Most of the guards were dead or gravely wounded. Baba Omly had rushed over in the night, along with a host of brown witches. Renwick had called upon his own brown witch healer and Remy to Fenrin to come to the Western Court and aid the recovery efforts. The brown witches continued to tend the wounded even as the others sat and ate.

Bri reached down and threaded her fingers through Lina’s as she laid her head on Lina’s shoulder. It felt wrong to rest after such a night. Baba Omly had gently but firmly shooed them away. Bodies were being wrapped and shrouds hung across the windows again; there’d been only the barest reprieve before the castle was plunged back into mourning.

They sat in silence, not a single word passing between them, until the stench of the drying blood on their clothes made them rise and go bathe. Bri wished the feeling wasn’t so familiar to her—the boneless shock of near death. They all drifted like ghosts through the palace, their minds still reliving the horrors of what had just happened as they bathed and changed their clothes. It felt like too common an action to Bri—washing, dressing, brushing her hair—after she’d just taken so many lives.

She was still washing blood from her skin when Talhan arrived at Lina’s chambers to bid them farewell.

“I wish you could stay for the funerals,” Bri said into her twin’s shoulder. “But I know you need to head south.”

Talhan looked at her, his cheeks dimpling as he nodded. They hadn’t spoken about what had transpired between him and Neelo when he chased after the Heir of Saxbridge the night of the ball . . . but Bri had her suspicions and she wasn’t going to push him.

“Who’d have thought.” He grinned, shaking his head. “If Mother had known, I think you’d have received a lot less of her energy.”

“We could have split her meddling between the two of us.” Bri chuckled, the smile dying on her face as she looked to the window covered in a black shroud.

“I’ll keep an eye out for Norwood,” Talhan said. “I’ll let you know if we catch sight of his fleet.”

“And Cole.” Bri frowned. “Even if he’s not directly serving Baba Monroe, he knows more than he’s telling us. Keep an eye out for him as well. His trail went into the foothills of the High Mountains, but who knows where he went from there.”

“Probably East to reunite with his grandmother.”

“Maybe.” Bri shifted, staring at the ceiling. “Maybe we should move the competition for the Eastern crown sooner.”

“Carys’s odds have just vastly improved with you in the West and me in the South,” Talhan said, adjusting the shoulder straps of his pack.

Bri narrowed her eyes at him. “Do you think you’ll do it? Marry Neelo?”