“I’m not that brave.” She shakes her head. “I’m not you.”
“That’s a good thing, because I’m not brave at all. I couldn’t have survived this long without Evander, Master Cymbre, Meredy, Lysander...”
My voice trails away as my heart leaps into my throat. The bear is gone, vanished from my side as I spoke with Valoria.
“Don’t worry, Sparrow,” I faintly hear Valoria saying. “You’ll never have to fight alone.”
I frantically look around for Lysander. A creature as large as a grizzly should be easy to spot, even in a massive crowd.
I shake my head to clear it. Lysander still hasn’t appeared, but Valoria’s smiling, pointing to something past the fishmongers’ stalls.
Several familiar figures hurry toward us.
Jax reaches me first, lifting me off my feet and spinning me around until I’m dizzy. I bury my face against his shoulder, assured by the scent of his evergreen soap that it’s really him and not my mind playing a cruel trick.
Simeon quickly shoves Jax aside, squeezing the breath out of me in a rib-cracking hug.
Danial waves from over Simeon’s shoulder, looking tired but no worse off than the last time I saw him. “Hurt yourself again I see, Sparrow,” he calls. “I’ll heal your leg, if these two will let me borrow you for a little while.”
“Not a chance. Not yet,” Simeon murmurs to Danial, quickly refocusing on me. “What happened?” he whispers, pushing back his soggy bangs to better look at me. “You’re as soaked as we are, and we took a dip in the harbor!”
“You—what?” I stammer, realizing that both he and Jax are as damp and frigid-looking as I feel. But I don’t care if my whole body goes numb with cold right now, because my heart is soaring. “I was hiding from a Shade. Why were you in the harbor?”
“Hadrien ordered his guards to drown us. I guess so no one would find our bodies,” Jax says, slipping an arm around my shoulders so I’m pinned between him and Simeon. Just like old times. “The bastard. But it took ten of his men to do it.”
“It was more like five,” Simeon counters, grinning slyly.
“However many there were, they did a pretty good job,” Kasmira says, joining Danial with several of her crew in tow. “But I thought these two had brighter futures than serving as fish food.” She winks, tossing her many dark braids over her shoulder. “The crew and I dredged them up as soon as the guards had their backsturned. Hid them on theParadise, and that’s where the princess here found them.”
“You saved my friends,” I mutter, beaming at Kasmira. “If there’s anything I can do to repay you... anything, just name it.”
She arches a perfect brow. “Before today, I might’ve asked you for a raising. But my dead are going to stay that way, I’ve decided.” Her cool gray eyes dart to the mess in the streets, then focus on my face again. “I wouldn’t mind a taste of royal gold, though, if we’re talking rewards.”
“Consider it done,” Valoria says firmly, gazing at each of us in turn: Jax, Simeon, and me in the middle. She holds out a hand to Kasmira. “And from now on, consider yourselves free to come and go from these waters as you please.”
Kasmira grins at her crew, then gives Valoria a long, thoughtful look. “That’s almost a better reward than the gold, Highness.”
“Actually—” Valoria’s cheeks redden as she boldly declares, “it’s Majesty now, but I prefer just Valoria.”
Kasmira blinks. “All right, Valoria.” She bows, and the other smugglers follow her lead.
I raise my voice. “Has anyone seen Meredy?”
I still have to find her, and while everyone around me looks relieved to see each other again, I can’t breathe easy until I know where she is. That she’s safe.
Danial frowns. “She ran off right before I found Valoria and the others...” He grimaces. “I wasn’t fast enough, and she disappeared on me. Before that, she was acting strange. Erratic.”
Maybe she’s still nearby. Even if she was in a feral state when she ran off, it may not last long. I’d better find her before someoneelse does. Someone who might not understand why she’s growling at them like a bear.
“We were looking for her when we found you,” Valoria adds in a small voice. “We thought she might’ve been drawn to the crowd.”
Jax nudges my shoulder, startling me. “Look.” He points to an oddly shaped shadow moving toward us through the late-afternoon gloom. My muscles tense as I wonder if another Shade got loose somehow.
But as Jax reaches for one of his blades, I shake my head. It’s not a Shade, but a large creature dragging a smaller one by the back of her cloak.
Lysander, and—
“Meredy!”
