Page 78 of Taken By Shadows

“Well, not all the details. Just the end.”

That was even stranger. Why the end? Surely that would be the part that made the most sense to celebrate, to pontificate over.

“The Aurorans were beaten.” Gavrin flicked his eyes to me. “That’s all that matters.”

I looked up at him, wondering if there was any way to pull what I wanted from his defensive stance.

“Geology is not my forte, but it’s interesting.” Audrie tried to banish the tension that had poured from Gavrin. “I’m happy to stay and read a while longer if you both want to leave.”

I pulled at the end of my braid, dipping my chin to hide a sheepish look.

Gavrin and I exchanged a glance, and then we shifted our gazes to Audrie. I wasn’t about to abandon her here.

“Don’t look at me like that. I’m not the one under house arrest, or whatever it is Kaedian is calling it,” she said.

A bubble of laughter escaped me as I said, “I’m not under house arrest. He’s just being—”

“Kaed,” Gavrin supplied. “He’s being Kaed.”

“And he is the one who is under city arrest,” I clarified.

“Which essentially amounts to nothing? Right?” Audrie had seemed confused earlier by the concept of being under city arrest. And she was right to be.

I wasn’t sure about their decision either. Or how the council would enforce it. It seemed like a risky move to hold the Prince of the Northern Corner. My mind still reeled at that title. I refused to call him “my Lord” from the start with anything other than heavy sarcasm. But there was never going to be a truth where I called him “my Prince.” But maybe it had been the council’s only card. The Eastern Corner had once held its own Crown. Though long ago, Viverna had been the seat of that power. So perhaps handing over all power to a single Crown was something they were still chafing against.

“Isn’t the king upset over this? Would he not care that the pr—Kaed is being held?”

Gavrin scoffed, and Audrie looked to him, biting her cheek.

“The king doesn’t really leave Hayden. He hasn’t since the war ended. Or rather, since it began,” she said with deliberate quiet.

My brow raised in question.

“He, well …” Audrie looked to Gavrin again. He nodded in affirmation. What was so private about all this that Audrie felt compelled to check with Gavrin? “The king has always used his sons as soldiers, spearheads on the front lines during the Two-Hundred-Year War.”

“So why would now be any different?” I finished for her.

Audrie nodded.

So Kaed was a bargaining chip for the Vivernan council and a pawn for his father. A cold knot settled in my throat, but I swallowed against it.

Over the past few days, news of the trade routes shutting down from Hayden had reached Viverna, and Kaed was to appear before the council this week as the representative and Prince of Hayden and the Northern Crown. It was still a heavy weight in my hands to know he was the heir to the Northern Crown. It hadn’t dredged up any reverence in me for my kidnapper, but it was a strange knowledge to have alongside my first impression of him. I didn’t know if he would attend the meetings because he had to as a political prisoner of the city, or if he wanted to. Maybe he genuinely cared whether or not trade and peace were upheld with Hayden.

From the little Audrie had told me of his father before now, I wasn’t sure I’d ever want to negotiate with him. If he thought punishing his own son was the answer to good parenting, I would hate to think what he thought good politics was. And if he was happy for his son to bear the weight of his crown, then maybe he really was more of a king in name and not deed.

Knowing I was now held by not just the prince but, by extension, the King of the Northern Corner, turned my skin cold. I hadn’t felt the iron bars of my captivity; I had never been caged in quite so literal a sense as Kaed had been. But the looming aura of the Crown was something difficult to ignore.

“Where are you going?” Gavrin asked, brow stern as I stood.

“I just need a little space.” I didn’t bother turning back, and no one followed me.

The stillness of the pages and the gentle breathing of the living forest shaft offered more peace than the history I’d scratched at.

Roving through stacks, I ran my fingers along the countless beaten spines of the leather books. Some of them were so old that they were cracked and hardly holding the pages together.

I passed dozens of scholars, readers and Silent Servants of the library, all of them reverent and eyes downcast or noses pressed to the pages before them.

I found my way to one of the many balconies that had dotted the facade of the tower. The sun was beaming down from the sky as I walked onto the hanging terrace. Above me were streamers of green and mossy curtains from the balconies above.