It’s unfortunate, Raisa thought, shivering, when so many people are trying to kill you that you can’t sort them out.

Byrne lifted Ghost’s saddle and positioned it atop the tall horse. “If you would like to go fetch your belongings, I’ll finish him up.”

Raisa was familiar enough with Byrne avoidance tactics to know when she was being played. “Corporal Byrne taught me to take care of my own horse,” she said, ducking underneath to buckle the cinch strap. “Who else knows that you were coming after me?”

Byrne thought a moment. “Your father,” he said. “And Amon.” He bit down on the last word as if he regretted saying it.

Raisa stood on tiptoes so she could look over Ghost’s back. “Did Amon contact you? Is that how you knew to come here?”

Byrne cleared his throat. “When you disappeared from Oden’s Ford, Corporal Byrne thought perhaps you had gone home, willingly or not. He guessed you might take the western route, since you’d come that way last fall. He sent a bird, suggesting I try to intercept you here in order to avoid a possible ambush at West Gate.” Raisa could tell he had been shining up this story for some time.

“Really?” she said. “How did he know I survived? We left a bloody mess behind at Oden’s Ford.” She buckled Ghost’s bridle while the stallion lipped at the bit, trying to spit it out.

“He…ah…had a feeling,” Byrne said. Raisa snorted. He was no better a liar than Amon.

“If he thought I was here, then why didn’t he come here himself?” Raisa tugged at the cinch strap, unconvinced that it was as tight as it could be.

“He thought I could get here sooner,” Byrne said, shifting his weight.

“Why? Where is he now?” Raisa demanded.

Byrne looked away. “I don’t know where he is right now,” he said.

“Well, where was he when he messaged you?” she persisted. “We had no birds at Oden’s Ford that would carry a message to Fellsmarch.”

“He was in Tamron Court, Your Highness,” Byrne said, like an oyster finally yielding up the meat within.

“Tamron Court!” Raisa straightened, swiveling around. “What was he doing there?”

“Looking for you,” Byrne said. “He’d received word that you’d been entangled in a skirmish between Montaigne’s army and a scouting party from Tamron. He thought you might’ve taken sanctuary in the capital. So he and his triple went there to find you.”

Raisa stared at Byrne, her stomach clenching as certainty set in. “He’s still there, isn’t he?” she whispered. “And Gerard Montaigne has the city surrounded.”

“That’s why it’s important that we move quickly, while the Prince of Arden believes that you are in Tamron Court,” Byrne said.

“What?” Raisa whispered. “Why would he think…?”