“What is your course of action now that your brother does not plan to pardon you?” Aureus’s gaze remained on his fallen friend. “How can you assure me you will keep Evera from this fate?”
“I cannot,” I admitted. “Though I suspect telling her to return with you will do little good. I’ve promised her I will not leave her unless she wishes it, and I intend to keep that promise.”
“So you still aim to return to the castle?”
“The Queen lies with her every word. She would only do so if she were the one to order Kaius’s death, if she were the one who framed me. Harlan is not in any danger from her. He doesn’tneed me. And he can make his own mistakes in ruling the kingdom.” I swallowed, the knot in my throat thick as I released the weight of responsibility, of obligation I’d so long lived with. I watched the shadows of Calix and Evera wrapped in each other’s embrace. “They are my family now. I will take them to the western lands and start a new life. An honest one.”
49
NEIRIN
Dawn came so subtly,I hardly recognized it until I glanced up to the break in the trees and found the sky a dusky gray. Time was running short; the tincture Evera had laced the huntsmen’s drinks with would soon wear off, and they would wake. Even if they were able to find their swords, which I had cast out in the trees and covered with leaves, I could take them now that I was unbound. Still, I didn’t want it to come to that. It would have been better if they were still deep in their sleep when we left.
“We need to go,” I said to Calix.
He sat beside me with one arm propped up on his knee, the other hand busied with pulling up blades of grass. “Are we really running away?”
I turned my gaze from the bottom of the hill where Evera was making her goodbyes with her brother, the form of the cobbler over his mount’s back. Calix had overheard, then, when I spoke with Aureus. Perhaps the Alidian did have heightened hearing.
“My brother doesn’t need me; he’s not in danger as I thought he was,” I said. “The Queen is malicious, selfish, but she would never put her son at risk.”
Calix held me with his cobalt eyes. “And what of the messengers?”
Releasing a breath, I ran a hand through my hair. How could I make him understand? “It is not—” I tilted my head back, resting it against the tree and looking up to the branches above, black silhouettes against the lightening sky. “It is a hard truth, but there is no outcome in which your friends survive. Even if we were to free them, I could not feed them all at once, and there is no way to travel with such a large group. I’ve no coin to my name. I can’t provide for them all.”
The boy shifted and tossed aside the blades of grass in his right hand before turning to fuss with his tunic. “What if there was another way?” He withdrew a folded piece of paper from his waistband. “What if they did not have to feed off your blood?”
“Calix—”
“Read this.” He swallowed hard. Interrupting went against his training, and his boldness spoke of his determination. Or perhaps desperation.
Nodding, I took the paper just as Evera climbed the slope and sat before us, crisscrossed in the grass. The slow patter of hoofbeats in mud sounded as Aureus left, heading back toward Elrune at a walk. Raising my eyes to Evera, I offered an encouraging smile.
She nodded subtly. Dark circles lined her eyes, which were red from crying. She sniffled, her nose slightly swollen. Her shoulders sloped, and her hair tumbled unkempt around her shoulders. To see her this way broke my heart. If only I could take her pain away, put it on myself instead.
Sighing, I turned my attention back to the paper, unfolding it to reveal Calix’s scribbles and sketches. His penmanship was rough in some areas, slanted as if he’d written quickly. In other areas the scroll was more elegant, practiced, with carefully drawn diagrams and images.
“What does this mean?” I asked, trying to keep the frustration from my tone. At that moment, I needed to focus onEvera, comfort her, and make a plan to get my family to safety before the huntsmen woke.
“Reiterations of Leighis’s studies,” Calix said.
Evera furrowed her brows and shifted to her knees, looking over the paper from where she sat in front of me.
“I’ve been researching whenever I had time, and talking to the old man. He traveled to the ancient library of Vitalis once, and the notes I found from his time there—they gave me an idea. It took me some time, but I found this”—he pointed to an illustration of a flower with delicate cupped petals and tendrils beneath its bud—“in a children’s book, a fairy tale. However, it aligns with Leighis’s notes and descriptions found in several other studies. I believe that whatever this flower is, it can work in place of your blood.”
Evera held out her palm, and I handed her the paper. “There’s no such flower,” she said, examining the drawing.
I rubbed the bridge of my nose. If I were to voice my thoughts aloud, there would be no convincing either of them to flee with me. They were too stubborn; Calix was too intent on helping his friends, and Evera was too invested in aiding anyone in need. But this was what she’d wanted all along—to use her abilities, to do good. Was it wrong of me to keep knowledge to myself if it kept her safe but stifled her?
“I know of the flower,” I said, breaking off the conversation the two were having without me. They both quieted and turned to me. “I’ve seen it before. They grow at my mother’s grave.”
As if too nervous to speak, Calix remained still as a statue.
Evera, studying the paper again, shook her head. “How did you learn all this, Calix?”
“When you care enough for someone,” I said, speaking for Calix, “you cannot give up in your search to save them, even when it feels impossible.”
He nodded, understanding perfectly.
