He stole a glance at Cora, her brows knitted as she read the parchment in her hands, oblivious of the truth he’d discovered.
He may not have learned much about her, but he now knew one thing. She’d killed Princess Aveline Caelan.
His eyes slid back to the poster and settled on the next words.
Reward: 500,000 goldsovas.
26
Teryn didn’t seem to notice Cora’s approach, even as she paused before him. He was too entranced by whatever he was reading. “You were right, it’s a forgery,” she said of the writ she’d found. The seal was almost an exact replica of Duke Morkai’s crescent moon, but the wordCalloway—the name of Morkai’s duchy—was in the wrong script.
Teryn startled at the sound of her voice. He met her eyes over his stack of papers, his face a shade too pale. She opened her senses and felt his spike of alarm seep into her. But it wasn’t her sudden appearance that had him so rattled. It had more to do with whatever he was looking at. She furrowed her brow. “What did you find?”
He went to hand her the top paper but ended up dropping the bottom of the stack. She bent to gather the loose papers before they could get soaked by the dewy grass. When she stood, he handed her one of the sheets. “You’ll want to see this.”
She took it from him and saw it was a map. Her heart sank deeper and deeper the longer she studied it. If the markings represented what she thought they did, there were several more hunting parties. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise. She’d begun to suspect as much when she’d witnessed Gringe interrogating Teryn and his companions. He’d too readily accepted that they’d come from another company of unicorn hunters. Sure enough,Drasswas labeled over the Cambron Pass, just as she’d heard Helios say.
Her lungs felt tight as she took a few steps back, slumping against the tree that met her back. “This is so much worse,” she whispered.
“Do you intend to hunt all of them down? To…poison them?” She felt his judgment then, his condemnation of her actions.
She met his eyes. “If you have something to say, say it. You insisted they were no friends of yours.”
He watched her for a few moments before averting his gaze, eyes unfocused. “No, they weren’t. Nor were they good men. Still…it was a bit reckless, don’t you think?”
“It worked.”
“Barely. Three men didn’t drink. What would you have done if Helios, Lex, and I hadn’t been there to take the fall? To fight them for you?”
She clenched her teeth. “I didn’t need you. Had you not been there, I would have taken them down with my bow one by one.”
“What if you’d been caught?”
“I wasn’t.”
“What. If. Just think about it.”
She did. Her heart raced as she imagined numerous ways her plan could have gone wrong. She could have been spotted. Even more of the men could have abstained from the rum. She could have tried to pick off the survivors and gotten a crossbow bolt to the heart. But that was the risk she’d taken from the start. She knew she was only one person. She knew the odds were against her. That didn’t stop her from trying. It was a risk worth taking if it meant saving the unicorns. Denying the Beast its meal. Destroying whatever dark plans Duke Morkai was brewing. Now that she was no longer with the Forest People, this mission was all she had.
Crossing her arms, she pushed off from the tree, feigning more confidence than she felt. “You won’t stop me. I’m going to find every last one of these hunting parties and wipe them out.”
“When the duke sends men to replace them, what then?”
She startled every time he mentioned the duke. It was strange that he knew Morkai was involved but didn’t show even an ounce of the terror that was due. That was probably because he didn’t know the man was a mage. To him, the duke was just a businessman trying to turn a pretty profit.
Then his words sank in, flooding her with an overwhelming wave of exhaustion. He was right. The duke would send more men to replace the ones she killed. Did that mean there was no end to her efforts? No way to keep the unicorns safe for good?
Her next words came out with far less conviction. “I’ll do whatever I can for as long as I can.”
Teryn’s posture stiffened. She sensed his tangled energy, felt him fighting against the words that were poised on his lips.
She gave him a pointed look. “What?”
He rubbed his jaw, then locked his eyes on hers. “Let me come with you.”
Her face went slack. Surely she hadn’t heard him right. Why would he want to come with her? She’d tried to kill him. She’d threatened his life. It had to be a ploy. Indeed she felt…somethingemanating from him. Some mixture of guilt, trepidation, and fear. It was heavy and cloying. She suddenly felt like they were standing too close, the three feet of space separating them not nearly vast enough.
He must have seen her reaction in her eyes, for he took a step back as if to appease her. “Hear me out,” he slowly said. “Let me travel with you to the next camp. I assume that will be the Cambron Pass, correct? It’s the closest.”
