The rookery entrance had been blocked off, but there was a hole big enough for me to crawl through on the side. I struggled through the opening, scraping my forearms and tearing the hem of my dress on the scattered debris, but I didn’t stop as I charged up the soot-covered steps to the second level.

The tower went up several more floors, but the circular room had caved in, blocking the stairwell and creating a dark alcove. I huddled underneath it with my arms wrapped around my knees, not caring that my dress was covered in ash or that I’d scraped my elbow hard enough to bleed.

I felt like I had the night the crows died—like everything was out of my control.

Caliza had promised me to Prince Ericen. She’d bartered me away, and now I would lose everything. My friendship with Kiva, my home, what little normalcy I’d regained—for what? A few more months to prepare for a war we couldn’t win even if we had years to recover? The Illucian Empire’s soldiers were utterly elite. Nothing less could have destroyed the crows.

Surely, this was all a ploy by Razel. She was like a jungle cat toying with her food. This was probably some sick joke to her. Why else ask for this marriage?

The familiar weight slithered up my shoulders. I didn’t even try to make it leave. I was floating in limbo, my future gone, my past all too present. Now, more than ever, I wished for a crow to carry me far, far away. We’d fly straight past Korovi and Jindae to the unexplored wilderness in the east. We’d never stop.

But the crows were gone.

Two

Golden sunlight filtered in from what remained of the rookery windows. Heat and the scent of smoke permeated the early afternoon air, but my bones had turned to ice. I hadn’t moved from my spot on the ground, though I’d drawn several pictures in the ash and dust that a warm breeze gently erased.

Memories swirled around me like leaves caught in the wind: meeting Estrel in the rookery for my rider training, teasing Caliza when the crows ignored her commands, sneaking out in the middle of a thunderstorm to sit with a candle among the birds, warm, quiet, content.

I spun Estrel’s bracelet around my wrist. My mother had died not five feet from where I sat, killed by Illucian soldiers. I’d have bet on her over a hundred Illucians, but that night…