“Romantic, no?” Leopold glanced at her, expression unreadable. “And also quite unknown. I placed alarm-stones all around this cave shortly after I discovered it, and not once, in all my years of coming here, has a single stone been tripped off.” Spreading his arms wide, he stalked forward. “We are very safe, Safiya fon Hasstrel, and very alone.”

He twirled about to face her, swooping a dramatic bow. Gone was the flat Leopold; returned was the charming prince—and returned was Safi’s wariness. Very safe and very alone. She did not like the way that sounded.

She kept her chest high and shoulders back as she strode to the nearest bench, where she withdrew her Truth-lens and once more trained it on Leopold.

“Why did you betray us?”

“And we return to the heart of the matter.” Movement flickered across the lens’s colorful glass, and when Safi opened her other eye, she saw Leopold had joined her at the bench. After draping his own scarf down, he sat.

Safi remained standing.

“I did not betray you to my uncle.” Leopold lounged lazily, bracing both hands behind him and stretching out his legs. With his dressing robe, he looked like some wealthy gentleman come to enjoy the steam.

Safi shuttered her one eye again and stared only through the lens. So far, the colors remained true.

“Not on purpose, at least. If Henrick had known I worked with you, Safiya, then I would have been executed.”

Safi’s toes curled in her slippers while heat curled in her chest. “And that would have been so bad?” She lowered the lens. “You protected your own skin, Polly, and now I have no magic while Iseult is leagues away and hunted by Hell-Bards.”

“Yes,” he admitted, and he did not even try to look apologetic. “Iseult is indeed leagues away, and your magic has indeed been severed from you. But you have that.” He tipped his head toward the Truth-lens. “And you have this. We have this.” He flipped a hand toward the bath. “Which is entirely thanks to me.”

Safi’s molars ground in her ears. She yanked the lens to her eye once more—while his words still hung in the air and the magic still might respond. But the colors remained; everything he’d said was true.

She huffed a low snarl and kicked into a prowling pace alongside the bath’s foggy edge. “I can’t deny the value of the Truth-lens, but this?” She sawed a hand at the columns. “What good does this do us? Do me?”

“Why, Safiya.” Leopold sat taller, his legs uncrossing. “I thought you would have figured it out by now: this cave connects to the outside world. Just as there is a secret way in, there is a secret way out. With this”—he parted his hands—“you can leave.”