“What about you?”

I gave him a gentle shove down the road. “I’m going after Tristan.”

The gate stood open, Guilluame’s corpse and one other lying next to it in a pool of blood. Though it had been hours since I’d left the king fighting the sluag, the streets were still empty, the citizens of Trollus bound by curfew.

Pulling up my hood, I kept to the shadows, avoiding the patrols of guards armed with sluag spears. The main gates to the palace were flanked by armed trolls, as were the side entrances. Sitting on my haunches next to one of the towering pillars of the stone tree, I contemplated how I might get inside. Then, from behind the palace, blossomed a familiar glow.

The glass gardens.

Only royals and members of the Artisan’s Guild were allowed to light the gardens. The guild members would be subject to curfew, and I sincerely doubted Thibault was in the mood for a whimsical stroll. Which left only one, or rather, two, other candidates. And they might just be willing to help me.

I entered through the hidden gate at the rear that Tristan had once shown me, the glass brilliant with the unearthly beauty of troll-light. I dreamed of them often, but even the limitless bounds of imagination had failed to capture their beauty. It was a place one needed to be in order to experience, and though I’d explored them countless times during my time in Trollus, I knew that if I spent the rest of my life walking through them, there would always a new detail to discover. The curve of an unknown flower. The vaulting height of a tree. A dewdrop balanced on the tip of a leaf.

As I searched the paths and courtyards for the Queen and the Duchesse, the waterfall roaring as it toppled from the heights, little memories layered themselves across the present. The places I had lingered, deep in thought. The songs that I had sung. The maze of hedgerows I had walked with Tristan shadowing my steps, both of us deeply aware of the other. Listening. Watching. Wanting. But neither of us daring to hope there might be a chance for us.

My chest ached as I remembered those moments. The enchantment of Trollus. Leaving had been like waking from a dream, and no matter how many nights I slept, I could never find my way back. And even if I did, it would never be the same. I stopped in my tracks, resting a hand against a tree trunk while I gave the profoundness of that loss its due.

Then I heard them.

The Queen and the Duchesse were arguing; more accurately, the Duchesse was lecturing while her sister protested with soft sounds of dismay.

I crept closer, so focused on the placement of my feet that I did not notice my sleeve catch on a bush.

Snap.

A twig, little more than a filament of glass, broke away. I reached for it, but my hand was too slow and it shattered against the ground.