“If we go down this road, there’s no coming back,” he said, skulking toward her. “I can’t just let you leave here with what you know. You do understand that, don’t you?”

His threat rode the back of a strange wind that gathered in her ears. Her skin warmed and her limbs seemed to float. She was losing focus, losing all sense, and Hesperus was still coming toward her.

“Stop,” she said, voice alarmingly weak.

His laugh seemed to come from very far away. “Oh, it’s far too late for that.”

Her vision narrowed to a point on his black coat, and then there was nothing but comfortable, smothering blackness.

She opened her eyes to find the face of Hesperus Shreeves hovering just above her own, his brows knit firmly together.

Her body felt light and filled with fluttering birds. Her ears rang with a hollow whistle, and slowly she came to understand that Hesperus’s mouth was moving.

“I can’t hear you,” Caledonia said, or at least, she thought she said it out loud. Even her words felt different.

Hesperus frowned again, then he gently shifted her to the ground—which was the moment she realized she’d been cradled in his arms—and left. He returned a moment later with a canteen and a sack of dried, salted meat. Her mouth watered hotly, and she consumed the first strip of meat before she registered its flavor.

“Slowly,” Hesperus chided, holding the sack away when she reached immediately for another. Instead, he offered the water, waiting until she’d had several swallows before allowing her another piece of meat. “I take it water isn’t the only thing your crew needs. I should have known. You’re as thin as two threads spun together.”

Caledonia let him talk, choosing to focus on the meat. Now that she’d had a taste, her body was ravenous. If she could have chewed any faster, she would have.

Hesperus was shaking his head. “Good thing you waited until we stopped to faint. That, at least, shows some reason. Why didn’t you ask—?” He stopped himself, knowing the answer to his own question. She didn’t ask for food because she had nothing to offer in trade for it. The Sly King of Cloudbreak didn’t trade something for nothing.

When the meat was gone, she reached for the water, draining the canteen in one long pull. Her body was beginning to feel cohesive and less like it was filled with a flock of fluttering birds all trying to move in opposing directions. The ringing in her ears receded like the tide. She was still hungry, but the desperate vibration in her blood was gone.

“Thank you,” she said.

Hesperus grimaced. “I should start a tally: all the ways Caledonia Styx owes me.”

“If you don’t intend to let me leave, I’m sure you’ll find a way for me to pay you back.”