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“ I ’ve got her. You deal with them .”

I feel oddly disjointed, like I’m no longer rooted in the earth, and yet definitely not caught up in my Divh’s mighty grasp. In fact, I don’t sense Gent anywhere near me at all, and yet I’m definitely not standing, not lying down, I’m?—

I blink my eyes open and stare up into Tennet’s laughing eyes. “Well, hello, Lady Talia. Glad you decided to rejoin us.”

“Put me down.”

“Not yet.” To my surprise, it’s Fortiss who issues this order, and I realize he stands next to Mirriam’s still-collapsed body, while Caleb kneels beside the councilor, dabbing a folded sash at her brow as if she’s bleeding.

“The warrior distracts and lulls his opponent into false thinking,” Nazar says, drawing my sharp focus.

I crane my neck to see him better, and Tennet obligingly shifts me toward Nazar.

The priest’s eyes are on the far distance—where I’d seen the Eighth House.

“We arrived like a battle party, forty Divhs strong. Before the Eighth House could even open the gates, we’d sent our Divhs home and looked more like a troupe of bards in need of a rescue.

Both presentations were useful, but the second will ensure our safe passage into the house more quickly and easily than the first.”

“Miriam’s already down,” I argue. “There’s no need for?—”

“Nazar’s right.” The surprisingly strong voice of the councilor floats up from her huddle of robes. “Lord Daggar is the newest in a long line of leaders who don’t know what to do with capable women, and he’s trained his house to be the same.”

“Lord Daggar,” Tennet echoes, as if he’s rolling the name around in his mouth and finding it suitable. “I like him already.”

He clamps his arms around me tighter as I elbow him in the gut. “The Eighth House lost good men in the Tournament,” I grouse. “Those who survived would have told him who I am. I’m not weak or needing to be carried by an oaf.”

“Just a little longer,” Fortiss says, and his voice also sounds odd—everyone’s voices do—fuller and richer, more nuanced. Did the fall from the Divh’s plane damage my hearing or augment it in some way? “Curious warriors are easier to defeat than wary ones.”

“But why do we need?—”

“Hush, Lady Talia,” Tennet says, then—infuriatingly—he lifts me up higher in his arms, just far enough that he can lean down to brush a kiss over my ear. The move is so unexpected I barely avoid bleating in surprise as a shimmery shiver of energy rips through my blood, awakening every inch of me.

“Fortiss is injured,” he hisses urgently to me. “You’re the distraction from that. Go with it.”

My eyes lock on his as he edges back, but there’s no deception or teasing in them. “How?” I murmur, but Tennet’s back to staring at the company of armed horsemen streaking out toward us. “Just—put me down already. I can look pitiful from the ground.”

“Maybe I like carrying you.”

I snort. “Maybe you can go hang your?—”

“Lord Protector Fortiss!”

I flinch as Tennet’s grip tightens convulsively on me, as if the loud, booming-voiced man riding toward us is somehow a threat.

After what I’ve survived these past several weeks, it would take more than shouting to unnerve me, but I find Tennet’s instinctive reaction both strange and… oddly appealing.

Clearly my transition back to the Fated Plane has crippled me harder than I thought.

The head of the Eighth House delegation gallops up, leading his brace of fighting men. He’s older than I expect him to be, older even than my father and Rihad. Given the fiery orange of his cloak and tunic, this has to be Lord Daggar.

I view him through my lashes while I pretend to still be in a dead faint. If not for Nazar’s approval of this farce, I would’ve already punched my way to a standing position. Still, it allows me to judge Lord Daggar without feeling awkward about staring.

Gray-haired, wiry, and stern-faced, he carries himself with both authority and resolve, a steadiness in his bearing that I didn’t expect given Miriam’s judgment of him.

He sweeps our small group with a quick, assessing glance, and I can feel his gaze hard on me and then his scowl at Miriam.

Does he know who we are, specifically? Has he heard what I did?

Beyond what his men have told him, seeing an entire battalion of Divhs on his doorstep had to be unsettling.

Fortiss strides forward, and to his credit, Lord Daggar dismounts. He cuts the distance between them another few strides, then lifts his right hand to his chest, forms a fist and places it against his heart. He bows formally to Fortiss.

“We were not expecting you or your company, Lord Protector Fortiss,” he says as he rises, his oddly timbred voice carrying to us on the wind.

“We certainly weren’t expecting a brace of Divhs.

