Such conviction. Such desperate, fierce hope.
But as I look around the war room at our battered group, at Zoran's too-pale face, at the blood that seems to coat everything, I can't help but calculate the odds.
They're not good.
We're going into a realm designed to break people. We're doing it with no backup, no real knowledge of what we'll face, and only three hours to succeed or be trapped forever.
And yet... what choice do we have?
Stay here and die slowly as Taren's forces overwhelm us? Watch more people fall like Zoran did tonight?
No. Better to take a desperate chance than accept slow defeat.
"Everyone get cleaned up," I order. "Eat something. Rest if you can. Tomorrow night, we enter the Veil."
They disperse slowly—Elçin limping toward the baths, Yasar moving like every bone aches, Emir staying close to coordinate with the healers.
Only Nesilhan remains, still kneeling beside her brother.
I kneel beside her, my hand finding hers where it grips Zoran's. Her fingers are cold, and she's trembling with exhaustion.
"He's going to live," I say quietly. "The healers are good. He's strong. He'll survive this."
"You don't know that." Her voice is small, vulnerable. "You can't know that."
"No," I admit. "But I believe it. Because Zoran is too damn stubborn to die before making me regret every tactful slight I ever delivered to the Light Court."
That startles a laugh out of her—broken and watery but genuine. "He really does hold grudges, doesn't he?"
"Like a dragon hoards gold." I squeeze her hand. "Come on. You need rest. The healers will watch over him."
She doesn't move immediately. Just stares at her brother's face, at the rise and fall of his chest that's too shallow but at least still moving.
"I can't lose him," she whispers. "I can't lose anyone else. If Zoran dies, if we fail tomorrow?—"
"We won't fail." I say it with more certainty than I feel, but sometimes conviction is all we have to offer. "Tomorrow night, we cross the Veil. We find Banu. We come back. All of us. Together."
That word again. Together.
She looks at me finally, tears still streaming down her face but something like hope flickering in her eyes. "Promise me."
I shouldn't. Promises about entering a death realm are fool's currency. But looking at her now, seeing the desperate need for something to believe in, I find myself nodding.
"I promise."
She leans into me, and I wrap my arms around her, feeling her shake with silent sobs. Across the thread between us, her pain is mine, her fear is mine, her desperate love for her brother is mine.
And tomorrow night, we'll face the Veil together.
The dawn breaksgrey and cold over the palace.
I haven't slept. Neither has Nesilhan. We've spent the night in a strange vigil—her beside Zoran's bedside, me pacing the war room, both of us counting down the hours.
Emir finds me in the pre-dawn gloom.
"The casualties are worse than we thought," he reports. "We lost eighteen in the village. Another dozen wounded badly enough that they're out of action for weeks."
Eighteen dead. Eighteen people who trusted me to lead them, who followed me into that trap.
