Safi eased off her shoes, dropped them into the chest beside Leopold’s, and after hefting up her skirts and cloak, she followed the prince into the water. He moved with silent ease through the reeds, like a heron who’d traveled this way many times. Safi felt clumsy and loud in comparison, each footstep splashing and squelching and rolling through her.

The water reached only to her upper calves, but the silt was unstable. It sucked her in. Fortunately, they were cast in shadow from the Sarian Bridge. When she glanced back, only once, she found the hole in the wall was gone. Slimy flagstone stretched as far as she could see, curving with the river and vanishing from sight.

By the time Leopold reached a small shelf onto which they could haul themselves, Safi had lost all feeling in her toes and ankles. The water was beyond frigid, and somehow withdrawing her feet to clamber onto the stone ledge only made her that much colder.

Leopold didn’t slow, though, so Safi pushed herself onward until they reached a rusted ladder leading to the street. Leopold ascended first, and Safi followed with a great deal less grace.

Weak streetlamps glared down, revealing the merchants’ shops Safi and Henrick had passed earlier that day. At this hour, no lights burned within, no shoppers milled about. Two guards patrolled, but they had their armored backs to Safi and Leopold, who now hurried for a nearby alley.

Once they were cloaked in shadows again, Leopold whispered, “How do you feel?”

“Fine,” Safi said, and it was true. She still sensed no significant increase in the shivers at her heart; they remained easy to ignore as long as she kept moving.

“Then we continue on.” Leopold took Safi’s hand into his own before leading her more deeply into darkness. His fingers were warm and deceptively soft. He must keep his calluses filed down, Safi realized, for she had seen Leopold training when they were young. He had been quick with a sword then, and she had no doubt he was quicker now.

I have spent twenty years grooming Leopold to be the perfect leader, Henrick had told Safi earlier. At the time, she’d assumed Henrick meant all the skills needed to run an empire—warfare, diplomacy, bureaucracy, and politics. Now, she wondered if perhaps it also included the art of performance.

Henrick was not the toad he seemed; Leopold was not the dandy.

They traveled several miles before finally approaching one of the city’s outer walls, beyond which were suburbs and settlements that had sprung up over the centuries and continued to spring up today.

“How do you feel?” Leopold asked, peering up at the towering gatehouse. Lights flickered within the slitted windows, and soldiers stood watch at the gaping archway. They paid no mind to Leopold or Safi or anyone else hurrying by. Buoyant voices bounced off stone, suggesting alehouses and brothels on the crooked streets nearby.