The blue roan mustang glared at me as I fastened the horn bags and saddlebags to its body.

"Don't give me that look," I said. "I'm not happy about this arrangement either, Frank."

I'd been riding a high yesterday, knowing I'd get to escape Havenbrooke's walls for a month and explore the southern terrain with my friends. Then Rover assigned us a band of horses to hasten our journey, and my mood immediately tanked.

Horses...didn't like me. I'd learned as much at camp, back when my brother made me ride into Holly wearing that insufferable yellow dress. I was pretty sure the beast had detected my power a mile away and decided, right then and there, it would never cooperate with a sorceress. Ever since then, the equestrian family had—collectively—shunned me as a human being.

Or a half-human hybrid, anyway.

To make matters worse, the stableman paired me with an antsy young male who had zero intention of standing still, while my companions calmly tended to their well-mannered steeds. Will might as well have raised his black stallion himself; the thing minded him as if it recognized his regal tattoos.

As I waited for Frank to cease his temper tantrum, my gaze wandered across the frost-bitten valley. Chards and spinach wilted against frozen soil. Root vegetables grew sweet under their cloches and cold frames. But despite the surplus grow lights and greenhouses, our yield was looking pretty sad.

We'd have to restore our rural lands if we hoped to survive the next few years. Regulas may not have conquered our capital, but he'd left us with a fatal wound when he torched our low-elevation crops.

On the bright side, the irrigation channels no longer harbored any Pans, much to the farmers' relief. After the trial, the Court had made room in the prison cells for the notorious troublemakers, and Rover's infamous Purgatory was no more.

Under Siren's orders, Jo and Koji had led guided tours to the ditches during my remand. They'd hoped to expose the civilians to the monsters beyond the wall. Show the curious city folk who and what we'd been fighting, what their weaknesses were, and the horrific destiny we'd saved them from.

It's only a matter of time before the refugees share their stories with the entirety of Havenbrooke, Siren had warned. Better they hear it from us than the likes of Melissa Gaines.

That choice had put us in favor with the public prior to court, and I had to think that exposure made all the difference in how they'd reacted to the Pans being housed under the city. They'd been educated enough to render our leaders' fear-mongering ineffective, and that knowledge had spared us an untimely riot.

At least, for now.

Beckett, garbed in his winter gear, wool cloak, and one of Ellen's hefty travel scarves, guided his Quarter Horse out of the stables. "We should head out before the storm catches up with us," he announced. "If we stick to the foothills, we can avoid the worst of it."

Mason cast a dubious glance at the rain clouds shrouding the Rim. "You sound pretty sure about that."

"I'm sure about everything," Beckett responded lightly, passing me a silent smirk as he moved for the canvas tents along the river. "Age will do that to you."

"Hope not," I said. "Mason's overconfident enough as is."

"Tt. Look who's talking,"

Torian approached us with his honey-mustard horse in tow. "If you get too cold tonight, Price, you can always come join me in my tent."

Mason narrowed his eyes. "...Join you."

"Yeah. Consider it an open-door policy."

The blond opened his mouth and closed it again like a malfunctioning farm plow. Then, with his trademark tut, he pivoted on his heels and followed after Beckett, earlobes pinkening beneath his gray beanie.

Torian shook his head at the boy's retreating spine. "He's a tough one to crack, isn't he?" he mumbled. Then he realized he had an audience and flashed an embarrassed smile. "I thought he'd appreciate my candor, but maybe it's too much."

Valerie wove the final pink bow into her steed's mane—completing her set of ten. "Don't blame yourself, Tori. Here in Ells, people don't date. They sign a form and get hitched, usually straight out of school. Most of us don't even know what the courting stage is supposed to look like." She jabbed her thumb at me. "I mean, Liam kissed this dummy, and she still thinks they're friends."

"I do not," I hissed.

"Oh? Then are you two official now?"

I scowled at her question. Official? What did that even mean in this context? Did we have to formally announce our relationship status to the army? Express our feelings through song? Trade kisses for the world to gag at?

Sign a marriage contract?

Why did we have to cater to the world's vision of togetherness?

I peeked over at Will, who was thankfully out of ear-shot and completely oblivious to our conversation. At the moment, he crouched down next to Richard, gently prying his shoelaces from the mutt's mouth.

"We feel the same way about each other," I said. "That's what counts."

"And which way is that?" Valerie pressed. When I struggled to answer her, she rolled her eyes. "Case and point!"

I waved her comments away, facing the medic once again. "Keep trying with Mason, Tori. He's just now coming to terms with his identity, and it's not an easy thing to do in a culture that worships procreation."

