Page 2 of A Court of Truth and Thorns (Royal Scout #2)

KALI

T he girls scream but I feel calmer than I have in hours.

With the adversary finally before me and a sword in my hand, I can forge my own outcome instead of waiting for it to spring upon me from the shadows.

I feel rather than see Trace at my back, his muscles flowing with the lethal grace he takes for granted.

The six-man rose patrol splits into pairs, four men going after me, Trace, and Luca, while the remaining pair heads straight for Wil.

The shift of Trace’s weight is all the signal I need; he wants me to move closer to the prince.

Before I can oblige, the first attacker is upon me, his face concealed in his hood’s shadow.

I parry the sword aimed at my gut, the force of the blow rattling my still-healing bones.

The man winds his sword over his shoulder, readying his next strike.

He has the advantage of strength and reach, and his eyes say he knows it.

His sword falls in a sweeping arc. I throw myself to the ground, staying beneath the deadly blade.

The moment it passes over my head, I spring to my feet, only to block the next blow.

And the next. My balance wavers. The man grins, his white teeth flashing in the moonlight.

With his next attack, the sword slips in my sweaty grip and I fall to my knees to keep hold of the blade.

A thread of true fear twists in my gut. I’m a decent swordswoman, but nothing approaching Trace or Luca. Half-healed, exhausted, and lacking my throwing knives, I’m little more than a nuisance in the attackers’ path.

Had I gone after Leaf like I wanted to, I’d be long dead by now.

Trace’s sword stops a blow that would have split open my skull. The lack of reprimand stings like salt on raw flesh. Trace is proving himself more right with each of my failings.

Flushing, I jerk my mind back into the fight.

Trace’s parry has forced my foe’s sword wide, creating an opening.

I see the space, claim it, and slide inside.

With my next breath, I’m close enough to inhale the attacker’s scent, its familiarity stirring my gut.

I block off my thoughts. With our bodies so near, the man’s sword is useless.

I must keep it that way. Must keep him from regaining space to swing his weapon.

Close. Stay close. Fight close. Snaking my hands behind the man’s neck, I snap his head down onto my rising knee.

A bone cracks. The man grunts. Warm blood running from his nose seeps through the cloth of my breeches. Before he can recover, I lift my knee for another blow.

He crosses his forearms to block the attack.

My knee strikes something hard and uneven beneath his sleeve. A vambrace with weapons. Knives. My fingers rip cloth, moving by feel to a weapon’s hilt.

The man yanks his arm away, a single throwing knife staying behind in my palm. He wipes his ripped sleeve over his face, our eyes meeting for the first time .

“You?” His nasal voice is a punch to my gut. His eyes widen, the whites gleaming in the darkness of night. “Goddess. You. How—”

He never finishes. The throwing knife in my hand is my knife, and it flies true into the base of Nasal’s neck.

Bile rises and burns my throat, the obsidian wall of memory trembling in recognition of my captor.

Nasal’s body falls to the dirt, the shocked look frozen in death.

I’ve the wherewithal to spin around and take the measure of the fight before lowering my guard.

The small alcove is littered with bodies, but the melee itself is finished. Wil stands with a bloodied sword in his hand, a man’s corpse at his feet. Luca is bending over one of the girls, Jasmine. Trace holds the last living attacker against the base of a tree, a sword pointed to his throat.

I take the rest of my throwing knives and vambrace from Nasal’s corpse and numbly strap it to my arm. Don’t think, my mind orders. Don’t remember. Focus on now.

“Samuels.” Trace’s clipped tone turns my attention to the prisoner.

“Aye.” The man rubs his mustache, the mole at the corner of his mouth bobbing with the movement. “I wish I might say ‘well met,’ guardsman, but...” He clears his throat. “I imagine you are not inclined to release me, so I’d be obliged if you hurried up with my execution.”

“Wait,” I call, quickly stepping to Trace’s side in case he decides to fulfill the request too quickly. My breath is ragged, but the words come clear enough. “How long have Viva Sylthia rebels been serving in the Holy Guard?”

Samuels chuckles. Trace presses the tip of his sword harder against Samuels’s skin. “The boy asked you a question.”

“I heard.” Samuels spits blood onto the ground. “Kill me or let me go, Trace. We both know those are the only choices you have within you.”

Trace’s nostrils flare. “What were your orders?”

Samuels raises his chin, exposing his jugular to Trace’s blade. My jaw tightens, acid burning my throat. Soft footsteps tap the ground behind me as Calvin joins us.

“Sergeant Samuels, is it?” The older man leans on a walking stick, but his quiet voice carries an ice-cold edge that has Samuels’s breath quickening.

Smiling without humor, Calvin squats down to eye level with the prisoner.

“I think you are quite right about the guardsman here—Trace can do little beyond end your life. Shortsighted of him, perhaps, but it’s true.

Just goes to show that professionals should stick to their own trades.

” He pauses, his voice dropping lower. “Speaking of professions, do you happen to know mine?”

We leave Samuels—who proved quite talkative when left alone with Calvin—tied to a tree.

Grabbing supplies off the dead roses, we gather ourselves together and put as much distance between us and the battleground as we can before our strength gives out completely.

According to the sergeant, his was the only patrol sent this way, though others will likely follow when the men fail to return.

A small window of relative safety. Small and brittle.

We stay put for the darkest part of night and move out onto a mountain path with the first dawn rays. No one speaks. Trace’s promise of a higher-ground advantage and a cave large enough to offer shelter is all that keeps us moving, however slowly.

