Safi was in agony. She’d had injuries before—a shattered ankle, a broken nose, burns and scrapes and stitches aplenty. A knife stab in the thigh was a new one.

And not being able to use magical healing was also new and also rutting horrible.

After the initial shock of a hole in her leg gushing blood, fire had set in. She’d been unable to walk, even with the bindings Caden had quickly and efficiently wrapped around her.

“I will kill you,” she told him over and over again.

“No you won’t,” he replied each time.

After that, the journey through the palace had passed in a haze. Caden had carried Safi up from the bowels of the training area, across several blustery courtyards pink with sunrise, and finally into the palace stables. She was vaguely aware of Hell-Bards marching around them. Of Lev ordering attendants to inform His Imperial Majesty of the injury. Of a carriage being summoned and grooms rushing out with horses for the Hell-Bard.

A training injury, Caden kept telling them. Alert His Imperial Majesty. The Empress was hurt in training.

Then Safi was dumped into the carriage, and Lev and Caden were scrambling onto a seat beside her. Rather than help her sit up or check on her injury, though, Caden barked, “Wards,” and he and Lev clasped hands.

Their heads bowed low, and through the pain, Safi sensed power gathering. A swell of static. A magic her Hell-Bard senses instantly identified as our own. It took only moments before the wards were done. Then Caden and Lev released each other.

Caden knocked on the carriage’s front wall. The horses clopped into motion, and with a gurgle of fresh flames, Safi fell against her leather-bound bench. Each quake in the carriage sent eyeball-crushing pain throughout her.

“Why,” she ground out, “does it hurt so thrice-damned much?”

“Because that’s what knives do.” Lev removed her helm and offered a tight-lipped frown. “I was wondering when you’d set your mind on the Keep—and I was hoping you never would.”

“I warned her,” Caden defended, “but she insisted.”

“We all do.” Lev wagged her head. “We all do. Except this time, I would wager the Emperor himself will come deal with the damage.”

“She’s right.” Caden turned to Safi. She struggled to keep a lock on his face. “You won’t have much time at the Keep, and that”—he waved at her leg—“is only the beginning.”

“Beginning of what?” Safi tried to sit up, but Caden swatted her back down. She glared at him, though it quickly turned into an eye-rolling moan. “Is this carriage hitting every hole in the street?”

“Every one,” he replied.

Lev snorted. “When we get to the Keep, Safi, you’ll be taken right away to the special healing wing. Hell-Bards can’t be treated by magic, but there are … well, there are other ways of keeping us alive.”