Page 27

By the time I reach the main square, half the villagers are waving, calling me things like "Lord of Mischief" and "Sir Slime," a nickname I will absolutely be keeping forever.

It’s ridiculous.

And it makes my chest ache in a way I don’t want to name. Because this is borrowed time.

This village, this festival, this paper-thin peace—they don’t know how temporary it is. But I do.

Which is why I drink when they offer me their mugs. Why I throw my arm around their shoulders and shout back twice as loud. Why I laugh like none of this will ever end.

Because it will.

And when it does, I’ll be the one dragging their bones out of the dirt.

But not today.

Today, I let them cheer for me.

And I let myself pretend it matters.

It’s too early in the godsdamn morning to be lusting after sugar, but here I am. Standing at the crooked stall halfway falling apart, staring at an array of baked sin laid out like it’s a religious experience. Flaky pastries stuffed with honeyed fruit, rolls dripping in something thick and sweet enough to rot my teeth, tarts dusted with sugar like a dusting of snow. The whole thing smells criminal. I should be arrested.

My stomach growls, and I almost lean in closer, forehead nearly pressed against the wood like a starving man.

And that’s when I hear it.

“Silas?” A woman’s voice.

Not drunken and slurred like half the village calls after me. Not shouted across the square like I’m some feral local celebrity. Soft. Hesitant. Almost… familiar.

I blink, dragging my gaze away from the pastries and down—way down—to the woman who’s stopped in front of me.

She’s short. Barely reaches my chest, head tilted back to look at me like she’s never seen something quite like me before. Dark hair pulled back into a loose braid, dark chocolate eyes sharp beneath heavy lashes, and something about the way she’s looking at me makes my stomach pull tight—not because she’s pretty (she is), but because there’s recognition there.

Like she knows me. Like she’s not surprised to see me here but surprised I don’t recognize her.

And that’s unsettling as hell. Because I know every face in this village. Or at least, I’ve memorized their ridiculous nicknames. Crooked Tooth. Frog Mother. Tiny Warlord. Old Man Knobbles.

But her?

Nothing. I clear my throat, shift my weight onto one foot. Smile because that’s what I do when something feels off.

“Good morning,” I say lightly, polite even though I want to ask her how the hell she knows my name when half this village still thinks I’m called Frog King.

Her eyes flick over me, cautious but curious. "I wasn’t sure if it was you."

My grin sharpens automatically, practiced. “Oh, it’s me. In the flesh. Arguably too much flesh before noon.”

Her brow pinches like she doesn’t get the joke—or worse, she does and doesn’t think it’s funny.

There’s a weird hum under my skin now. Something that doesn’t feel quite right. Because most people here either treat me like a joke or like a threat. She’s doing neither. She’s just… looking.

And that look is crawling under my ribs in a way I don’t like.

I glance down at her again, deliberately casual. “I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say I should know who you are.”

She smiles faintly, soft and sad in a way I don’t know how to parse. “Maybe.”

That makes something in my stomach twist, sharp and wrong. I swallow it down, turn the full weight of my grin on her like armor.