As a society, we weren't exactly blind to the spectrum of sexual orientation, but in this country, we expected men and women to stifle personal desires for the greater good. The moment one couple chose love over duty, the rest would surely follow, and our precious world would crumble like the Ancients' social pyramid—or so we'd been conditioned to believe. Those who strayed from the Court's agenda were eschewed, penalized, or nudged toward Holly's famous brothels, and I didn't blame Mason one bit for his reservations.

"I don't know," Tori sighed. "There are times when it feels like I can get through to him.  Times when we really connect. Like that day of the attack, when we figured out how to partition the canals to hold the demons. We were so in sync, it was almost eerie...like we'd worked together for years."

Valerie and I traded looks. We'd both suspected something happened between them that day, but Mason never shared the details.

"And then at other times, it feels like the only way he'll engage with me is an argument or a debate. It's exhausting."

"Yeah, but that's how he is with everyone," I assured him. "Whether or not it's obvious, Mason trusts you, which is all the more impressive considering you're Rhean. He clearly enjoys your company if he suggested we bring you along in the first place."

Tori's lips parted in surprise. "Mason...wanted me to come."

"He wasn't going to leave without you, doll," Valerie said. "Your pick up lines slipped under his thick skin, even if he doesn't show it."

That detail brought a small, delighted smile to the young man's face, and I returned to my stubborn gray steed. "Be patient with him, doc," I advised. "You'd be good for him, and he recognizes that. He's just not ready yet."

Will caught my eye from across the road, and he smiled in that special, unsmiling way that made my heart spring about in its cage.

"You really think it's fear driving him away?" Tori asked.

I glanced away from the prince before he set me aflame. "Just a hunch."

We said our goodbyes to the crew, along with Ellen Price and a few other refugees, and after the countless hugs and warnings and cautionary tales—and Blaze stuffing as many jerky bites and baked treats into our packs as humanly possible—we left the stone walls of the capital behind.

The seven of us, including Richard, who I couldn't bear to desert again, spent the day riding south toward Belgate. As Beckett instructed, we hugged the base of the Rim, avoiding the warmer, drier conditions near the road, lest we run into any Pans on their journey west.

As we progressed, the wind nipped at our cheeks and ears like stinging nettle, and for a while, all I'd heard was the relentless winter gust and the horse hooves crushing the frozen terrain. But aside from the weather and my smelly, distracted mode of transport, we made good time.

Hours later, an invisible moon kissed a sky of magnetite, and we sat around a crackling campfire, resting our aching legs and hip flexors. Congregating for warmth.

"We'll bypass Belgate tomorrow," Beckett said, an old topographic map in his hands. "Then we'll enter the Gritz."

Tori choked on a spoonful of chili. "The what?"

"The Gritz," I supplied. "It's what we call the southern territory beyond Ells. Its cities were destroyed in the Crash, and then our Patrons collected any viable resources and construction material they could salvage from the area. It's a waterless wasteland."

"There's a reason it evolved into a curse word," Valerie said from her tree stump, where she worked to replace the nocks on her arrows. "It's not just no-man's-land. Our major cities all have fortifications that were built long before Godric unleashed his demon parade. Our ancestors were desperate to keep whatever they'd found in the Southern Range out of Ells."

"What, like...survivors?" Tori asked.

Beckett folded up his map. "After the Crash, historians accounted for a series of small communities who refused to join our society. Many individuals were eager to band together against foreign advances, but these folks preferred their way of life and refused to elect—or heed—a new body of government. Because of that, we left them to fend for themselves." His face turned a rusty orange in the firelight, his eyes a muddied green. "Rumor has it a handful of these societies endured over the centuries, and their offspring reside somewhere along the Ridge, but I've yet to encounter any."

The idea of people out here in the woods, divorced of Ells and Rhea and any other semblance of modern civilization, made my skin crawl. That was a long time to live away from society.

"At least Regulas can't spy on us with his evil ancestors anymore," Mason offered. He'd swathed himself in a number of blankets, and I wondered if he'd take Torian up on his offer tonight, or if his pride wouldn't allow it.

"That's a strangely positive take from you," I commended, though I agreed with him. Those spirits had cost us Harmon, and they'd almost killed me that day at the pond. I was beyond happy to ditch those monsters in the Pass. "Gritz inhabitants or not, let's just hope my presence doesn't alert any demons in the vicinity."

Will, ever my dietician, dumped another serving of chili in my bowl before joining me by the fire. "You think there are still Pans in Belgate?"

"I can't sense anything yet. I'm hoping they already returned to Rhea. Regulas was pretty clear; he wants them all home."

