh is drill. “No—that won’t be our lasting legacy. I’ll see to it.”

“Lucien—” I start. He straightens, sword clinking at his hip.

“I’ll be a better king than any of them were—by being no king at all.”

His words strike hard in the vaulted ceiling, in the bones of the valkerax. My unheart swells with that sweet pride, and Malachite looks at him with nothing but admiration.

“I’ll help, Luc,” he says.

Lucien’s rigor softens, and he grins at his near-brother, all-friend. “Who else will motivate me with their constant harping?”

The stone slab doors slide open then, soundless save for the triple tapping of shoes and a cane. Fione walks to us slowly, gaze fixed to the ceiling and the valkerax there. Lucien’s the first to run up to her, Yorl’s tail swishing as I follow.

“So?” Yorl presses.

“Malachite’s sentence? Is he free? Did they agree to help us?” Lucien asks. Fione’s eyes move down to me, and then flicker away to Luc. I pray the prince didn’t catch it.

“Yes,” she says. “They’re sending two battalions to escort us to Pala Orias.”

“Just two?” Malachite grunts.

“It’s all they could spare,” she says.

“And Malachite’s life—”

“His outcast status will be revoked,” Fione cuts Lucien off. “On the condition we stop Varia.”