“At least tell us before you run off to rescue another stray,” Aran continued. “A heads up would be nice.”
“She’s not a stray.” I glanced down at her. ”I’m Kera, what’s your name?”
Her lips moved slowly, the word catching on her breath before it made it out. “Kalani,” she whispered.
I nodded once, then looked back up at the boys. “That’s Will. And that’s Aran.”
I turned fully to Aran, heat rising in my chest. “And he doesn’t tell me every time he sees something shiny and sneaks off, so why should I have to?”
Aran blinked. His jaw twitched like he wanted to argue, but the words didn’t come.
“No,” he muttered. “But I don’t come back soaked in blood.”
Kalani stirred beside me.
“Kera,” she repeated, tasting the name like it unlocked something. Her brows pulled together. “That sounds… familiar. Why does that sound familiar?”
“It does?” I asked softly, but my chest was already tightening.
She looked up at me, and then I saw it. The moment it landed.
Her eyes widened. “You’re Licia’s friends.”
The world tilted.
“What?” I breathed. My voice cracked.
Beside me, Aran stiffened. “Did she just say—?”
He glanced between me and Will, as if trying to confirm he wasn’t hearing things.
“You know Licia?” I asked, the words tumbling out in pieces. “Licia Warlin?”
Kalani nodded. Once. Then again, faster. “She told me about you. All of you,” she said. “She still dreams of you, Kera. She used to talk about you all the time. About Will. Aran. Everything you did together. She never forgot.”
“We never forgot her either,” Will added.
Kalani’s eyes brightened, her voice picking up speed, like something in her had been cracked open. “It makes sense now. That’s why she ran when she did. That’s why she fought so hard. She must’ve felt you coming. She must have known you were close.”
I blinked. “She ran?”
Kalani nodded. “Sheplannedit. I just followed. But the guards caught us. She fought them off so I could get away.”
The breath left me. A dull ache bloomed in my chest. She got caught… because she was trying to find me.
“She used to tell me stories,” Kalani whispered. “About Vestance. About the time Will fell through a frozen lake and you saved him. About the paintings she made of you. And the doom.”
That word stopped me cold.
“The doom?”
“That’s what she called it. The fire. The screaming. The smoke.”
The sacking of Novil. Shehadseen it. Somehow, she had seen it.
Will exhaled, rubbing at his eyes like it took effort just to stay standing. “So, you know where she is?” he asked finally. His voice had steadied, but the look in his eyes hadn’t.
Kalani hesitated. I could feel her body tense beside me. “It’s called the theatre,” she said. “But it’s not really a theatre. It’s… it’s horrible. A prison.”
