“Don’t do this. I need you here now, more than ever. There are traitors in our midst, you know that, yes?”

  “I’m aware. Appoint another Viscount in my absence, ready a group of your most loyal to find the traitor and root them out. When I return, we’ll deal with them.”

  “You won’t return.”

  “Then do it without me.” The Viscount climbed the carriage, took the reins, and jabbed a finger at the servant who had just finished clasping the horse to the vehicle. “Move,” he growled.

  With his hands up, the servant stepped out of the way. The Viscount slapped the reins and yelled. A moment later, the carriage was on the move—and it was coming right in my direction. I didn’t have the time to stop him. I didn’t have the time to talk to him. I could either try to get on it, or go back to my room.

  And I only had a split second to decide.

  CHAPTER 14

  This has got to be the stupidest thing I’ve ever done.

  No one could say I was a person prone to doubting her own actions or convictions, but even I had to admit that leaping into a moving carriage bound for my impending death was… questionable. And yet, I had done it anyway.

  I’d had only a split second to decide whether to jump into the Viscount’s vehicle or let him charge away on his own. Lucky for me, I had become pretty good at making a single second stretch into a handful.

  On the one hand, leaving with the Viscount meant I would be following him into the dark, away from the relative safety of the house. There was a chance I could help him with a problem I felt responsible for, only I’d be putting my life on the line as well. If left, I would also be ditching the Favoring. I had no idea how that decision was going to affect the other girls or the competition itself.

  Invidia was going to be furious, though, and I had a feeling that if I somehow survived and made it back to her, she could decide to kill me herself.

  On the other hand, staying at the house meant abandoning the Viscount, and possibly exposing myself to whoever had stolen his cure. The niggling feeling in buzzing around in the back of my head served to warn me that whoever had tried to kill me and steal the pendant I carried around my neck wasn’t totally finished. Even though the original assassin was dead, as was the man who had trained him, I felt like I was still in mortal danger in the house.

  The Viscount had been the only person I could count on for protection, even if it was only given grudgingly, and he was leaving. So, like him, I was in a damned if I do, damned if I don’t kind of situation. Leave or stay. Either choice could’ve meant my death, so I decided to roll the dice and jump, hoping I wouldn’t bounce off the side of the carriage and go crashing into the cobblestones.

  I wasn’t sure if he had heard me throw myself into the cabin and shut the door behind me, but he’d had such a concentrated look on his face as he drove, I didn’t think he had noticed. At least, I hoped he hadn’t noticed, otherwise he was likely to stop the carriage and kick me out to the curb before we even reached the gate.

  Rell caught up with us quickly, his wings having fully healed by now. I watched him fly next to the carriage, then panic when he encountered a closed window. “Uh, little help here?” he shrieked into my brain.

  I leapt up and opened the window, and Rell squeezed through. As soon as he got inside, he headed straight for one of the plush, velvet seats and sat down, panting and wheezing while I rolled the window up. “Geez, you’re out of breath,” I said.

  “My wing is still healing, and I haven’t flown in a while. Give me a break.”

  “Could also be the lack of exercise and the overabundance of birds in blankets, huh?” I grinned. “I’m only teasing. Do you think he heard us?”

  “I don’t think anyone heard, or even saw us. I think we’re safe.”

  “For a few more seconds, at least.”

  “Seconds?”

  “Look.”

  Rell joined me to look out of a window. We were coming up to the exterior gates, and quickly. There was a guard posted near it. As soon as he saw the Viscount’s carriage approach, he undid the locks and opened the gates without question. I ducked back into the carriage, hiding just under the window’s edge to avoid being seen.

  A shiver worked its way up my spine, and I shuddered. It was a weird sensation, like walking through a wall of static electricity. I’d never felt anything like it before in my life. I realized, then that I hadn’t felt this strange wall the last time I had stepped out of the gates. I had been running full pelt, though, and had barely felt my own feet pounding the ground.

  “Did you feel that?” I asked.

  Rell nodded. “We’ve crossed the threshold,” he said. “There’s no turning back now.”

  “He could turn us around if he finds us, I guess?”

  “Do you really think he will?”

  “No… I think it’s certain death or bust.”

  The carriage jostled over the path at a quick pace, giving me no time to truly experience the environment outside of Emerald Hall’s walls. The last time I’d been out here, I hadn’t gotten more than a hundred paces away from it before a large butterfly tried to take my soul. Now, I was moving so quickly along the path, between tall trees that zipped past, I didn’t think the butterflies could even reach me.

  Then again, who was to say I was right? Maybe they were biding their time. Maybe they could already smell me, the human in their midst; the prey. Or maybe, so long as I stayed in the carriage, they couldn’t get to me. I didn’t want to test the theory by opening the door again, not until we were stopped, at least.

  I looked over at Rell, eyes narrow. He was sitting down, making himself comfortable. “You’re strangely calm about all this,” I said.

  Rell shrugged. “I’m here, now. I’m part of this. Might as well make the most of it, right?”

  “That’s a very awakened point of view, Rell. I like it.”

  “I suppose I’m finally choosing to go along with your stupid ideas. It’s kind of liberating.”