Jasmine, her broken arm bound to her chest, stumbles so much that Luca passes his arm around her and half supports, half carries the girl along. Wil carries a sword. I carry my knives and the slimy sheen of my own uselessness.

The images of Leaf flash in my mind’s eye again.

An endless, exhausting loop of horrors, any of which might be real.

Might be happening this very moment. Leaf.

My fragile, brilliant, loving, thoughtful, defenseless Leaf.

Alone and suffering, waiting for me to come for her, not knowing that I’m getting farther away with each step.

I couldn’t go back for Leaf now even if I wanted to, and therein lies the greatest horror of all: In the pit of my gut, I don’t want to.

Because I’d die if I tried. I could barely save myself when Viva attacked, much less protect Wil and the girls.

Stars, the prince took down as many attackers as I did.

And I needed Trace’s help. This isn’t a scuffle in a remote town, where I decide if and when to engage. This is war.

“Here,” Trace says, halting before an unimpressive mountain face amidst a thinning tree line.

Before anyone can summon strength for a question, he moves several stones aside, revealing a crack large enough for a man to fit through.

“It’s one of the waystations on the path to Everett.

Many whisperers have stayed the night here. We’ll be safe enough.”

Luca squeezes himself through the opening first and has a lantern glowing by the time I maneuver in after him.

The cavern is large enough to house our group comfortably, its ceiling allowing me to straighten in the center, though Trace and Luca must stay hunched.

A fire ring in the corner holds a few pieces of charcoal and a beat-up cooking pot.

“Stars,” says Wil, twisting his slender frame in a full circle.

His once-splendid clothing, accented with bits of velvet and subtle embroidery, is covered with caked dirt and dried blood.

The prince’s gaze is still glassy beneath his long lashes, but at least he is moving.

Talking. “I never imagined a cave feeling more luxurious than the Delta Royal Palace. ”

Alexa and Luca help Jasmine inside and settle her onto a blanket.

The girl’s moans send my eyes toward Trace’s neckline, where the depleted healing crystal hangs beneath his shirt, useless.

If Trace hadn’t had to use all its magic on me, Jasmine would be better now.

Not that anyone but Trace and me knows he is a healer.

Or that I—the guardsman trainee they know as Kal—am a girl named Kalianna.

“Master Luca?” Alexa’s voice is thin as a thread. “Jasmine has a fever. I can’t get her to drink any water.”

Wil crouches beside Jasmine, brushing the girl’s hair from her face, then looks up to survey Trace, Luca, and me. “I’m sorry,” he says, his throat bobbing. “Not just for tonight, but for every day that I made the likelihood of you getting hurt to protect me more likely.”

“Let’s live through the day, then we’ll talk,” Luca says, trying for a hint of a smile and failing.

Wil nods.

Kneeling before the cooking pot, Calvin empties his pockets of the plants and herbs he collected during our trek. He selects several for the pot and pours our remaining water over the plants. I fetch the flint and start a fire for him.

“What now, Your Highness?” asks Calvin. In my fatigue, the duality of the address nearly makes me giggle. Which prince did you want, Calvin—Dansil’s or Everett’s?

Wil rubs the back of his head. “You heard Samuels. Bahir has declared Dansil a sanctuary of the Goddess and me a disciple of the Dark God. It appears he’s been preparing this coup for a while now—the Order certainly took the capital with little effort.

I imagine it will be some time before I can return to Delta. ”

“And do you plan to return, Your Highness?” Calvin sets the pot atop the flames, seeming for all the world to be fully engrossed in making tea rather than guiding a kingdom’s ruler through planning his destiny.

I glance around the cavern, curious as to how many others picked up on the questioner’s ways, and find Trace watching the prince intently, his muscles tense.

“Yes,” says Wil, his voice ringing between the stones.

The prince is just as sixteen as he was yesterday, but it’s an older sixteen now.

A harsher one. “Yes,” Wil repeats, “but it will be a different Dansil and a different court.” He pauses, drawing a breath, and surveys our little band, holding each of our gazes in turn.

“And it will not start with friends held against their will. Trace, do not try to stop Kal from leaving again if he wishes. Or anyone else. You’ve all done more for me than I deserve, and you should make your own choice of path now.

I’ve no expectations that you’ll continue on with me. ”

Free to make my own choices. Never has freedom had so many shackles.

“Continue on with you to where?” Alexa asks from the corner.

Wil rolls his sword hilt in his hands and nods to himself. “Everett. They are no friends of Bahir’s. Perhaps they will stand with me.”

Trace snorts, straightening to as full a height as the cavern allows.

“You are ready to hike to Everett alone?” he demands, whatever leash he had on his temper during the trek snapping like a dry branch.

“Had you ever spent a night outdoors before yesterday, Your Highness?” He waves a hand in the air.

“You think one day of reality has granted you some untold wisdom and skill?”

Wil puts down the sword and stands. Hands in his pockets, he rolls back on his heels and regards Trace coolly.

No two men have ever looked more different.

Smaller, younger, with a bit of feminine beauty beneath the grime and blood, Wil is a sapling bending in defiant survival amidst a storm. Trace is granite, solid and unwavering.

One a prince discovering himself a warrior; the other a warrior hiding his birth as a prince.

Wil breaks the stare-down first—not through surrender, but rather a shrug that dismisses the whole process. “I’ll manage. Everyone else can do as they wish.”

With nothing more to be said, Trace retreats into a brooding silence and the group beds down for the night.