Lucy stared. Sylva stared back, unreadable. Then his tail swished, and she tried not to stare at the very warm, huggable fluff. The movement wasn’t idle. Lucy had grown up around enough animals to recognize restraint masquerading as calm.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m good at chasing things that don’t want to be found.”
Lucy swallowed. That did not bode well for Esther, who absolutely did not want to be found. She was not prepared for the extra—arguably adorable—chaos joining their hunt.
26
Esther
How to handle conflict: let your friends fight while you question your life choices.
The caravan rattled along the dirt road like rusted bells tied behind a running horse. It was loud, shaky, and one unfortunate bump away from disaster.
Esther clutched her satchel tighter. She did not have enough emotional stability for disaster—not today, not with Nythir looking at her like he wanted to say good morning inthattone. The tone that made her want to bury herself under the nearest rock until her soul evaporated.
“Essie,” Lyssara called from atop her horse, “you look like a disgruntled shrub. Sit up.”
“I like being a shrub,” Esther muttered. Shrubs didn’t call attention to themselves—they thrived quietly in the background. That was her. She aspired to be just like the shrubs they rode past.
The caravan stretched ahead: six wagons, two dozen merchants, and several goats Vorrik insisted were emotional support animals. They were obviously not. The air smelled of hay, wood, spices, and impending doom.
Esther had learned to recognize that feeling—the quiet stretch before something went wrong. It lived low in her chest, like a held breath she hadn’t chosen to take.
As if summoned, doom arrived.
Thunk.
An arrow embedded itself in the road, inches from Esther’s horse.
Sound vanished for a heartbeat. The world narrowed to distance and direction and the certainty that she had been almost—but not quite—too slow.
The riders shouted. The goats screamed.
Nythir drew his dagger, shielding her before her mind could process the near miss.
She didn’t protest. She registered it instead—how quickly he moved, how carefully he positioned himself without forcing her backward. Protection without displacement. It mattered.
“Ambush,” he barked.
More arrows rained from the trees. Merchants ducked behind crates. One man dove off his wagon, rolling in the dirt like he had trained his entire life for this moment.
Esther’s hands flared with gold, her panic igniting her magic. Sparks shimmered under her skin, eager and wild.
Her thoughts spiraled. She clenched her eyes shut, bracing forBandit Explosion ACT II.
Panic always felt the same: heat, pressure, and the sense that something terrible was about to escape her, no matter how tightly she held on.
The bracelet pulsed once, like a warm, anchoring hug. Her magic softened and coiled inward instead of bursting outward. Nothing exploded. Nothing caught fire.
The calm didn’t erase the fear. It redirected it—channeling the surge into something survivable. Esther wondered, distantly, how often her mother had needed the same interruption.
Steel clashed ahead. Lyssara leapt from her horse, slicing an arrow mid-flight as if she had trained since birth to argue with projectiles.
Vorrik charged with all the grace of a drunken avalanche.
Teren immediately hid behind a barrel, pants stained with pee.
Nythir glanced toward her. “Essie. With me.”
