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C ora had forgotten the quiet melody of dawn so deep in the forest. It had been too long since she’d experienced the soft hum of awakening activity in the commune, the scent of the morning cookfires, the peaceful silence of those still sleeping. It seemed not even the chaos of last night could disrupt the Forest People’s daily routine. The only differences were the extra figures tending to the destroyed common area, lighting new cookfires, raking the earth, and rearranging the stones and logs that served as seats.

She pulled the hood of her cloak lower, hurrying her steps as she passed the bustle of activity. She was determined not to be noticed by the others on her way to find Valorre. Though Ailan had spoken with the elders last night—after offering Cora and Mareleau her wagon to sleep in—she didn’t know how that meeting had gone. Cora hadn’t seen the High Elder since she’d left with Salinda and Bernice.

Cora still wasn’t sure how to feel about Ailan. About all of this. Ailan was so different from the Nalia she’d thought she’d known, yet similar at the same time. She still held the same air of authority. The same kind eyes. At least one thing was certain: Ailan wanted to defeat Darius as much as Cora did.

It was that determination that propelled her feet toward the edge of camp, two sets of letters rolled together and clenched in her fist. She found Valorre not too far away. She hadn’t had time to unsaddle him last night, and something was perched upon his pommel—Berol. She paused her preening to eye Cora, then went right back to it.

“I’m glad you were easy to find,” Cora said. She hadn’t seen the falcon since she’d taken to the skies on their way from the lake.

She’s been with me ever since the dragons appeared , Valorre said, tossing his mane in greeting.

“With you?”

We’re friends. She came to me for protection. She knows how brave I am .

Cora snorted a laugh. So Berol was a bit of a coward when Teryn wasn’t around. Had he been here when the dragons had landed, the falcon would have dove in without hesitation, doing whatever she could to keep them away from Teryn.

“I see where your loyalties lie,” Cora said, humor in her tone. “It’s obviously not with me. That’s all for the better. I suppose it means you’ll reach him quickly.”

Her heart sank as she approached Valorre’s side and extended the hand with the two letters. She hadn’t read the second letter, but she could guess at its contents. It had probably been even more painful to write than Cora’s. Mareleau’s letter would eventually reach Larylis and would convey their newest developments. Particularly the fact that Mareleau would not be returning home after all and would seek refuge in El’Ara. If refuge was truly what they’d find.

Cora’s letter was of a similar nature, informing Teryn that she was taking a detour before coming home. At least she had a solid plan to come home. Ailan wanted Cora there for the meeting with the tribunal so they could begin negotiating an alliance to face Darius together. Mareleau, on the other hand, only had a vague idea of her stay there. A vague promise of protection.

Cora could at least carry the comfort of a failsafe, one she’d relayed to Mareleau after Ailan and the others had left the wagon: if things in El’Ara took a turn for the worse, if Mareleau and Noah seemed to be in any danger, if they faced even an ounce of scorn from the Elvyn, Cora would take them and worldwalk the hell out of there. She would steal their Morkara and damn them all if it came down to it.

Berol extended her talon at the sight of the scroll.

With a resigned sigh, Cora turned it over to the falcon. “To Teryn.”

She expected Berol to fly off at once. Instead, she froze on Valorre’s back, beady eyes pinned on Cora. As she released an aggrieved chirp, Cora realized what the falcon was waiting for. “Oh! I…I don’t have any treats. I’m sorry.”

She is not impressed , Valorre said.

“Teryn will give you extra for me,” Cora said with a grimace. Berol abruptly pivoted away from her—a cold shoulder if she’d ever seen one—before launching into the sky with the scroll of letters curled in her talon.

Cora had one more visit to make before returning to Ailan’s wagon. She wove through the tents, seeking the one that belonged to Maiya. The tents looked similar to one another, especially in the winter season, with their rounded walls and pointed roofs. While the Forest People dressed the reed-and-willow frames of their tents in thinner fabrics in the summer, allowing them to show off bright colors, patterns, and other personal touches, in the winter the tents were comprised of oiled hides and felted wool. As a result, the camp was a sea of brown and tan.

On an exhale, she pried a hole through her mental wards, extended her senses, and searched for a familiar echo. She was struck with a barrage of recognizable energies, so potent they filled her with a bittersweet ache. Of course that would happen; she should have expected it. She may have kept most of the commune at arm’s length when she’d lived here, but she’d still been physically close. She’d gotten used to their energies and emotions, and now that she was among them, it was hard to pick out a specific one. Yet there was one set of emotions that tugged on her more than all the rest. She narrowed her focus to it, followed it, and was rewarded with the sight of a figure she’d recognize anywhere.

