But Aelin stood alone on the prow, her golden hair unbound and flowing behind her, so still that she might have been the twin to the figurehead mere feet beneath. The rising sun cast her in shimmering gold, no hint of the moonfire that had threatened to destroy them all.

But even as the queen stood undimming before the shadows of the world … a lick of cold traced the contours of Dorian’s heart.

And he wondered if Aelin was somehow watching the archipelago, and the seas, and the skies, as if she might never see them again.

Three days later, they were nearly out of the archipelago’s strangling grasp. Dorian was again at the helm, Aelin at the prow, the others scattered on various rounds of scouting and resting.

His magic felt it before he did. A sense of awareness, of warning and awakening.

He scanned the horizon. The Fae warriors fell silent before the others.

It looked like a cloud at first—a wind-tossed little cloud on the horizon. Then a large bird.

When the sailors began rushing for their weapons, Dorian’s mind at last spat out a name for the beast that swept toward them on shimmering, wide wings. Wyvern.

There was only one. And only one rider atop it. A rider who did not move, whose white hair was unbound—listing toward the side. As the rider now was.

The wyvern dropped lower, skimming over the water. Lysandra was instantly ready, waiting for the queen’s order to shift into whatever form would fight it—

“No.” The word ripped from Dorian’s lips before he could think. But then it came out, over and over, as the wyvern and rider sailed closer to the ship.

The witch was unconscious, her body leaning to the side because she was not awake, because that was blue blood all over her. Don’t shoot; don’t shoot—

Dorian was roaring the order as he hurtled for where Fenrys had drawn his longbow, a black-tipped arrow aimed at the witch’s exposed neck. His words were swallowed by the shouting of the sailors and their captain. Dorian’s magic swelled as he unsheathed Damaris—

But then Aelin’s voice cut over the fray—Hold your fire!

All of them halted. The wyvern sailed close, then banked, circling the boat.

Blue blood crusted the beast’s scarred sides. So much blood. The witch was barely in the saddle. Her tan face was leeched of color, her lips paler than whale bone.

The wyvern completed its circle, sweeping lower this time, readying to land as near the boat as possible. Not to attack … but for help.

One moment, the wyvern was soaring smoothly over the cobalt waves. Then the witch listed so far that her body seemed to go boneless. As if in that heartbeat, when help was mere feet away, whatever luck had kept her astride at last abandoned her.

Silence fell on the ship as Manon Blackbeak tumbled from her saddle, falling through wind and spindrift, and hit the water.

PART TWO

FIREHEART

40

The smoke had been stinging Elide’s eyes for the better part of the gray muggy morning.

Just farmers burning fields left to fallow, Molly had claimed, so the ashes might fertilize the earth for next year’s harvest. They had to be miles away, but the smoke and ash would travel far on the brisk northward wind. The wind that led home to Terrasen.

But they weren’t headed to Terrasen. They were headed due east, straight toward the coast.

Soon she’d have to cut northward. They had passed through one town—only one, and its denizens had already been fatigued of roving carnivals and performers. Even with the night barely under way, Elide already knew they would likely only make enough money to cover their expenses for staying.

She had attracted a grand total of four customers to her little tent so far, mostly young men looking to know which of the village girls fancied them, barely noticing that Elide—beneath the makeup pasted thick as cream on her face—was no older than they were. They’d scampered off when their friends had rushed by, whispering through the star-painted flaps that a swordsman was putting on the show of a lifetime, and his arms were nearly the size of tree trunks.

Elide had glowered, both at the feckless young men who vanished—one without paying—and at Lorcan, for stealing the show.

She waited all of two minutes before shoving out of the tent, the enormous, ridiculous headdress Molly had plunked on her hair snagging on the flaps. Bits of dangling beads and charms hung from the arching crest, and Elide batted them out of her eyes, nearly tripping over her matching bloodred robes as she went to see what all the fuss was about.

If the young men of the town had been impressed by Lorcan’s muscles, it was nothing on what those muscles were doing to the young women.

And older women, Elide realized, not bothering to squeeze through the tightly packed crowd before the makeshift stage on which Lorcan stood, juggling and throwing swords and knives.

Lorcan was not a natural performer. No, he had the gall to actually look bored up there, bordering on outright sullen.

But what he lacked in charm he made up for with his shirtless, oiled body. And holy gods…

Lorcan made the young men who had visited her tent look like … children.

He balanced and hurled his weapons as if they were nothing, and she had the feeling the warrior was merely going through one of his daily exercise routines. But the crowd still oohed and aahed at every twist and toss and catch, and coins still trickled into the pan at the edge of the stage.

With the torches around him, Lorcan’s dark hair seemed to swallow the light, his onyx eyes flat and dull. Elide wondered if he was contemplating the murder of everyone drooling over him like dogs around a bone. She couldn’t blame him.

A trickle of sweat slid through the crisp spattering of dark hair on his sculpted chest. Elide watched, a bit transfixed, as that bead of sweat wended down the muscled grooves of his stomach. Lower.

No better than those ogling women, she said to herself, about to head back into her tent when Molly observed from beside her, “Your husband could just be sitting up there, fixing your stockings, and women would empty their pockets for the chance to stare at him.”

“He had that effect wherever we went with our former carnival,” Elide lied.

Molly clicked her tongue. “You’re lucky,” she murmured as Lorcan hurled his sword high in the air and people gasped, “that he still looks at you the way he does.”

Elide wondered if Lorcan would look at her at all if she told him what her name was, who she was, what she carried. He’d slept on the floor of the tent each night—not that she’d ever once bothered to offer him the roll. He usually came in after she’d fallen asleep, and left before she awoke. To do what, she had no idea—perhaps exercise, since his body was … like that.

Lorcan chucked three knives in the air, bowing without one bit of humility or amusement to the crowd. They gasped again as the blades aimed for his exposed spine.

But in an easy, beautiful maneuver, Lorcan rolled, catching each blade, one after another.

The crowd cheered, and Lorcan coolly looked at his pan of coins.

More copper—and some silver—flowed, like the patter of rain.

Molly let out a low laugh. “Desire and fear can loosen any purse strings.” A sharp glance. “Shouldn’t you be in your tent?”

Elide didn’t bother responding as she left, and could have sworn she felt Lorcan’s gaze narrow on her, on the headdress and swaying beads, on the long, voluminous robes. She kept going, and endured a few more young men—and some young women—asking about their love lives before she found herself again alone in that silly tent, the dark only illuminated by dangling crystal orbs with tiny candles inside.