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“I am close with my sisters, but they do not have the numbers to help us make a significant difference, and we have no room to house them within the walls to aid with a siege.”

Desperately, I ask, “Can you not leave?”

“And just hand over the territory to him?” Saydan asks.

“Land is land. It can be reclaimed. People are harder to replace,” I respond, my heart hammering a million beats a minute.

“Ziva, I appreciate your input,” Skiro says. “Truly. But I have to try to keep what is mine first. Besides, it is not only mine. It belongs to the people who live here. Ravis will not leave them be. He’ll tax them. Force them to feed his troops before moving on. He’ll take what he wants, leaving people to starve.”

What he says lines up with everything I know about Ravis so far. I nod in understanding.

And then I’m struck by the absurdity of the whole situation.Am I in a council meeting? Did I try to give advice?

However has it come to this?

I don’t envy Skiro or his people. They’ve got a brutal time ahead of them.

I sit silent for the rest of it, feeling ridiculous for speaking in the first place.

Afterward, Temra and I walk back to her rooms. Kellyn tried to meet my eyes as I exited, but I refused to look at him.

I know what he’s thinking about. What we did in that abandoned room and how he wants to do it again.

And though part of me wants to also, another part wants to get away and have some more time with my sister. If we didn’t need to leave this territory right away, I would likely insist on my own room and lock myself inside until I was ready to come out.

When we reach her rooms, I ask, “Has Skiro cleared ournames? With everything that’s been happening, I never got the chance to ask. And it seemed insensitive during the meeting.”

“Good instinct. And yes, Petrik explained everything to Skiro. The prince has cleared us of all charges, sent notices to all the major cities and rulers within those territories. We’re no longer wanted, and with Kymora imprisoned, there’s no one coming after us.”

“So the warlord is still alive?”

“Skiro is keeping her in the dungeons. He’s acquiring as much evidence against her as possible before holding the trial. I have no doubt she’ll be executed when the time comes.”

I sigh in relief. “Good. Then we can leave. Let’s get you packed.”

Temra blinks. “Leave?”

“We need to get as far away from Ravis as possible. We’ll go to the northern continent like we always planned.”

“We can’t let Skiro fend for himself!”

My fingers open the nearest dresser and start pulling out clothing, setting it all on the bed in neat piles. “We have to, Temra. We don’t have enough forces to withstand Ravis. His soldiers have too many of my weapons. It’ll be a slaughter.”

“The prince thinks he can negotiate, and I believe he knows his brother better than you do.”

“Perhaps when they were little and living under the same roof. People change. Ravis is greedy and power-hungry. You know all too well what that can make a person do. We saw it with Kymora. We need to go, and we need to go now. Talk to Petrik; I’ll talk to Kellyn. We can all leave together.”

She narrows her gaze. “So your plan is to run like a coward and ask our friends to go with us?”

“It’s not cowardice; it’s sense! You weren’t there, Temra. Youweren’t captured by Ravis, forced to do his will, just praying that you did things quickly enough and well enough so he wouldn’t hurt the person you care about.”

I wish I could make her understand just how dangerous Ravis is. That I could pull my pounding heart out of my chest and shove it into hers so she could get a taste of my own fear and understand the severity of the situation.

Temra’s face gentles. “You’re right. I cannot imagine what you went through, but, Ziva, we can’t go now. We must try to reason with Ravis and withstand a siege if nothing else. What about those too poor or too weak to flee? What about Amanor?”

At that, I feel my stomach sink to the floor.

“What about Kellyn’s ma and da?” she presses. “His siblings. The little ones? They’re not leaving. They can’t afford life on the northern continent. You would leave them to be butchered by Ravis?”