An enormous building stands high up on the cliff behind us, built into the mountain itself. Brushed gold adorns its arches, and a light breeze whispers through the hollows of the stone. My gaze wanders down the cliff to our level, where a jagged crack just large enough to be an entrance yawns into the darkness of the mountain’s heart.

The compass points steady and sure and calm, and I can sense, with every fiber of my being, that this is where our journey ends.

“I... I think I twisted my ankle,” Isolde says. Her voice trembles but comes out stronger than I expected. “When I was...running away.”

Olani switches into healer mode instantly. “Move,” she tells me. Against all my instincts, I ease back, letting Isolde slowly, gingerly stretch her legs out straight in front of her. I don’t let go of her hand, even when it crushes mine so hard it hurts.

Olani doesn’t look so good herself. She took a pretty bad fall from that horse, and if she was riding as long as I was dancing, she must be exhausted. There’s still an arrow poking out from her hip at a sickening angle, and I have no idea how she’s still on her feet. Her face is even more grim than usual, her practiced movements just a bit too tight. Like she’s scared to even touch Isolde.

“I’m sorry,” she says again, easing herself onto the ground to examine Isolde’s awkwardly bent ankle. “I’m so sorry, Isolde, I didn’t—” She stops, voice taut. “I should have stopped it.”

“Wasn’t your fault,” Isolde says, gentle and ragged and final. Then she seems to notice the arrow for the first time. “Are you okay?”

“Never better,” Olani grunts. Raze hovers over her, looking like he might pass out if he doesn’t find something to do with his hands very soon. “It was a lucky shot.” She turns from me to Raze, waving him away with irritation clear on her face. “I can handle it.”

Olani reaches for her bag, and I silently thank Fate that the faeries didn’t take it when they swapped our clothes. Her face crinkles in pain as she flips the bag open, but her eyes move with the steady sweep of a physician assessing a wound. I watch in mingled disgust and amazement as she takes a deep breath.

Releases it.

Her strong, well-practiced fingers wrap around the arrow, knuckles turning pale as her hand flexes. And then she pulls the arrow out of her own flesh with barely a sound, nothing more than a sharp hiss of breath through her teeth.

My stomach churns. Isolde and Raze both stare determinedly anywhere but at the arrow.

“Won’t kill me,” Olani says, reaching for a compress to stop the gush of blood that has already poured out onto the stone. “Probably.”

“Probably?”

But she’s already moved on, ignoring me. “Let me see that ankle.”

Isolde downplayed the damage—of course. It must be worse than a sprain. Her nails dig into my palm as Olani gently removes her fitted, pointy-toed boot. Her ankle hangs uselessly, at an angle that looks wrong even to my untrained eyes.