“Seize him.”
The word hit the stair like a hammer. Men moved before the air had time to cool—boots, armor, the flash of metal. For a second the palace felt less like stone and more like a throat closing in on itself.
“Now!” the captain barked, and the sound scattered the courtiers into motion.
I didn’t wait to see whether the captain meant me. I grabbed Liora’s wrist and ran.
“Kael—” she gasped, breath bright and small in the cold air. Her braid slapped against her shoulder as she turned her head to look at me; those green eyes—clear, stubborn—were wide with that fierce mix of fear and resolve she always had. The thing that made me want to protect her wasn’t only that she’d stood by me; it was the way she looked at the world with quiet measurement, like a surgeon testing a pulse. She d
