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“No one’s hurting anyone,” said Sly Boots, looking quickly between Thorn and Quicksilver. “I’ve had a long day, and I don’t feel like bandaging up any of you.”

Thorn noticed the stormy expression on Quicksilver’s face, and then, all of a sudden, began to speak. The words spilled out of her mouth, faster and faster, shoved up through her throat on the sticky, clever cords of her belly’s web.

“Zaf’s right,” Thorn said, pouting delicately. “I didn’t mean what I said. I’ve just been... well, I’m tired, and I’m worried about my home, and I’m in a strange place where I have to wear goggles on my head all the time, and they’ve given me a constant rotten headache—though I am thankful that you gave them to us, of course.” She smiled a little. She scrunched up her face to illustrate the words “rotten headache.”

The hard line of Quicksilver’s mouth softened.

Thorn’s heart pounded gleefully. Was this what it was like for Brier, every day? To know exactly what to say, and what people wanted to hear?

Thorn breathed in and out. The web in her stomach expanded and contracted, dark and sprawling.

“I was rambling to Noro,” she went on, “because I couldn’t sleep, and I was just saying aloud any thought that came into myhead, no matter how stupid or wrong or mean.”

Thorn took a deep breath, looked Quicksilver right in her sharp gray eyes. “Of course I wouldn’t take anyone to the Vale against their will. I wouldn’t even if I had the ability for it.”

Quicksilver’s gaze cut to Zaf, then back to Thorn. Her face was unreadable plaster.

Then she withdrew a folded piece of paper from her pocket and passed it to Sly Boots. He read it, then closed his eyes.

“Oh, Quicksilver...,” came his soft voice.

Quicksilver flinched.

A war raged inside Thorn’s belly.

On one side: an ache of pity. The urge to reach for Quicksilver. Perhaps a warm touch would comfort her.

On the other side: the web holding her fast with a slight growl. Not a growl that Thorn heard, but one shefelt.

Don’t be a weakling,it said.

She froze. She wavered, teetering.

Yes, the web was right. Of course it was right.

Comforting Quicksilver was a thing the Thorn of the past would have done. The soppy, soft Thorn who hid her face in her tangled hair and clung to her broom like a baby.

Thorn stayed put.

The web sighed, content.

“My friend Ari has been abducted,” said Quicksilver softly. “He is a prince of Valteya, the northernmost country of the Star Lands. He was coming here to visit us when a company of masked soldiers attacked his entourage. When his guards came to, he was gone.”

Quicksilver closed her eyes briefly. “They did manage, however, to capture one of the attackers. They didn’t get much out of him before his wounds claimed him, but he told them one crucial thing, and they passed it on to me. It would have meant nothing to me, before your arrival.”

Quicksilver took the note from Sly Boots, held it up, and looked calmly at Thorn. “He said, ‘I fight to save the Vale, and I am not ashamed.’”

The chill that swept through Thorn’s body nearly buckled her knees. It silenced every other thought. It silenced the web.

“I don’t understand,” Zaf said, her hand still clamped around Thorn’s. “Why would soldiers from the Vale want some Star Lands prince?”

“Because he’s not just a prince,” Quicksilver said, her eyes bright. “He’s a witch.”

Zaf inhaled sharply.

Thorn’s stomach, web and all, turned over. Thinking, just like her mind was turning over and thinking.

“They want him for something,” she said. “Something to do with the Break. Just like we thought you could help us, Quicksilver.” She turned to Bartos. “You don’t know anything about this, do you? Could the queen have secretly sent people to bring back a witch to the Vale?”