“Frances has been trying to stop her father from invading any other lands. We thought we had time with the Wilds. We thought we could get him to pull the troops back. And then—”

“The octagon.” Victory after one day. Victory that should have been rewarded. “The king was going to knight me. I was going to be a commander.”

Brella stood, breathing. Her face was twisted, pained, but she couldn’t deny it. “Yes.”

“Until your people got to him.” She stared at Brella through a haze of stinging blur, her details fading into splotches of dimmed color. “Your group convinced him not to knight me.” Suddenly, the yawning hole inside her was full of fierce, sweltering anger. “Wasn’t that enough for you? Why rip me away, ruin any chance I had at a future, when you could have just—”

“Because you did it as a Sergeant Major!” Brella cried. Her voice was raspy, echoing messily off the trees. “It was only a matter of time until he changed his mind again, gave you a command. Imagine what you could have done!”

“Lived!” she cried, something cracking inside of her. “Succeeded. Did the one thing I know how to do.”

“You’re wrong, Scratch.” Brella was openly sobbing now, bent and pleading. Pathetic, and yet Scratch and her twisted hope felt the traitorous urge to go to her. Hold her, calm her. This liar. “You c-can do so much more. You can.”

“What were you going to do with me in Koravia? Kill me?” Brella shook her head ferociously. “Tell me.”

“Frances is getting help from Koravia. She’s been corresponding with the king when she can. We’d been planning to get her there for months. But we knew . . .” She gulped, wiping her face. “We knew they didn’t trust her. Not completely. You were—”

“A gift,” Scratch snarled. “A price.”

“We need to win, Scratch. We’d been looking for a way to earn Koravia’s trust, and then you took the Western Wilds. You’re the best strategist in Ivinscont. Getting you out of there was t-twofold: an easier win for us and a w-way for Frances to prove herself. To convince the king he should back her against her father.”

“And ruining my life wasn’t a problem for you?”

“You’ve ruined lives, Scratch!” The forest was still. Barely any bugs chirped. No bats swooped. It was only the two of them standing apart in a clearing under scrambled stars. Brella’s breathing was loud and ragged, but Scratch could barely hear it over the raw thump of her blood rushing through her tight and throbbing veins.

“What lives?” she demanded.

“We talked about this, Scratch.” Brella’s braids were disheveled, little strands coming loose from each plait. “The Western Wilds are under Ivinscont now.”

“And their lives are better.”

“They’re not citizens. Their trees are going to be felled for the mills.”