CALLYN
I expect it to be difficult to sneak past the guards, but Queen Lia Mara is shockingly good at getting out of the palace without being seen. Once we joined Alek and Nora in my chambers, we all dressed in riding clothes from my wardrobe. Only Sinna is still in her nightdress. Now the queen is leading us through the darkness, and we slip through unlit hearths and servant passages and down hidden stairways until I completely lose track of which way we’re going, especially when our twists and turns seem counterintuitive. Luckily, the queen seems to know every step, every tunnel, and every door.
“How do you remember all of this?” I murmur to her, a little breathless after we sidle along a narrow passage in complete darkness, Sinna between us, gripping our hands with her tiny fingers. Nora is right behind me, gripping my hand just as tightly.
Alek is behind her, the only one not part of our little chain, probably because Nora would break his fingers before she’d consider holdinghishand.
“Admittedly,” the queen whispers, “I don’t rememberallof it.”
“That’s reassuring, Your Majesty,” Alek says from the back of the line.
“Hush, you,” she says— but she doesn’t sound too upset about it.
“Mama taught me how tosneak,” Sinna says in a musical little whisper.
“I know,” I say. “I’m glad you didn’t know aboutthesepassages or I never would’ve found you.”
“Believe me,” says the queen with a sigh, “I already know I’m going to regret this.” She stops short. “Be silent through here. We’re near the main atrium, and sound carries.”
We ease along in complete silence. I try to inhale as shallowly as I can, as if distant guards might be able to hear even that.
But after another hundred feet, the queen lets out a relieved breath. “We’re safer here,” she says. “This is the last servant tunnel. It comes out along the wall by the dungeon, and we’ll have to watch for a guard patrol, but we should have a few minutes to escape.”
A guard patrol. I don’t even want tothinkabout what a guard patrol might do to us if they found us sneaking around in the dark.
Then again, we’re with the queen— though she’s in plain clothing, her hair in a loose braid. We all seem a little rough and harried, even Alek. What would the guards believe?
And what if they’re working with the Truthbringers?
I still have so many questions for Alek, but I can’t ask him likethis. He clearly thinks everyone in the palace is a potential threat.
“Are these the paths you and the king used?” Nora whispers from behind me, her soft voice full of intrigue. “For your trysts?”
“Nora!” I admonish.
But the queen laughs lightly under her breath.
“What’s a tryst?” says Sinna.
“A meeting,” I say promptly.
The queen laughs again. “I’m so glad you’re here, Callyn.”
My cheeks warm immediately, and I’m startled by the sudden burst of warmth in my chest. “Thank you, Your Majesty.” I hesitate. “I’m glad, too.”
“Where are we going to go?” Nora asks. “Are we just going to walk through the Crystal City?”
“I have a carriage waiting,” says Alek.
Of course he does.
Once we make it off the palace grounds, it’s easier to breathe. No guards wait around every corner, ready to pounce on anything suspicious. True to his word, Alek does have a carriage, the horses tethered not far off the road. There’s no footman or driver, but I’m still a little shocked when he climbs up onto the driver’s seat on his own.
“Feel free to join me,” he says, and there’s a note in his voice that says he doesn’t expect me to do anything of the sort. The queen, Sinna, and Nora are already slipping into the carriage, but I take hold of the rail along the front of the carriage and yank myself up to sit beside him.
Alek glances at me in surprise, but he doesn’t say anything. He just snaps the whip, and the horses leap forward.
My heart still hasn’t settled, and I can’t tell what’s louder: my thundering pulse, or the steady pounding of the horses’ hooves on the cobblestones.
