His eyes narrowed before glancing back toward the street, like he was expecting someone to be listening. “Which is where?”
I only lifted a shoulder, studying the split edges of my nails. “He didn’t say.”
His eyes snapped back to me. “Interesting.”
“So,” I turned to him, “you’re not even a little curious how Reve knows the king’s plans?”
Callum exhaled. “He probably overheard it. Or it’s another tavern rumor. You know how these things spread.”
“Aren’t you curious,” I pressed, “whyyouhaven’t heard it?”
He met my stare then. “That’s exactly why it’s likely untrue.” A subtle shift ran through his posture, the smallest correction of his collar. His universal sign for don’t push me. “You can’t take every whisper as gospel, V. Not every story told in the dark is prophecy.”
My mouth curved, not quite a smile. “Maybe not. But some of them start that way.” I caught his arm as he started toward the road, dragging him back a step. “We need to move faster. If Obrann finds the heir before we do, he’lldestroythem. The kingdoms will crumble and Selvarra willburn.”
He shook me off, jaw tight. “I will talk to everyone.”
It was simple to see his focus was cracked, his thoughts still snagged on Nezra and what she knew.
I cut where it would land deepest. “Think of Elva, Cal.”
His stride broke mid-step, boots scuffing right on the edge of the alley. The last sliver of sun spilled over him, coating his body in a burnished flare as he looked to me, staring a moment too long. “That is all I do.”
I exhaled. “We’re running out of time. We need to act now.”
He dragged a hand across his mouth before murmuring, too soft for even the wind to carry, “Faster than you know.”
The last of the light faded with him as he stepped out of the alley, leaving me alone, where darkness roused, brushing against my spine.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Verena
IT HAD BEEN DAYS SINCE THE TAVERN, since Nezra’s song and the past she had shown me.
Callum had been scarce, only a handful of brief run-ins in the palace halls.
It felt deliberate. Every time our paths crossed, he was suddenly gone again, rushing somewhere that didn’t matter.
I squeezed my eyes shut, leaning against the boulder. The view overlooked the brook running through the Roux Forest’s heart, silver water slipping over stone, shaping its way toward the Indra Mountain.
One day, I would follow it to its end, beyond the peaks, beyond the edge of what everyone feared, to whatever waited once the water was finally free enough to become something grander.
Wind whipped through the trees, slicing across my cheeks until they burned red and raw. The winter singers had begun harmonizing, a more relaxed trance than Nezra’s, soft enough to draw me toward sleep. They circled the peak in the distance, suddenly making it feel not so far away.
The unknown of the wood never stirred dread in me. Not even when it maybe should have. For a brief, heartbreaking moment, this place had been my home.
The shadows everyone else was afraid of, they had shielded me.
I wondered if the forest had been this calm on the day I was left here. If the birds sang, if the brook whispered. If the woman I often dreamed about had hesitated with me in her arms—
Or if she never looked back.
My eyes shot open when the birds had gone quiet, their songs swallowed by fog that settled in the gaps of the trees.
The air was crisp enough to raise chills along my skin, yet the fog carried a strange warmth, wrapping me, chasing them away.
I rose cautiously. There was no movement, no sound. I was abandoned. The same as that day.
