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She nodded, drawing herself up. “I’ll work until you come to let me know you’re going.”

He brushed his lips across her forehead, and then she was gone in a swirl of green silk.

He didn’t see a single stitch of embroidery on her dress.

Knowing his heart’s choice, she had hidden them away. And he realized they hadn’t even had time to talk about what her magic had told her about the Grimwaldians.

They wouldn’t have time before he left, either.

Things were moving too fast.

And while he hadn’t exactly enjoyed the aftermath of his victory over Kassia, he realised he dreaded having to leave.

His life had been a series of doing things he dreaded, he acknowledged as he strode out of the palace to the stables.

Maybe one day he would be able to say no to whatever it was that was asked of him.

Unfortunately, that day wasn’t today.

Chapter 5

“Ithought you’d be more difficult about it.” General Ru turned back to the palace, and given Luc and his unit of eighty soldiers were out of sight, Ava turned with her.

“I wanted to be.” But there was no one to blame, other than the Jatan. And Luc was the one going off to deal with them. “There was no other choice.”

“No. Things are wobbly enough with you here, imagine if the queen disappeared? We also have the Grimwaldians to deal with. You need to be careful there. I don’t trust them.” General Ru stepped through into the big open space at the entrance to the palace.

“Luc has people watching them, and Rafe has appointed Eckhart to coordinate and look for the wagon driver.” She didn’t know Eckhart well, but she’d traded pleasantries with him over meals on the road with the Rising Wave, and he seemed competent.

Rafe wouldn’t have chosen him otherwise.

Massi and Revek had gone with Luc, and she couldn’t help but think he’d taken them because it was easier for her that way.

Both of the Rising Wave lieutenants had had problems with Ava when she’d come into Luc’s life. Things were better now, but there was a lot of unspoken history between them.

Dak, Luc’s third lieutenant, had been chosen as the head of the Rising Wave in Luc’s absence. Ava wondered if he was happy or sad to have been left behind.

He’d come to say goodbye to Luc, but had left to go back to the Rising Wave camp immediately.

He promised he’d be back the following evening to have dinner at the palace with the general and herself, so they could plan their next moves in Luc’s absence.

It was not something she was looking forward to.

Her aunt had run Kassia with less and less input from her councillors as she’d become more and more paranoid, and Ava's cousin, Herron, the Queen’s Herald, had made decisions behind her back that had led to the Rising Wave’s decisive victory.

The way Kassia was run had to change.

She had always thought Grimwalt had a good system, that Kassia could benefit from learning from it. It was ruled by input from all its people, theoretically, but since she’d escaped, and learned first hand the overreach of Grimwalt’s Speaker, its system clearly needed a few tweaks, as well.

The Venyatux had a similar structure to Grimwalt, with a council that elected a leader. The Skäddar didn’t even appoint a leader to make decisions. It was done by a collective.

But after her aunt’s long influence, it was taking people time to understand a shift in governance was coming, and to put forward ideas.

She had come away from each meeting with the community leaders and councillors feeling further behind than when she’d started.

The problem was they kept trying to work out her angle, sure she was tricking them in some way. And they kept nervous, wary eyes on Luc and the general, as if sure a bloodbath was imminent.

It drained her of energy and made her feel like getting on a horse and riding away back to Cervantes with Luc, letting Kassia rot.