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“We’re on the road to Trec, not raider country.” Andry licked his dry lips and immediately regretted it when the cold hit them again. “Does she want us to abandon Prince Oscovko and look for allies elsewhere?”
Charlie scoffed. “Much as I dislike taking orders from dogmatic worshippers like Isadere, I wouldn’t put much stock in the witch’s song,” he said. “It won’t mean anything until she wants it to. Don’t waste your energy on witch chants and Jydi foolishness.”
Corayne eyed him sharply. “That Jydi foolishness pushed a kraken back into another realm,” she said, and Charlie threw up a hand.
“We should keep on as planned,” Sigil said, her strong voice booming from the head of the line. “The Treckish are good fighters, good enemies. They’ll be even better allies if we can sway Prince Oscovko to our cause.”
Andry nodded with her. “Even if he is a marauding drunk,” he said through gritted teeth.
Corayne only shrugged. “He can drink whatever he likes, so long as he helps us fight.”
Sigil’s laugh shuddered in the cold air. “In that, we have a good chance. Oscovko’s a warmonger. Spends more time with his mercenary war bands than on his throne.”
“One of the many reasons Erida turned him down,” Andry added. “He courted her for years, sending letters and all these awful gifts. He sentwolvesonce—real wolves. They terrorized the palace for weeks.” He laughed at the memory, shaking his head. “It didn’t go very well when they met, before—” He stumbled,the words going sour in his mouth. His manner dulled. “Before everything.”
Corayne leaned toward him, looking up into his face. She raised her brows, as if to coax the smile back to his face. “I didn’t know squires were so well trained in gossip,” she teased, poking him in the chest.
His cheeks went hot. “It’s impossible to escape, really.” He cleared his throat. “Most people at court had little else to do besides bicker and scheme. The knights most of all. Sir Grandel used to...”
Andry’s voice trailed away. His memories seemed to curl at the edges, rusting over, corrupted. Beneath them all lay Erida’s betrayal, and his own pain.
Corayne’s hand was warm on his forearm, fingers grasping over his sleeve.
“It’s all right,” she said, low and steady. “Tell me more.”
Andry swallowed around the lump in his throat. “Sir Grandel used to complain about Erida’s council meetings. Said they were just endless arguments about her betrothal.” In his mind, he saw Sir Grandel in his golden armor, his face red from exertion, the gray in his hair turning silver in the candlelight. “He used to complain about almost everything.”
And still he told me to run, told me to save myself.On the temple field, Sir Grandel had fallen fighting with his fellow knights. Dying for the Ward. Dying a hero. Andry could still hear his final words.With me.
“I wish I could have met him,” Corayne murmured. The coldwind stirred in her hair, and she drew her collar up, hugging herself for warmth.
Andry knew she mourned a ghost of her own, a face she tried to see in memories.It isn’t fair, Andry thought.I knew her father and she never did. None of this will ever be fair.
Corayne offered up a weary smile.
Despite the cold, a burst of warmth flared in Andry’s chest. Corayne was familiar as his own face now, after months on the road together. But her smile still ran him through, piercing as a blade. It was almost exhausting, to be so overcome by every flash of teeth.
“Oscovko will help us,” Andry said, if only to convince himself. “He has to. His war bands don’t turn from a fight.”
“The war bands used to try the Temurijon too,” Sigil called out, turning in the saddle. Her booming voice broke the quiet around them. “But even they will not dare break the Emperor’s peace. The border has been quiet for twenty years.”
Today she wore all her leather armor, and her ax on her back instead of tied with her saddlebags. She looked ready for a fight too.
“What about you, Trelland?” she asked, angling toward him. “Trec has had its fair share of troubles with Galland as well.”
“I don’t know if I’m Gallish anymore,” Andry murmured, feeling the sting of it in his heart.
He wondered at their path since the capital—through criminal havens and perilous seas, across endless desert, and now hundreds of miles along the mountains. From his queen’s most dutiful squire to one of her most fervent enemies.
“Erida betrayed the realm,” Corayne said in a low voice. She nudged his shoulder, leaning into the space between their horses. “And she betrayed you. Not the other way around.”
Andry tried to take her words to heart, to let them fill him with some resolve. He gritted his teeth and nodded back at her, forcing a smile he could not feel, even for Corayne’s sake.
As a squire in the queen’s palace, Andry had spent much of his time in the training yard, learning to swordfight, ride a horse, or brawl with his own two hands. But the squires were not ignorant of the world, or the court. Their lessons in the classroom were just as important as their training, with most knights relying on their wits as much as their swords. As such, Andry had learned his histories, the politics of the Ward, and good etiquette alongside how to clean armor and tend horses. Most of the squires cared little for their education, their eyes drawn to the windows, dreaming of the barracks or the alehouse. Not Andry Trelland. He bent to his work diligently, studying his books as much as his swordplay.
It was why he felt a shiver when they passed into the kingdom of Trec.
He looked down at his tunic, the blue star poking out between the folds of his cloak. With a twitch, he pulled on the fabric, hiding the emblem of his father and a Gallish knight.
