“Cass!” Princess Elena hissed, looking as if she would follow him.

She did not.

She stopped when the mare butted Prince Cassius’s outstretched hand and whinnied.

She then moved her beautiful head with clear intent to invite the prince to stroke her nose.

This, Cassius did.

Those of the crowd were stunned.

What was this marvel?

A male of the royal house of Airen at one with a unicorn?

Was all of this indication that magic would be back in their bleak realm?

“Bring him to me,” Cassius demanded, to who, the people didn’t know.

Until the mare lifted and shook her head, braying.

“Bring him to me,” Cassius repeated.

Another shake of her noble head before she blew out of her nostrils, jerked from him and trotted, rounding and herding the reluctant stallion toward the prince.

“Tch, tch, tch,” Cassius fussed. “Here now. Come here, boy.”

The stallion swung his head side to side and danced this way and that, trying to evade getting close to the prince, not as if he feared the man, as if he was ashamed, but his mare was always there to foil escape.

And finally, as the crowd looked on in amazement, Cassius caught the stallion’s velvet jaw in two hands.

“You came to Ellie and me to be safe, eh?” he asked the creature, moving his head side to side to catch the unicorn’s evasive gaze.

It was not lost on many that their prince referred to his intended as “Ellie.”

Many thought that was very sweet.

Some thought it nauseating.

“And now you are with us and you will be safe,” the prince promised. “For you are my Sky, and she is my Star, and the Sky King cannot do without either. Hmm?”

The stallion nickered.

“Yes, that’s right,” Cassius murmured.

The stallion nickered again, dipped his head and pawed at the cobbles with his hoof.

Cassius moved his hands from the unicorn’s jaw, toward the truncated horn at his head.

And when he did, Princess Elena sprang forward with great alarm, crying, “Cassius, don’t touch his—!”

But the Prince Regent touched the horn.

And the darkness went from the day, the air went stark white and the ground shook.

Triton

At the movement of the earth, Mars raced for his Silence.

And when he found her, she turned her silver gaze to him, and she was smiling.

Marian put her hand to the wall of their underground lair, looking up.

And she frowned.

The pirates ceased shouting at him at the summit table, and Aramus turned his head to look at his wife.

And he caught Ha-Lah grinning.

Serena lifted her head from the crumbling stoop as she felt it, her eyes watching the troll across from her blinking stupidly as he did.

“Sister,” she whispered.

And her heart grew light.

Even as her eyes filled with tears.

Jellan pressed his hands to his throat, closed his eyes, sensed the seismic shift of the veil.