In the early hours of dawn, the trickle of patients finally slowed and stopped altogether. After Ranka finished wrapping the ankle of a florist who had toppled from a ladder, she remained on her knees, fingertips aching from handling dozens of rough-textured bandages.

Her stomach turned. What was she doing here, giving care to the very humans who would be all too happy to see her burned if they saw the nails under her gloves? How many of the people she’d treated tonight supported the Hands? How many more would?

Behind her, Lanna rose with a groan and stepped into one of the back rooms.

As soon as the door shut, Ranka turned to Aramis. They’d not spoken all night, save for hurried orders and directives while funneling patients back and forth, but now curiosity tugged at her. “Does she know…?”

“Yes.” Aramis laughed. “She figured it out the first day. No one else knows, but Lanna’s too smart for her own good.”

“Why not tell them? It’s not every day you get to meet a princess.”

Aramis wrung out one of the linens, twisting it until the water ran from pink to clear. “If I were here as Aramis Sunra, these walls would be packed with nobles preening for attention. The people who need care wouldn’t be able to make it through the door—and even if they did, no one would get treated. No one would say what they actually needed.” She squinted. “Galen can’t leave the palace. But when I’m here, I can be his eyes and ears and heart.”

Ranka’s hands slowed. It had to be a lie, right? Just another clever tactic of a calculating princess? Another deception from an enemy?

Except it felt genuine. And right now, Aramis felt like anything but her enemy.

The shadow of a smile touched Aramis’s lips. “It’s also not a terrible place to do research. And Percy hardly has the best bedside manner.”

Ranka hid a smile. That felt more like the princess she knew. If you were a sick witch, what better place to seek treatment than an underfunded clinic, where the healers would be too busy to notice the tint of someone’s nails or the way their body handled pain better than the average patient’s? “Have you found anything yet?”

“Not yet, but we will.” Aramis’s eyes glittered. “We have to.”

They were alone now, and the air felt fragile, as if anything more than a whisper would upend their peace. For a while they worked in silence, Ranka cleaning, Aramis resetting the clinic back to some shadow of normalcy before the next rush. The watery pink light of early dawn crept in under the door, casting the clinic’s gray walls into delicate blush. And slowly, softly, seabirds began to sing in the new day.

Aramis looked over at her. “Who taught you to heal?”