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Dawsyn fumes silently. She has many questions. How did he escape the palace? How is it that human guards have managed to track a man with wings? But if those guards are about to descend upon them, only one question matters: “How many?”

“Five, maybe six.”

Dawsyn’s shoulders settle. “Simple quarry. They will be weary.”

Ryon nods, looking down at his hand. In it, he holds her ax. In her desperation to flee him, she must have left it behind. Some small part of her mind notes that this is a first. Like a gesture of truce, Ryon holds it out to her.

She closes the distance between them in seconds and snatches it, a scowl on her face. “I should leave you here to take care them yourself. You led them here, after all.”

“Would you believe me if I told you that I needed your help getting rid of them?”

She stares at him, baffled.

Ryon sighs. “It is the truth.”

“The truth is not something I can trust from you.”

From out of the mist below come the guards. Their ridiculously weighted Terrsaw armour glinting in the weak dawn light, immediately giving away their position. Out here in the elements, they are hardly seasoned fighters. They could be outsmarted in seconds.

And time is of the essence. She cannot afford to tarry. “Baltisse is hurt,” Dawsyn tells Ryon, without preamble.

Ryon’s eyes widen. “Baltisse? She is here?”

“She came with me,” Dawsyn says. “She needs help.”

“Damn it,” he grunts, then holds out his hand. “Will you lend me a weapon?”

Dawsyn takes a small blade from her belt and flings it at him with deliberate carelessness.

He catches it anyway, then grimaces at its size.

“Let’s make this quick,” Dawsyn says, advancing forward.

The Terrsaw guards branch outward at the sight of Dawsyn and Ryon’s advance, though neither have their weapons raised. The expressions of the soldiers show how unaware they are of their disadvantage. Dawsyn and Ryon have the higher ground, and neither of them slip on the slope the way the guards do, their feet so unaccustomed to the tendencies of uneven terrain.

Dawsyn does not pause in her approach, and so the guards pull forth their swords, shouting for her to halt. The guard in front, the only one with the foresight to don a thick hood, calls loudest. Her voice is feminine. Familiar. “Dawsyn Sabar, wait–”

But one guard foolishly storms the hill alone toward her. With barely a look in his direction Dawsyn ducks and slices the side of his thigh with the corner of her ax blade.

The next guard roars at the sight of his downed comrade and swings his sword through the air toward Ryon. The Glacian steps back and then lunges forward, catching the soldier in the chest and easily knocking the sword from his hand. Seconds later, the guard is tumbling downhill, Ryon holding his weapon as a prize.

Dawsyn swings her ax toward another who hesitates, his feet inching back and forth with uncertainty. She remains still and tilts her head at him as he dithers, a wolf observing its kill. Then she raises the ax in line with his head.

“STOP!” shouts the leader, her sword drawn, but her feet edging backward. “I said halt!”

They all freeze. The remaining guards, who have yet to engage Dawsyn or Ryon, back away, their weapons raised, but obviously reluctant.

Dawsyn eyes the leader, shifting the butt of the ax toward her. “I know you,” she says, her voice dispassionate. “Ruby, yes?”

The guard raises her hands, dropping her sword into the snow. Dawsyn stares at it, surprised. Perhaps Terrsaw soldiers are not half as courageous as she imagined. Or maybe they have more sense than valour.

The soldier lowers her hood, and the captain of the guard meets Dawsyn’s eyes, swallows. “Peace,” she says.

Dawsyn tsks. “Was Queen Alvira so willing to see me recaptured that she would dispense of her finest soldier?”

Ruby grimaces, hands twitching. Her discomfort at being unarmed is clear. “You underestimate how threatened Her Majesty is by your escape.”

Dawsyn nods. Good. “And how threatened will she feel when the captain of her guard does not return to the palace?”