Rushing to the sink, I heaved, but the little food I’d eaten refused to budge, leaving me nauseated and choking on nothing. One thought circulated my mind repeatedly.

Who was he?

I no longer knew. For he wasn’t anything I remembered.

The male I’d come to know these past months was nothing but a lying, merciless asshole.

If Rorn intended to take the babe from this Carelda and leave it at that, then it was clear he’d most certainly not informed her. And after what I’d witnessed from him of late, I had a harrowing feeling that he never intended to tell her much at all.

That he had no idea what to do with any of us.

ELEVEN

Aster

“No one has seen her, and those who claim they have say she appears like a ghost,” Urina said inside the doors to the terrace. “Darting about and hiding before anyone can get a proper glimpse or talk to her.”

“You know her father was odd too,” Fregson said without care for his volume. “Always so quiet and stoic.”

Urina snorted. “He wasn’t odd, but indeed, there was something different about him. In any case, the way he left our queen to fend for herself in those woods day in and day out likely hasn’t helped matters.” She tutted. “She was far too young. Now look at her.”

“You think she’s losing touch with herself?”

Water sloshed. A clang sounded.

Then Urina said gently, “That’s what many are whispering, and though it’s mostly in jest, I do fear they might be right.”

Their voices faded as they moved on to clean elsewhere.

I remained where I was upon the grass between the pond and the bed of roses just beyond the terrace. The moon was heavy but not so full that anyone paid me any notice when walking past the doors to the gardens.

Some of the sentinels had paused, one had even asked if I’d needed anything, but they otherwise kept to their duties of patrolling the grounds and the rolling hillsides.

And here I’d thought that choosing to sit outside in the moonlight was a healthier option.

Glossing my fingers over the stem of the rose curling closer to me, I watched it shiver in response. Perhaps I was indeed losing my mind. Perhaps it had begun long ago. A relief, I thought, to have an answer—perhaps an antidote—for all of this.

Howls struck the silence.

The echo of warriors communicating with one another was typically a knife grazing every organ. A reminder of my father and of another male I’d never had yet had lost all the same. Now, those howls were something of a balm over a burn, as I allowed the memory of those precious days in Vordane to tumble forth.

As I allowed them to take me away.