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I let my arms drop. “What do you know about relationships, Averee? You’re so hostile, no guys ever want to get near you,” I growled, striking at the jugular with my words instead of my staff. In the heat of the moment, I can’t remember what else either of us said to the other; all I know is that the instructor had to pull us out of the ring after I’d given her a bloody noseand threatened to do worse. After that, Averee stopped coming to trainings and cut off all contact. I hadn’t seen her since.

Until now.

“The king’s holding Lila hostage,” I admitted, dropping my head into my hands at the table. Despite our fight months ago, I knew I could still trust Averee with this. She may not like me, but she’d never betray me. We’d saved each other’s lives too many times to break the invisible ties that connected us.

“Wait,what?”

I didn’t look up. Memories of the Kovak guards dragging Lila away, her eyes filling with tears, her screams echoing in the hallway pounded against the inside of my skull. I couldn’t save her then. And now, my only hope to keep her alive involved stealing some map from the guard commander’s prisoner. A task I didn’t want to admit might be impossible.

Averee spoke when I didn’t respond. “I don’t understand. He’s holding Lila hostage to force you to spy on the Rathalans?” Nya was settled at our feet, her perked ears indicating she was listening. “So, you bought a spell from a Magi to disguise yourself as a Rathalan and make Kah invisible so you could sneak into Malengard?”

“Something like that.”

She gave me a dubious look. “Why you, though? He could have sent anyone,” she said, leaning closer and dropping her voice to a whisper as two men walked past us into the tavern.

The kinghadsent others, I’d learned later. Months before, he requested a meeting with ten of the most skilled warriors, and they’d left the city shortly afterward. I recalled the timing because it happened right after I’d met Lila. I’d learned later that the king had sent them to the four corners of Eastlandra to track down the stone. None had succeeded, which is why he came to find me. When I refused, that’s when he took Lila. As “collateral,” he’d said.

“Because—”

“We know,” Averee said, rolling her eyes. “Because you’re the best in our training class.” She was still sore about that, apparently.

The truth was, I’d been training since I was seven, and this was the first time that Ididn’twant to be the best.

“What have you seen inside Malengard?” Averee asked.

“It’s not good. They’re building an army.” The vision was burned in my memory. South of the Obsidian Tower, the barren landscape was overtaken by what looked like a growing colony of black ants.

“So, the rumorsaretrue.” Her eyes were wide.

“The army isn’t that large yet, from what I can tell. They don’t seem to have the numbers to launch a widespread attack. But I overheard that Thrailkull is planning one. We need to get word to Askeland and find a way to warn the other tribes too.”

Averee didn’t hesitate. “I’ll inform the End Guards before I leave here—I mean, since you look likethat.” She nodded at my appearance. “They’ll find a way to send word to the tribal kingdoms—if they believe me. But Jeddak, I don’t know if the bear king will even heed such news.” A worried look crossed Averee’s face. “You of all people know he’s been acting strange lately, since the queen died …” She trailed off, watching me to see if I’d already made the connection between the events.

I had.

He’d always been keen and iron-willed, but he’d ruled our kingdom evenhandedly and unselfishly. Until the weight of his grief had consumed every scrap of his tolerance, leaving behind a man almost as power-hungry and deceitful as Thrailkull.

Averee continued, “His gaze is fixed on the neighboring Terran kingdom. My father said the king’s planning to wage war against them unless they surrender the city of Jetan to us.”

My eyebrows rose. This was news to me. I didn’t know the king’s hatred of the Terrans had reached such a boiling point. The ancient rift between the Kovaks and the Terrans had been raging for centuries, ever since the Terrans sieged the Kovaks’ twin cities, Jetan and Javan, during the Iron Wars. Our people were pushed out of our own lands, which divided and weakened the strength of our tribe. Some of our ancestors moved east to establish Kadden, while the others trekked northwest over the mountains to found Askeland.

Now, Javan lay in ruins at the eastern foothills of the Annundu Mountains, but Jetan had become a thriving Terran metropolis—salt in the deep wound of the Kovaks.

“The Tribal Peace Accords would never allow it,” I said.

“The king doesn’t care about the accords! He’s obsessed with rebuilding the twin cities and reclaiming the lost territory of the Kovaks.”

“But if we break the accords, all the other tribal kingdoms will rise up against us. Not to mention, the Terrans could probably raze Askeland with a single earthquake like they did at Javan long ago.”

“That could be why he wants the stone,” Kah said to me through the necklace. “If the king thought possessing a stone of power during battle could assure his victory, then he would go to great lengths to attain it.”

Kah was on to something.

“That’s why I’m here,” Averee said, unable to hear Kah.

“What do you mean?”

“I came here with my father. As the seneschal, you know, it’s his duty to carry out the bear king’s will. But my father’s secretly opposed to war. A war against the Terrans will weaken all the tribal kingdoms and make Eastlandra vulnerable to attack from the Rathalans. If what you say is true, the Rathalans are rising in power faster than we thought. They’re building an army on ourdoorstep.” She waved her hand in the direction of Malengard. “I don’t like the Terrans any more than the next Kovak, but the king’s focus should be on Malengard, not Jetan.”