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“Let’s try again,” I suggested.

“All right,” he said. “If I may, I would hear you first.”

“Thank you for what you did. For defending me and Nicu and Lyrik against your troops. It must have been awful to turn on them.”

“It proved far easier than when I turned on you in the colony. My choice last night was not a generous one. I confess, I wasn’t thinking of Nicu or Lyrik.” He met my gaze. “I only thought of you.”

My nostrils flared, inhaling mist and soil.

He took my hand, exposed my lifeline, and slid his finger along the strange grooves curling into my flesh. “I could not bear the thought of seeing you harmed. I would not let them near you, no matter what you’ve done, and no matter the consequences.”

“What will the Crown do to you?”

“Nothing that I won’t accept. It was worth it.”

I sucked in tears. “I’m sorry, Aire. I’m so sorry.”

“As am I for not defending you sooner, for letting my grief interfere.” He winced, his eyes clenching shut. “Aspen, I would beg your forgiveness—”

“You had every right—”

“I’ve exercised that right beyond what is fair. I did not listen to you. I did not consider your pleas. I rejoiced, seeing you cower in the throne room. I denied what we shared, belittling it to the court. When you spoke up, it unhinged me, and when you escaped, I took leave of my senses. But please,pleaseknow, that I would never strike you down. I would never hurt you.”

“I know that.”

He swiped a thumb across my palm. “You were always real to me.”

Past tense. I had been real to him.

In the graveyard, on the castle training yard, in the pumpkin wood, in the treehouses, in the forest, by the fireside, in the candlelight, in the mist, in the morning and at night, I had been real to him.

More importantly, I should have been real to myself.

My words might have been lies, but my skin never was. My woodskin had been real. It had been mine. It had been me.

My mother had loved it. Punk had loved it.

Aire had cared for it. Even if he never loved it, he’d cared for it.

I’d always been a real girl to them.

But I couldn’t go back. Neither could he.

We could forgive each other, but we couldn’t forget. We could say the truth from now on, but one truth still pressed between us. The one thing I’d said too late, and the one thing he might never say.

Caring for me wasn’t enough. His actions in the last couple of days told me plenty. He couldn’t move on, couldn’t release his past, couldn’t let her go.

And I couldn’t hold on. Not anymore.

We’d been living in a fantasy for a while, but this was our reality now. We’d serve our punishments and go our separate ways. I knew that, as surely as he did. But I didn’t regret a single moment.

I scooped his face into my palms. “You were real to me, too.”

His falcon brows fastened together in pain. He gripped my waist, tugged me closer, and pleaded, “Do not go. I’m begging you.”

I rubbed my nose against his. “I won’t forget meeting a knight in the darkness.”

He nodded. “I shall not forget meeting a lumber maiden in starlight.”