Callyn goes still.
Tycho says, “Do you think she’ll be willing?”
“Yes.” Her voice breaks. “I’m so glad she’s sending them away.” She swipes away a tear before it can fall.
I exchange a glance with Tycho. Again, this might be the first time I’ve ever shared a moment of understanding with him. But before I even say a word, he echoes my thoughts by gently saying, “Callyn. You can leave with them.”
Beside me, she startles. “What? No. I’m not leaving.” This time she really does swipe away a tear, but her expression turns fierce. “I just wanted to make sure I could keep my sister safe. Nora might not leave if I told her to, but she’ll want to protect Sinna, and she’ll obey the queen.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” says the queen. She steps through the doorway into the workshop.
She looks just as exhausted as she did an hour ago, but her expression is more settled. More determined.
Tycho stands. “Your Majesty. We’ve determined a plan.”
“I’m glad to hear that, too.”
Jax uses a pair of tongs to shift the stone bowl in the fire, and the molten steel glows red in the light. “Tycho. Give me a blade.”
Tycho draws the dagger at his right hip and holds it out. Jax uses his tongs to press the glowing Iishellasan steel against the end of his dagger, then uses pincers to clip off the excess. Moving quickly, he hammers the steel around the tip, flattening it along the edge until it’s a thin layer along the point. As the metal cools, it turns gray against the gleaming silver of the weapon. Jax thrusts it into the bucket of water like he did the arrowheads.
When he pulls it out, he shakes it off. “Here,” he says. “See if that’ll sharpen well.”
Tycho obeys, and for a minute, we all watch, listening to the sound of his blade scraping against the whetstone.
Only Jax continues to work, because he’s already snapping off another piece. “Give me one of yours,” he says, and it takes me a second to realize he’s talking tome.
“Oh,” I say, startled. “Here.”
My dagger is wider, but Jax quickly adapts, swiftly taking extra steel from the bowl to coat both edges, hammering it into place until it’s flattening along the edge and ready to be dunked in the water. Then he holds mine out as well.
Tycho pulls his off the whetstone and holds it up to the light. “Looks sharp,” he says. He presses a thumb to the blade, and blood wells almost instantly. “Feelssharp.”
“Good,” Jax says absently, as if he expected nothing less.
“Can you heal it?” asks the queen, her voice hushed.
Tycho’s gaze goes a bit distant, and then he shakes his head. “No. It works.”
More assured now, I put my own blade against the whetstone.
“It won’t hold forever,” Jax says. “But it would take too long to blend the steel in the blades— and I’m not sure if that would work.” Hegestures to me again. “Give me your sword.” Without waiting, he looks to Tycho, then swipes sweat off his forehead. “Leave yours, too, then call Mal and Seph in so I can do theirs. I’m not sure how much I’ll have left, but I’ll do my best.”
Tycho gives him a nod, then strips his weapons, awkwardly laying them on the table. Callyn is following my lead with the shafts and arrowheads, but she watches Tycho disarm, her eyes flicking from person to person, eventually landing on Jax.
Her hand falls back over her mother’s pendant.
She doesn’t want to. I know it. She lost her mother in the war— just like I lost mine. Unlike me, she doesn’t have much left. It’s one pendant, and it’s not much steel at all. Hardly anything. At best, it’ll offer an extra edge to one sword. Maybe two.
But as I watch, she puts down the arrow, and she reaches behind her neck to untie the leather that holds the pendant in place. “Jax.” She holds out the pendant, and the steel gleams in the light. “You can use this, too.”
CHAPTER 29
CALLYN
My sister, as expected, is eager to follow the queen’s order.
“You are to obey Princess Nora,” the queen says sternly to her daughter, tears gleaming in her eyes. “No sneaking. Do you understand me? We want to make sure we win our game.”