Maiya stood outside a tent not too far from Salinda’s. Her long black hair hung loose down her back. She was dressed in layers of patterned skirts, a long-sleeved top with fur-lined cuffs, and a thick red vest. In her arms was a bundle of firewood.

Cora quickened her pace, desperate to reach her friend before she disappeared into the tent. Maiya paused just as she reached the tent flap and whirled toward Cora. Cora’s lips stretched into a wide smile as she closed the remaining distance.

“Cora!” Maiya’s grin mirrored hers, though she didn’t set down the firewood or embrace her friend. Instead, she cast a furtive glance around the camp and nodded at Cora to follow her inside.

Cora tempered some of her excitement and quietly entered the tent after her friend. She pulled up short at the sight of the interior. The last time she’d been inside Maiya’s tent, all of Cora’s belongings had remained exactly as she’d left them. They’d always shared a tent since the day Cora had joined the commune. She hadn’t expected Maiya to carry around Cora’s things and maintain an unused space as if she’d never left, yet seeing proof of her own absence was more startling than she’d anticipated.

That wasn’t the only change either. The tent was larger overall with more furnishings, finer rugs, and a much wider bed. This was a married couple’s tent.

She faced her friend with wide eyes. “You and Roije…”

Maiya crouched before the small stove and placed one of the logs inside. She grinned over her shoulder. “We were handfasted in the fall.”

“I’m so happy for you.” The warmth in her heart washed away the bitter ache at having seen her things replaced. Maiya had loved Roije for a long time yet had always been too shy to make a move. When Cora had returned to the Forest People last spring, her friend and Roije had just begun courting. And now they were wed, bound by ritual handfasting. She wished she could have been there, could have seen their ceremony. Maiya must have looked radiant, and Roije?—

The blood left Cora’s face. Shame replaced her joy as she recalled something about Roije she never should have forgotten.

“Roije…his arm…” Cora swallowed hard, working the words from her throat. “Did he heal well?”

Maiya’s expression fell, and she quickly turned back toward the stove, busying her hands with a kettle. “He did.”

Cora didn’t miss the curt edge to Maiya’s words. Did she blame Cora for what had happened to her husband? Roije had fought at Centerpointe Rock and had faced Morkai directly. He’d lost an arm for it. Mother Goddess, she’d thought about his fate several times since then, yet she hadn’t considered it since stepping foot into the camp. Not until now.

“I’m sorry,” Cora said, voice trembling. “That should have been the first thing I asked?—”

“And you?” Maiya faced her again, this time with two mugs of fragrant tea in her hands. “How have you been?”

Cora blinked at her a few times, surprised by Maiya’s deliberate change of subject. Her lips were pulled wide but the smile no longer reached her eyes. Cora shook her head, accepting one of the mugs her friend offered. “I…I’m as well as I can be, considering current circumstances.”

Maiya sipped her tea. “You’re a queen now, if the news from the villages is to be believed.”

“I am.”

“You still don’t mind if I call you Cora and not Highness or Majesty?”

Cora’s shoulders slumped. “I always want to be Cora to you. To everyone here.”

Maiya’s jaw tightened, and Cora was struck with a spear of anger that wasn’t her own. Still, her friend’s grin remained on her lips and she kept her tone light. “I don’t think you can be just Cora anymore. Not to the commune at large.”

“Why do you say that?”

Maiya gave an easy shrug and took another sip of her tea. “Twice you’ve returned since leaving us, and twice you’ve brought terrifying news. Last time, you took some of our people to war. This time, you’re taking our High Elder.”

“That’s not…I don’t mean to be a harbinger of doom, but?—”

“I’m just telling you how it seems to the commune.” Maiya’s tone took on a sharper edge. She was so unlike the sweet shy girl she’d been not even a year ago. “I’m explaining why you can’t expect to be received as Cora anymore. To the commune, you are Her Majesty Aveline, Queen of Khero.”

“And you? You said the commune sees me this way, but how do you see me?”

Maiya let out a long breath, her expression softening. “I see you as a treasured friend whom I’m looking at for the last time.”

The weight of that statement pressed hard upon her chest. She wasn’t sure how to take those words. Was she saying she never wanted to see Cora again? Warning her to stay away? Or was this a claircognizant knowing ?

“It doesn’t mean I don’t wish it were otherwise.” Maiya’s voice came out soft, strained. “You were my sister, Cora. But…but now you’re a queen. You can’t just show up when you need something. It makes a mockery of our core principles. The very rule that allows our commune to live in peace.”

