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‘You were quiet…’ he managed.

‘I have learnt to hold my words until they are most effective,’ she replied, surveying him with an amused look. ‘They’re the sharpest weapons that way.’

Wilder glanced around the deserted corridor. ‘We can’t tell her.Them.’

Audra raised a brow, resting her hands on herceremonialdaggers. ‘Which part, exactly? That there is a tyrannical heir hunter after them, or that it’s also your sworn duty to hand them over?’

‘Both. Everything.’ Wilder rubbed the back of his neck and then stopped himself. It was something Talemir always used to do when he was under pressure. ‘She’s already struggling. She already has the fate stone to deal with. One more thing might push her over the edge.’

‘Perhaps she needs to go over the edge.’

‘Not yet,’ Wilder replied. ‘We need to keep her safe.’

‘The safest place for her is here. Right beneath their noses. Her and Elwren both,’ Audra whispered. ‘They do not leave the grounds. Not for anything.’

‘Agreed.’

‘You must prepare her for the horrors ahead,’ the librarian warned.

‘What do you think I’ve been doing, Audra?’

But she gave him a knowing look, as though she could see right through him. ‘You must train her, hard. Even it means becoming her enemy. Even if it means she never looks at you the same way again.’

His fought the urge to rub the ache at his chest. ‘I know,’ he murmured.

‘Do you?’ Audra challenged, an edge to her words. ‘This is your duty – to her, to the midrealms. Althea has the power to change the fates of us all.’

CHAPTER FIVE

THEA

Thea strode into the Great Hall with her head held high, relishing the stillness that fell like a blanket across the tables before her. The first time it had happened she had stopped in her tracks, her cheeks flushing at the whispers that broke out, at the wide eyes that stared. But now, she let them see her: the woman they’d scorned, the woman they now feared. Magic or not, she was no ordinary Guardian of the midrealms, and they all knew it.

From across the hall, she felt Hawthorne’s searing gaze upon her, but she wouldn’t falter now – not after weeks of leaning into the reputation she’d started to build for herself here. Resting her good hand on the hilt of Malik’s dagger and glancing at her Guardian totem to make sure it was straight, she made for her usual seat.

A few feet away, she noticed Evander, her former lover, trying to catch her eye as he made space on the bench beside him. He’d been attempting to talk with her for a while now, but she had zero interest in anything he had to say. She ignored him, suppressing a shudder. How she’d ever found him attractive was beyond her.

Several fellow Guardians scrambled to make sure there was enough room for her at their table. Then there was more shuffling as Cal and Kipp found their places at her sides.

‘How’d the reunion with Hawthorne go?’ Kipp asked, ignoring the stares around them and reaching for a basket of bread.

Thea waved her splinted fingers. ‘Wonderfully.’

‘Really?’

‘No.’

Beside her, Cal finished retying his chestnut hair in a short tail and laughed. ‘If he’s standing up there in one piece, I’d say it went well enough…’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Thea refused to look to the head table. Instead, she reached for Cal’s mug of peppermint tea and took a long, appreciative sip.

‘It means, dear Thea,’ Kipp replied around a mouthful of food, ‘that when we left you in the ring, you looked ready to throw your beloved mentor off a cliff.’

‘Perhaps I should have.’

‘I’m sure we’d agree with you if you just told us what happened…’ Cal ventured.

Thea hadn’t told them about her and Hawthorne. At first, it had been because she wanted to keep the secret for herself, as though it were something precious she wasn’t ready to share with the world. But after he’d left, it had become a matter of embarrassment, and so she’d said nothing about it.