And for you to arrive on their shoulders or clasped in their grip…

such a thing hasn’t happened since the Great Conflict.

We are honored with this sign of solidarity. ”

“There’s much that has changed in the past month.” Fortiss turns to gesture back to us. “We’ve suffered in our travels, and two of our company are injured. If we can trouble you for horses…we can speak more easily inside.”

“Yes.” Daggar lifts a hand and a half-dozen riders move forward out of the center of the group, each with a second horse. “Can your injured soldiers ride?”

“They can,” Fortiss assures him, and I watch Daggar stiffen as Caleb helps Miriam to her feet.

Tennet finally takes that as a signal to drop me to mine.

He still holds me as if I’m going to crumple, and it’s all I can do not to stomp on his instep.

Beneath my feet, the ground is strangely sandy, tall grass twisting up out of the loose soil. I broaden my stance to keep my balance.

Daggar scowls from Miriam to me. “Why are you traveling with a… you .” He practically snarls the last word, and he takes a long stride toward me, then checks himself and turns back to Fortiss. Tennet’s arm around me has turned to a solid band of iron, but he makes no other move.

“My warriors sent riders ahead with orders to switch out horses wherever they could to help speed them along,” Daggar continues, his words now harsh and clipped.

“The catastrophe of the Tournament of Gold cannot be understated, but that a woman was involved…” His lips twist in an ugly grimace as he glares back at Fortiss.

“Do you know what you’ve unleashed, Lord Protector Fortiss? ”

“I know that the former lord protector put our entire nation at risk to further his own aims,” Fortiss says stiffly.

“I’ve yet to understand exactly why. I further know that there’s a threat emerging from the Western Realms which has already breached our defenses.

I wouldn’t come here in such haste otherwise, Lord Daggar.

But let me be clear. Lady Talia is a critical reason why we’re even standing here at all, and why you had any soldiers able to return from the tournament.

If they told you the story, you know I speak the truth. ”

“I know you speak the truth as you understand it, but there’s far more that you do not understand, Lord Protector. That needs to end now. Because you’re right, there is a new threat emerging, or better stated, an old threat returned.” He jabs an accusatory finger at me. “And she’s the reason why.”

For just that moment, I’m grateful for Tennet’s stalwart presence beside me, because the key emotion rolling from Lord Daggar isn’t disgust or rejection, both of which I expect. It’s fear.

Daggar turns back to his riders. “Escort the others,” he orders as they bring the horses forward.

They all step back to allow us to mount on our own.

Tennet practically throws me up on my steed like a sack of flour, securing my feet in the stirrups with quick, fierce movements.

He’s furious, I realize with some surprise.

It seems an odd reaction, but if he’s angry at me, he’ll have to get in line.

Still, I can’t help but contrast the very different reactions of the men who surround me. Daggar might hate women like me, but Fortiss wields me like a weapon. And Tennet… Tennet acts like I’m a storm he’s already survived once. And maybe wouldn’t mind being struck by again.

“Lord Protector Fortiss, we’ll start our discussions in private,” Daggar says, interrupting my rabbiting thoughts. “Your company can join us— Miriam ?”

He breaks off as he glances back to our small group and sees the councilor for the first time with her hood thrown back, mounted on a horse.

Because I’m staring at him with such focus, I can track not only the change in his voice but the flash of recognition in his face.

I glance back to Miriam, and she’s staring at him with an expression of such studied neutrality that I would laugh if the moment wasn’t suddenly so fraught.

“Lord Daggar,” she replies, her words containing just enough deference to take the sting out of them, but not so much as to convey any warmth at her homecoming. “Well met.”

Daggar shakes himself forcibly, then turns back to Fortiss. “You brought a councilor with you, carried by Divhs through the Blessed Plane?”

I grimace, imagining Daggar’s reaction when he learns that Miriam has been banded.

Fortiss doesn’t respond at first, taking his time mounting his own horse.

His cape is thrown back to reveal his black and gold tunic, and he looks every inch the lord protector as he wheels his horse around to face Daggar again.

“There’s much we both need to learn, Lord Daggar. We should get to it, if you’re ready.”

Daggar gestures expansively with his hand for Fortiss to begin, then urges his own horse forward until it’s even with Fortiss’s mount.

The two of them head out toward the Eighth House, first at a trot, then at a canter, then at a full gallop, their cloaks flowing back from them to announce the splendor of their respective houses to any who might be looking.