To my complete and absolute shock, Noah is sitting at the little table in Jax’s kitchen. A cup of tea is in front of him, along with a stack of parchment and a kohl pencil. He looks up when I appear in the doorway.
“Hey, kid,” he says softly, giving me his familiar, gentle smile. “It’s good to see you upright.”
I stare at him. “What . . . what are you doing here?”
“I came with Jake.”
My eyebrows go up. “Jake is here, too? What— when—”
“Not now. He had to continue on to the Crystal Palace.” He frowns a little. “When he comes back, you’ll have to ask him for all the details, because we’ve covered a lot of miles in the last few days.”
My thoughts refuse to catch up. “What? But how . . . how are you here?”
“You sent a letter to Ironrose, didn’t you?”
“I sent a letter, but—” I try to count the days in my head, remembering my code, the way I stopped to send a letter after we discovered the dead courier. But my head is still twisted up in knots, and it probably doesn’t matter anyway. “Yeah. I did.”
Noah nods. “Rhen knew your code meant there was a threat against the king— but Grey had already left. He sent a regiment after him, but we weren’t fast enough. We made it here two days after the Queen’s Army seized the Truthbringers.”
There are too many surprises in that statement to process them all. “Two days?” I run a hand across my jaw. I peer at the doorway. “The army is here?”
“Not now. Grey ordered the Emberish army back to Ironrose. Most of them left yesterday.”
Grey.I stare at him. “The king left?”
Noah nods. “He had to.” His voice is grave. “He was in worse shape than you are, but you know their position. He couldn’t afford for rumors to start. There’s been too much insurrection already.”
The sad thing is, Idoknow their position. I swallow. “How long have I been asleep?”
“You’ve been in and out for about a week.”
That hits me harder than I’m ready for, and spots flare in my vision. I waver unsteadily on my feet.
Noah stands, moving to my side at once. “You should sit down. Do you need me to help you?”
I shake my head, but I don’t resist when he takes hold of my arm and lets me lean against him. For a moment, I just stand there, feeling his steady support.
“I have a thousand more questions,” I eventually say.
He laughs softly. “I’m sure you do.”
“First, I think . . . I think I need to go outside.”
“All right.” He guides me toward the door. The summer heat hits me like a wave, and I inhale deeply. The lane between the forge and the bakery is quiet, and I don’t see anyone at all. I wonder who else is here. Surely it’s not just me, Jax, and Noah.
Then again, Noah said the army was ordered to disperse. If Grey was wary of rumor and suspicion, maybe itisjust us. My heart twists a little. I remember that moment we were riding in the sunlight, joking a little, how family and friendship and love all seemed to come together in that moment. How deeply I longed for that. How much Ineededit.
The king and queen returned to the palace. They have countries to rule. I have a job to do.
Always work to be done.
“I can walk,” I say to Noah, and he lets me go.
I wander out of the forge and into the soft grass to attend to human
needs. My feet are bare, and now that I’m awake, I realize I’m rather desperately hungry. But I stare up at the sky and walk deeper into the trees, just feeling the air on my skin.
And then I realize what I’m missing: not just Nakiis’s magic. My own.