Mother Goddess, she was right. Cora knew she was right. Fate may have wanted Cora to come here, to meet Ailan, to walk the path her threads had woven, but after this…

She needed to let the Forest People go. Not from her heart. Never from her heart. But she could not use them as her political allies ever again. Even asking them to teach Mareleau magic had been offensive enough. At the time, it had seemed like the only recourse. Yet she couldn’t use them as a recourse. A last resort.

“You’re right,” Cora said, voice trembling. “I can’t do this again. I won’t do it again. Yet I will keep you and everyone else in my heart. I will protect you in whatever way I can, even if it means never coming to find you again.”

Maiya set down her mug of tea and sank onto the foot of her bed. Cora did the same, having no sense of thirst with such a heavy conversation. She kept her distance from the other girl, sitting a few feet away.

“How will you protect us from the newest magic war that’s about to clash on our land?”

Cora shook her head. “I don’t know yet. Did your mother tell you about it?”

“She told me and Roije late last night. Neither of us could sleep after seeing the dragons, not to mention all the rumors that were circulating camp.”

“Ailan—Nalia—is taking us to find the tear in the Veil. We’re leaving today, and none of us are asking the Forest People to fight this time.”

Maiya stared down at her hands, idly picking her nails. She lowered her voice to just above a whisper. “Have you thought about giving him what he wants?”

“What…who wants?”

“The King of Syrus.”

Cora blinked at her. “You mean…give him Noah?”

“No!” Maiya lifted her head and met Cora’s eyes. “No, I don’t mean giving him the child. What I mean is…as queen, you are in a position to negotiate with him as a fellow monarch. You can give him what he truly wants—access to the Veil. El’Ara. In exchange for leaving Lela alone.”

Cora would be lying if she said she hadn’t considered it. The Elvyn weren’t exactly her friends, and even the Faeryn she’d come across in El’Ara hadn’t treated her any better, but that didn’t mean they deserved destruction. And what about the other fae? The Djyn, Mermyn, and all the fae creatures like Valorre and the dragons. What would happen to them if Darius took control of El’Ara?

Furthermore, he was a worldwalker. Giving him access to El’Ara wouldn’t keep him out of the human world, and she couldn’t trust the fae realm was all he wanted. She had to remember Darius was the one to first use the term Morkaius, not his son. He didn’t want to simply manage the flow of magic throughout El’Ara like the Morkara was meant to. He wanted to be High King of Magic. He wanted to control and take. If he wasn’t content with all he’d gained there, he could take his new powers and turn them against the human world. Even if Cora negotiated an alliance for the safety of her people, could she bear the burden of what else he might do to other kingdoms? Other people?

Darius could never have what he truly wanted unless Noah was dead.

“No,” Cora said. “The only way to truly protect our world is to stop Darius entirely.”

“What happens after you stop him?” Maiya asked. “Mother said Lela is a piece of El’Ara. That it is the heart of the fae realm. What happens to this land after you defeat Darius? Will the Elvyn seal the tear and leave us alone? Or will they fight to take Lela away from us?”

Cora’s breath caught. That was a question she hadn’t considered. “I don’t know. But I promise you, I will do whatever I can to protect this kingdom and this land.”

Maiya held her gaze, but there was no hope in her eyes. Doubt rolled off her in waves. Cora could see herself the way her friend saw her now—young, small, and very much in over her head. Maiya had always believed in her, always encouraged her, but what she was facing went beyond Cora’s capabilities. She knew that. But Cora wasn’t alone. She had Teryn. Mareleau and Larylis. Even Lex and the Norunian rebels he was supporting. She had alliances she could count on, and she was about to forge a new one with the Elvyn. It was daunting. Maybe even impossible.

But she would give it her all.

Maiya’s face crumpled, and her chest heaved with a sob. “I really am happy to see you. You will always be a sister in my heart. Please believe me. I didn’t want to have this conversation. I never wanted it to be like this. It’s just?—”

“I know, Maiya.” She reached for her friend and pulled her into an embrace. “I know. You don’t have to explain.”

She didn’t need Maiya to say another word. She understood fully. It was time for a final goodbye. Time to close the door on six years of her life and the people who made her the witch she was today.

Maiya sobbed onto Cora’s shoulder, but Cora kept her eyes dry, refusing to add her own emotions to the medley filling the tent. Instead, she opened herself to her friend’s grief, her fear, her hopes, and memorized every painful inch of it. That way she could carry it with her. That way she could remember, as she faced the inevitable challenges that lay ahead, what she was fighting for.