"But it doesn't make sense. He was done with me. He crushed that circlet, severed the connection, and threw me to the hunters. Why protect what he'd already discarded?"
Thaine was quiet for a moment, and she could see him weighing his words. "My lord is... impulsive. Acts first, thinks later. Not my place to say it, but since you asked…" He shrugged.
"Impulsive." The word tasted bitter. "So I'm supposed to accept that my life gets torn apart whenever he has a tantrum? Cast out, hunted, then retrieved like nothing happened?"
"Your life is his to do with as he pleases, or did you forget? Would you prefer he'd left you to the hunt unprotected?" Thaine's voice hardened slightly. "Because that was the alternative. You lasted one day, barely. Without my intervention, without the princeling's help, you'd be a decoration in someone's hall by now."
"That's not—" She stopped, frustrated. "Why didn't he come himself? If he regrets it, why send you?"
Something shifted in Thaine's expression. He looked away, jaw tightening.
"Thaine."
"Because I stopped him." The words came out rough, forced. "He was going to come. That first night. I stopped him."
The room seemed to tilt. "You stopped him? Why?"
"Someone had to." He stood abruptly, pacing to the shadowed corner. "Malus is walking free, your doing if we're counting sins. The Forest Court is divided. Half think Eliam's gone soft, the other half are terrified. There are whispers about giving Malus his crown back, before he comes to take it himself, about Eliam being unfit to rule."
His voice was rising, anger bleeding through the careful control.
"If he'd gone after you himself, shown that kind of weakness, admitted that casting you out was a mistake…" he spun on his heel to face her. "The court would have torn him apart. So yes, I stopped him. I told him I'd bring you back quietly once the hunt ended, once things calmed—"
The door burst open. Arion stood there, light already gathering in his palms.
"Malus is free?" His voice was dangerously quiet. "When were you going to mention that detail?"
Thaine's smile was all teeth. "Wasn't my story to tell, princeling. Ask her how that particular miscreant got loose."
Arion's gaze shifted to Briar, and she felt the blood drain from her face. The weight of what she'd done crashed over her again.
"Briar?" Arion's voice gentled, but she could hear the concern beneath. "What is he talking about?"
She pressed her back against the wall, unable to meet his eyes. "When I was here, after you pulled me from the river, Ferria came to me. She told me about a prisoner in the dungeons. A human who had marks like mine, who grew golden flowers."
"Thomas," Thaine supplied darkly. "Or what Malus wanted her to think."
"She gave me a leaf that would hide me from Eliam's perception. But only if I promised not to involve you." The words came out in a rush. "I thought I was saving someone like me. Someone trapped and forgotten. I didn't know—I never imagined—"
"Ferria." Arion's voice had gone completely flat. "Ferria brought you to him."
"Your sweet little companion playing both sides," Thaine said with dark satisfaction. “How does it feel to be used?”
Arion's light flickered erratically around his hands. "She's been with us for decades. Trusted with—" He stopped, visibly struggling to process the betrayal. "You should have come to me, Briar. If she was pressuring you—"
"Oh yes," Thaine cut in, rolling his eyes. "Because the princeling here would have definitely let her risk herself for a stranger in the dungeons."
"I would have investigated—"
"You would have done nothing, and we all know it." Thaine's voice carried that casual cruelty she remembered. "Too careful, too proper. Meanwhile, Malus would have eventually freed himself anyway, just with more corpses in his wake."
"That's not—"
"Enough." Briar's voice cracked. "It's done. I freed him, and he destroyed everything. That's what matters."
Thaine studied her for a moment, then shrugged. "Well, we'll sort it out when we return. We leave at dawn, once the hunt officially ends."
"No." Arion stepped forward, positioning himself partially between them. "Briar isn't bound to Eliam anymore. She's free to choose whether she returns or not."
