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“Stand back,” he warned. “Or I shall make you.”

They wavered, put at a disadvantage. The Queen of Autumn or the First Knight? Whom to obey?

I doubted Aire blamed them when they charged. Whirling his swords, he collided with the men and women, blades ringing in the orchard, the stars glaring.

He clashed with three at a time, moving like a gale. He sliced a thigh, gashed an arm. Two blades struck out at once, and his spine arched, his head thrown backward to avoid the cut.

I’d had only a month of training. I brandished smaller weapons.

I hurled myself into it anyway. My back hit Aire’s as he righted himself, and together, we fought.

More like, I swatted my hatchets in front of my face and—oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!—prayed that I’d hit something. Lyrik grunted, his dagger jabbing into the path of a soldier. Punk stabbed a hand, an ear.

I couldn’t see Nicu. The knights must know not to harm him.

I thought so, and I hoped so, until his scream pierced the air.

33

Honesty

The turmoil ceased, the musical wail rending the orchard. For an intake of breath, I replayed the previous seconds, bearing witness to the incident seconds prior to its end, too late to leap and save a friend.

It had happened like this: Nicu was too small, in spite of his age, so that my brother-in-arms had not known the young man stood there. The blade was long and curved, and its point had been intended perhaps for me or Aspen.

Nicu tossed himself into the swarm of bodies, without thought to who held which weapon, who was good or bad, who meant harm to whom. Purely, he wanted to assist, to curb the fighting, as I knew him to be a peace-maker, the dreamer of a brighter world than any of us could conjure, even his family.

In the confusion, the knight swung, and a sound ripped into the orchard—that of Lyrik’s guttural roar. Seeing the weapon’s blind destination, the squatter vaulted, shoving Nicu out of the way and placing himself in its path.

The blade tore a minor slash of red across Nicu’s cheek, but no worse.

The rest befell Lyrik, a lash that pierced clear through his pectoral, close to his heart. It caused him to hunch and go still—for but a moment. A wild rage had overtaken him, his eyes wells of black, conscious of nothing, except for one thing.

I knew the look of vengeance, the obscene grip of it. That, above all things, propelled Lyrik into one final action. This, because he had not known whether Nicu escaped injury. He had not ascertained whether his interception met with success.

Accident or not, Lyrik was not done with the soldier. As the blade impaled the squatter, so did his dagger strike the soldier, a brutal and highly intentional motion, a punishing jab of that weapon straight into the knight’s shoulder.

The man withdrew his blade from Lyrik’s body, then landed on his knees, a slick stream running from the wound. To be sure, Lyrik would have finished the job, his fury reaching those heights, his face twisted and ready for it.

The reverberation from Nicu’s lips halted any excess bloodshed, yanking us all to the surface. Our weapons hung heavily. My friend wobbled, droplets leaking from his cheekbone, which he paid no mind to.

In the upheaval, Nicu’s presence had escaped my thoughts. I had been focused only on Aspen, because as she had proven to me: I was not a perfect soldier.

Nor could I be everyone’s savior. Although I would never stop trying, I might forgive myself whenever I faltered.

Yet Lyrik had not forgotten Nicu’s presence. Indeed, the rogue had saved him.

Glimpsing Nicu’s living face at last, Lyrik’s mouth slung into a wry grin. At which point, he grappled for his mangled chest, which oozed from both sides, and then toppled over with such expediency that Nicu gave a cry, crumbling to the ground beside him.

My friend cradled the squatter’s face and called his name, and called it again, and again. “Lyrik!” he shrieked. “No, no, no, please! Lyrik, wake up! Please, wake up!”

Lyrik’s head slumped, and his eyes shut, seeming almost at peace.

A howl of grief broke from Nicu’s throat, extending beyond the apple trees. I knew that sound well, because I’d made that same sound once. He held the potioneer and wept, and in between weeping, he sang. Were it not for our rapid exhalations, the melody would have overtaken this orchard completely.

Aspen, whose face I lacked the courage to drink in, crouched at Nicu’s side, wrapping her arms around him from behind.

I stabbed my sword into the ground and knelt. As my friend sobbed and sang into the night, I wondered how it had come to this, this fault of no one’s and everyone’s.