“I’m being followed everywhere I go,” I muttered, kissing Pénélope’s shoulder as I fastened the last button on her dress before passing her the hooded cloak she wore to and from our sojourns. “It makes it hard to do anything without eyes watching me. Including spending time with you.” Then a flash of metal falling to her feet caught my attention, and I reached down to pick up a tiny steel knife. “What’s this for?”

Her jaw tightened as she took it back, careful to touch only the leather-wrapped handle. “It makes me feel better to have it around my father.”

I carried my fair share of weapons, and had a lifetime of training in how to use them. Most full-blooded trolls carried a steel blade or two – not because it was ever our first line of defense, but because they were the only effective weapons we had against the sluag. But Pénélope – for good reason – avoided steel at all costs.

“Pénélope…” I hesitated. “Unless you got lucky, a blade this small isn’t going to do more than anger your father. What’s more, he’s always shielded.”

“I know.” She tucked the knife into a hidden pocket in her cloak. “It isn’t for him. It’s for me.”

It took time for comprehension to dawn on me, and when it did, I reached forward to take the blade away from her. “No. Absolutely not.”

But she dodged out of reach, batting my hand away. “I don’t need your permission, Marc. I’ve spent my entire life being told what I can and can’t do by my father – I don’t need you attempting to do the same.”

“You can’t actually believe that I’m going to quietly accept that you’re carrying around a weapon on the chance you might need to take your own life,” I demanded, barely managing to curb the urge to take the blade back by whatever means necessary.

“Actually, I do,” she replied, walking over to the open window. “Hundreds, perhaps even thousands of lives, depend on the success of the sympathizer revolution, and despite your best intentions, I have enough knowledge within me to bring it all crashing down. If it comes to it, my life isn’t worth putting all those others in jeopardy.”

“It is to me.” I caught her hands, not wanting her to leave. Not wanting her to walk toward a situation where that little knife might come to use.

“I know.” She kissed my cheek. “But it’s not your choice, it’s mine. Now lower me down – I need to get home before Anaïs notices I’m gone.”

I did what she asked, but I found I couldn’t let it go. So, knowing that I might very well have cause to regret it, I dressed and made my way to the palace to find my uncle, the King.

“He’s walking in the gardens with the Queen, my lord,” Élise, one of my aunts’ half-blood servants, said.

Which could be better, I thought. Queen Matilde was kind, and my Aunt Sylvie was perhaps the only individual in Trollus willing to talk back to my uncle. Both of them might be willing to advocate on Pénélope’s behalf.