"Yeah, so they can help turn his royal subjects into war puppets," Valerie growled. She sent Will an incredulous look. "How are you and Reguloser so different? You positive you share the same DNA?"

The prince stirred the contents of his bowl, thinking over his response for a few seconds. He always reflected on his words before speaking, and as someone incapable of such deliberation and patience, I couldn't help but admire him for it. "I guess my father got to him before I could. Then he was left alone to carry out a dead man's mission." His mouth formed a line. "There's a good chance I could've turned out just like him if I hadn't run away."

The confession sent me back to that evening in the Northern Pass, just before the blizzard hit. During our fight, Will told me that no matter how hard he tried to be better, he was still his father's son. As if he were genetically predisposed to despotism or something. And while he'd shed many layers of guilt, trauma, and resentment since then, he still wore this core belief in his breast pocket.

My gaze swept over the profile of a boy who was, quite literally, too sensitive for hunting, and I shook my head. "I don't think that's true."

He glanced at me, waiting for me to elaborate, to kill the shadows in his eyes.

"Harmon told us you were always different from your brother—quieter and humbler, more like your mother—which is probably why you were able to tolerate Belgate's bigotry for so long." I nudged him when his frown deepened. "You tried to get Regulas and Lucy to leave with you that night, Will. You always recognized the immorality of Godric's actions, even as a child. Regulas didn't. And more importantly, he doesn't."

You're not the same, my gaze emphasized. You never were.

Will clinked his spoon with mine, an, alright, alright, point taken, clink.

Beckett took a long, deep gulp from his flask and wiped the alcohol from his stubble. "It's a bit parabolic, isn't it?" he mused. "Two brothers, one crown. And the fate of all that's spiritual in their hands." His eyes raked over the prince. "You're living a legendary story, kid."

"That depends on the ending," Will pointed out.

"What is the ending?" Torian asked quietly. "I mean, what exactly is the plan here? Do we...do we kill Regulas? Does Will become king? Has anyone really considered the bigger picture here?"

I had. Many times. And it was an ugly conclusion no matter the victor.

Will looked like he was about to put out the fire with his vomit, so I tried to think of a way to change the topic. But it was Mason who beat me to it.

"I'm not sure what these idiots have in mind," the blond began, "but I've been reading through Fudge's notes, and I think he had a pretty good idea."

My mind took a few seconds to catch up after stumbling over Fudge's name. "Wait, really? What's...what was his plan?"

"No clue. Nikki wrote like his brain was spinning too fast for his hands. Can hardly read a thing! And there's no structure to anything whatsoever. A total mess, just like his schoolwork," Mason huffed, and it brought a smile to my face, hearing him speak about Fudge absent of grief and heartache. "But after the pages and pages of design mockups and mechanical engineering nonsense, he starts talking about the Seventh Order, and how he thinks they've taken refuge in the bunkers at the Rim."

Will nodded. "We suspected he'd arrived at that conclusion before any of us. What else did he say?"

"His notes get even more hectic and nonsensical toward the end. He starts drawing these diagrams between the Order and the portal and you and Alex. And Styx, for some reason. And he keeps writing dark and light over and over again. With lots of underlines."

"What...was he going mad?" Tori whispered.

"No." Sadness drenched the sides of my throat, sticking to my words, trapping my voice. "He found a solution to stop this war. A crazy, extreme solution by the sound of it. I have a feeling there was only one person foolish enough to carry out his plan, but...he never got the chance to tell her."

I'd had the opportunity to hear him out, but I'd chosen to run instead. And, to my horror, I'd outrun him.

Mason frowned at the fire. "What were you thinking, you illiterate genius? What was your big epiphany, huh?"

What was so insane about it that you couldn't tell anyone?

Our camp fell silent, and I was reminded of that first night in the forest with the boys and my mother's spirit. All of us gathered around the fire. Naïve children desperate for answers, haunted by ghosts.

"The truth is, we don't have a plan yet, Tori," I admitted, drawing the doctor's wary gaze. "When we make plans, the Fates gang up on us to ensure we fail. And they usually kill a few of our loved ones while they're at it."

Beckett and Will shook their heads at me, exasperated and amused.

"The first step is finding this Rhean city and securing an alliance with the clans," I said. "Then we can start filling in the blanks."

"...And what if we don't find this hidden city?" Mason asked, voicing the fear we'd all stifled upon departure.

I set my half-eaten bowl of chili on the ground for Richard to consume, then stared at my friend through orange and yellow tendrils.

"Then we try a little harder."

*****************************************************************************

Finally back from vacation and ready to dive into the adventure. <3