“You credit me with seasons of training, Elgart. I have done nothing of the kind. I was simply desperate. As we all were.”

Her comrades looked startled. Clearly, they doubted her. They did not have her control.

“Hells, Astride,” breathed Elgart. “Then you are even more remarkable than I supposed.”

He did not know another Magister who could match her force of will. Even Magister Pillion’s efforts in his garden were not so precise. Elgart’s own resolve did not equal hers. The Archpriest had overcome him with little more than a word and a touch.

But he saw at once that he had vexed her. With a tinge of asperity, she replied, “I did what I did to save myself, sir. I was only desperate.”

Elgart winced. Already, he had taken the wrong path toward her. Now she had withdrawn from him.

Before he could respond, Prince Jaspid’s shout carried across the camp. “Elgart, I need you! This limb must come off. There are too many wounded. I am not enough!”

Elgart had fought his way through more hells than the Prince. He had more experience tending men cut and bleeding, men mangled by sorcery. He recognized the edge in Jaspid’s voice.

Sighing, he forced himself to stand. Because he did not want to go, he risked saying, “I hope we will speak again, Astride.”

As he turned away, she said, “Tell me quickly. How is it that you do not shy away from Magisters? Everyone else does.”

A simple question. He had a simple answer. “Magister Pillion was my friend.”

Wondering where he stood with her, Elgart went to help the Prince.

Sometime during the night, King Bifalt awoke with Estie’s voice tolling in his ears. He wanted to shout at her, tell her that she had said enough. Long ago, he had assured her that she was free to make her own decisions. She had done so. She did not need to remind him that she was no longer his wife.

But when he tried to answer her, he could not make a sound. His mouth and throat felt like a fortnight in the desert. Hells, he was thirsty—

Where was he? He lay in a crypt of darkness. Instinctively, he tried to fling out his hands, block the blow that would finish him. One of his arms refused to move. It was bound somehow. The other struck a rough surface that shifted when he hit it.

Where was he?

Almost immediately, a wedge of unsteady yellow light opened beyond his feet. A figure stood in the gap, shutting out most of the light; but Bifalt saw enough to recognize that he was in a tent. He almost knew the silhouetted figure.

“Majesty?” asked Boy anxiously. “What do you need?”

Bifalt felt a moment of acute relief. A tent was not a crypt. It was not a prison. His bodyguards were with him.

Choking, he croaked, “Water.”