Page 144 of Feralheart

“I’m also tired of always doing the safe thing.”

“Sleep well, Fen.”

“You too.” I hesitated. “And Eradin? Tomorrow, when we both survive, ask me again what I want.”

“Maybe I will.”

I walked back to my tent with her small smile carving its way into my memory.

Back in my bed, I stared up at the tent fabric shifting in the wind.

I’d spent my life afraid of failing, my mother’s disappointment, and being anything other than what I’d been taught to be.

I was done with being afraid of the wrong things.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

ERADIN

Iwoke to gray light seeping through the cavern’s darkness, the weight of Selira’s wing draped across my shoulders, and something soft beneath my cheek that hadn’t been there when I’d fallen asleep.

My body protested movement. Every muscle I owned made itself known, and my palms stung where blisters had formed, popped, and reformed around the red lines.

I shifted, and Selira’s wing rose, letting me sit up.

A bedroll sat beside my pack. Not the thin, worn kind commons used when we traveled, but actual padding thick enough to make the ground comfortable and keep the cold away. Next to it, I found wrapped packages that looked like dried vegetables and bread. A full water flask with condensation beading on the outside. A pan and a magical lighter. Medical supplies in a leather pouch I definitely hadn’t brought with me.

Reece had the same setup beside him. Bedroll, food, supplies. So did Lyndie, who was already awake, running her fingers over the new blanket like she couldn’t quite believe it was real.

My gaze found Fen across the cavern, standing outside his tent. A servant approached him, and even from this distance I could read the tension in his shoulders when he gestured toward our section of camp.

He’d done this.

Last night he’d sat beside me in the sand and told me he had things he wanted to say to me. He’d burned his mother’s letter like a man cutting himself free from chains. And this morning he’d made sure three commons had what they needed.

The old wariness tried to surface, asking about the cost, what he might want in return, insisting this was a trap, but it felt hollow now. Habitual. A defense I’d built so well I kept reaching for it even when I didn’t need it.

My mother used to say the cruelest thing about the elite was that they saw us perfectly and chose not to care. But Fen kept looking, and every time he did, he chose differently than I’d been taught to expect.

That should terrify me, and maybe it did, a little. But mostly it made my chest lock and my hands uncertain where to settle.

Pride said I should refuse it all. Survival said I couldn’t afford to.

But deeper than either of those, a warmer, hopeful part of me whispered that this wasn’t about pride or survival at all. This was what it looked like when someone actually gave a damn whether you lived or died.

I tucked the supplies into my pack with care.

“Morning.”

I jumped at Lyndie’s voice. She’d walked over without me hearing. She settled cross-legged on the sand with her new bedroll in her lap. Her eyes flicked from the supplies to Fen and back to me.

“The prince is noticing you,” she said. “That’s either very good or very bad.”

I pulled the medical pouch closer, checking its contents. Salve that would keep my burn from festering. Bandages that might keep me alive long enough to see Tolross again. Tincture for pain. I’d coated my burned foot last night, but knew I’d run out of the two tins of salve he’d given me before the burn fully healed.

“He’s not noticing anything,” I said, though I knew that was a lie.

“Right.” Her tone said she didn’t believe me. “Princes don’t arrange tactical positioning for commons out of boredom.”