Bash strides toward the thrones and eyes me strangely, as if it’s unusual to find me here. It is, I suppose. This is not the time or place for florists.
“Merit’s company was ambushed on their way back from Dreah,” the king says.
Card reaches my side and nudges our elbows together. It’s a comfort, a solidarity I need to keep myself together.
“And? Where is he?” Bastion asks.
“The captain set out with a search party but they’ve yet to return.”
“Why are the girls here?”
“Nettle found Miss Farrow near the explosion site just north of here.”
Bash whips to me and places his hands on his hips. He presses his lips together like it’ll stop his emotions from bursting out. I know that look. It’s actually not too dissimilar from the way he looks when someone brings up Will.
“Fliss? Why didn’t you tell us you were going north today? We could have come with you,” Bash says.
Both Card and Bash look at me expectantly.Oh, I was just meeting your worst enemy for a cute day trip to buy flowers and eat soup and learn sorcery and have the most agonizing almost-kiss moment.Luckily, I don’t have to say any of that. I have a suitably truthful answer.
“I bought you a wedding present,” I whisper and motion to my basket, the sprig of hawthorn a sad reminder of how my day was going before this.
Bash does that thing that only happens around Card. His temper thaws, and the rigid chains keeping his shoulders tight loosen their grip. He softens.
“Are you okay?” Bastion asks me.
Am I?
“I don’t know…”
My answer is drowned out by the arrival of grinding metal footsteps. Ava leads a group of guards into the Grand Hall, including Tarin and Howell who I heard in the forest. In Howell’s arms, Merit lies as unconscious as I last saw him. I immediately eye his leg and clasp a hand to my mouth to hide the shock. The slice in his thigh, the one that stained my hands and threatened his life, is completely healed over. Merely a simple red line on an otherwise unharmed prince. His trousers are still ripped and soaked through, but—Gods, Will. You healed him. You used what little time you had before the guards arrived to save him instead of saving yourself and I can’t tell anyone.
“Oh! My baby!” the queen cries, flying past Bash, Card, and me to take Merit’s face in her hands. She pushes his black hair back anxiously. “Is he okay? What happened?”
“Your Majesty,” Ava says, and beginning her formal salute by forming a fist over her heart where—
An uncontrollable surge of surprise forces a laugh out of me. Oh, Will. Thecheekof it. There, tucked right in the top plate of Ava’s armor, is a hawthorn blossom. Is it the same one I gave him, or would he want to keep that? Either way, it has my heart soaring. He must have taken note when I told Pigeon that I know Ava. Is it a message? Does he know that the hawthorn blossoms mean hope?
Card shifts at my side.
“Prince Merit needs rest, but he doesn’t have any serious injuries,” Ava continues. “However, we found him in the company of Willoh Vane.”
“Will?Of course,” Bash spits out.
“We don’t know if it was a coincidence. He wasn’t willing to cooperate,” Ava says.
Of course he wasn’t. But I’m sure he was willing to stall and give me time to get as far away as possible.
“Howell, take Merit to his room. Tarin, call for the physician,”the queen orders, then ushers Ava forward. “Please, Captain, tell us everything.”
Ava dismisses her guards and joins us by the thrones. When she finds me among the group, her eyes sweep up and down my body as if checking for any wounds. I must look a state then. I’ll probably find tears in my clothes and leaves in my hair when I get home.
“When we searched the site of the attack, we found metal and phosphorus debris but no trace of the rebels. A few of the guards accompanying the prince were unconscious and some sustained minor injuries. They were able to tell us that the caravan of Dreyan food supplies en route with the prince had been raided. However, there had been a larger explosion when a leaking barrel of alcohol caught fire, after which the rebels retreated.”
That sounds like an accident…a bad one. After seeing what the explosion did to Merit, I hope Pigeon is okay. I’m glad I was able to keep quiet about her.
“One of the guards was able to point us in the direction that the prince fled. We eventually found him unconscious on the coastal road with Willoh Vane.”
“Did he say anything? Was he involved in the attack, do you think?” Queen Fern asks with stark focus.
