I want to get mad at this invasion of privacy, but I can’t. My past is the one thing I don’t mind him seeing, the one thing I never told him properly. Maybe it’s better he saw it through Nightsinger—more accurate. More real. More true to why and how I came to Vetris to steal his heart.

“It was…it was dark,” I start. “And lonely. But not always. Isn’t that how everything is, though? How life is?”

“No,” he says. “I think you had it differently than most. And harder than most.”

I nudge an elbow in his ribs lightly. “So did you.”

“I didn’t ever lose my heart,” he says. “Or watch my parents get killed. Or get killed myself. Or lose all those memories.”

His insistence hits like a bell, echoing in my empty ribs. I want to argue, to insist he had it worse, but there’s no use in comparing things, is there? It’s all right to say I had it hard. It’s all right to say I suffered and not put someone else before that. My pain is my pain, and it feels good—more than good—to have someone recognize it. To have him recognize it. My face crumbles with it all, and I lean into his shoulder as we walk, the piercingly blue sky surrounding us. Malachite stops groaning so much behind us, as if picking up on the feeling.

“I’m sorry,” Lucien says. “That I was so hard on you—so bitter—for wanting your heart back. If I had known what you’d been through up until that point—”

“It’s okay,” I say, half muffled by his shoulder. “You didn’t know. But now you do.”

“Now I do,” he agrees softly, wiping the sudden tear off my cheek with his working hand.

…

When we all set foot on the mainland, the cloudbridge instantly vanishes, blown away by the wind until there are nothing but remnant wisps of structure left hanging in the sky. Y’shennria and the two witches separate from us, but not before Y’shennria gives me a perfect curtsy.

“You must come to my apartments for dinner, Zera. Maeve is making a venison roast, and Reginall has been polishing the silverware idly for many a day.”

My chest inflates. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“You are invited too, Your Highness. And Your Grace. ”

“I would be honored,” Lucien agrees, and Fione nods.

“Then…” Y’shennria curtsies again, and I curtsy deeper back, our eyes meeting as we come up and the smallest smirk on her face obvious. “Try not to get into too much trouble.”

“No guarantee!” I laugh, and as she walks away I’m struck by how glad my unheart is to know she’s safe, and here, and that I’ll eat dinner with her again. Small things. Important things. Direly important things, in the middle of a war.