  “Right? I mean, we’re probably going to die, but can either of us say they’d ever done this before?”

  “If you mean stowing away in a Viscount’s carriage headed for the most dangerous forest in the Kingdom of Spring, then no. Zipping through Arcadia, though? I’ve done that. There’s a lot to see out there. I think you’ll find it beautiful… you know, if your small, human brain can comprehend things like colors, and vistas, and such. You know, pretty things.”

  “Number one, my brain is at least double the size of yours. And number two, I can totally appreciate pretty things.”

  “Clearly, otherwise we probably wouldn’t be in this carriage.”

  My cheeks flushed hard, hot, and red. I knew exactly what he meant, but all I could muster was a defensive shriek. “Excuse me?”

  “Oh, please. You mean to tell me, if it were Vito in the driver’s seat, that you’d be sitting in here?”

  I paused. “If I had caused his problem… yes.”

  Rell wagged a finger at me. “That little moment of hesitation just now betrayed your lie.”

  “Whatever, I’m still here to help him.”

  “You can’t say your intentions are totally selfless, though. We both know you’re just trying to win favor with him so he can send you home, but it probably helps that he’s easy on the eyes.”

  “And, so what if he is?”

  “Hey, I don’t care either way. I just think you should be honest with yourself for a change.”

  “Honest with myself?”

  “Since the moment we met, all I’ve seen you do is lie to yourself about how much you hate it here. How you hate the people, the food, the house—Arcadia. But I think, deep down, you’re starting to like it here.”

  I scoffed. “Don’t act like you know me.”

  “And don’t you forget that we’re bound, and that I can read your thoughts pretty accurately most of the time. I know how you really feel about this place, even if you aren’t ready to admit it to yourself.”

  “Oh? And how do I really feel about Arcadia?”

  “You liked your old home because it was comfortable, not because it was good. It was grey, and dull, and lifeless, and boring. The only way you could make it livable was to sing, to play your music, to bring your own kind of beauty into the world around you. But now you live in a beautiful world bursting with color, and flavor, and magic, and it’s growing on you.”

  “And things that want to kill me.”

  “Like your world was any better in that regard?”

  I folded my arms and turned my eyes toward the window again. We had cleared the trees, and while the carriage was still going full-pelt I was treated to a view like I had never seen before. The sky was clear blue, the mountains in the distance were wide, full, and deep green capped with white snow.

  The landscape that rolled away from the carriage wasn’t just green; it was vibrant, and alive with colors. The grass looked purer, the flowers came in all shapes, sizes—pinks, and yellows, whites, and purples—and those colors were exaggerated, and lush, as if someone had painted them.

  Crossing over a bridge, I caught a glimpse of a stream gushing away beneath us. The water shimmered and sparkled as the sunlight touched it. It was so clear, I could see the fish swimming against the current, leaping over the rapid parts like the salmon back home did. On the riverbank, a man with a cart and a bucket stood ready to impale them with a spear as they jumped, his movements lightning fast—too fast for the fish.

  And there, in a field not too far from the carriage, I saw flowers as big as people being nurtured by… butterflies. Not just one, or two, or even five of them. There had to have been a dozen of those large, fluttering creatures, each of them floating carefully from flower to flower, their huge, vibrant wings beating against the tall grass beneath them; each wing a piece of natural art in and of itself.

  “What the… oh my God,” the words fell out of my mouth. I sank into my seat, trying to hide from them.

  Rell perked up, but didn’t stand. “What is it?”

  “Butterflies… like the one that attacked me.”

  “Lots of them?”

  “Loads.”

  “I’m not surprised. They serve a purpose here like they do in your world.”

  “The ones in my world don’t eat human souls.”

  “Maybe they want to, but they can’t.”

  “Trust me, our butterflies don’t eat souls.”

  “Maybe these can’t help themselves?”

  “The one that attacked me did. Or maybe Arcadia did? But then that would mean that Arcadia thinks, and wants, and that doesn’t make sense, does it?”

  “It does. Arcadia isn’t just a place, or a world. If you believe the stories, Arcadia is a spirit, omnipotent, ever present. If she wants something, she gets it.”

  “I hope she hasn’t set her mind on transforming me into some weird creature.”

  “She probably has.”

  “Thanks, Rell. That’s encouraging.”

  “Just keeping it real, as you humans say. You don’t belong here, and she knows you’re here. She’s going to come after you.”

  “Yeah, I really needed to hear that right now.”

  Rell nodded, smiled, and tucked his head into his tail. “You’re welcome.”

  I tried not to pay too much attention to the butterflies, sitting upright again only when we were clear of the fields. As far as I knew, none of them had realized I was in the carriage; or maybe they had, and they didn’t care. Either way, I felt a lot more comfortable once we were past them.

  Without being able to tell the passage of time, I had no idea how long we were riding for. It could’ve been an hour, thirty minutes, five minutes. Rell seemed perfectly happy to sleep, but I wasn’t going to. There wasn’t a chance in hell I’d find any rest in the back of that rickety carriage that seemed to deliberately hit every rock and bump in its path.

  Then again, the Viscount was driving like a demon; like he was running out of time. Though, he was, wasn’t he? The healer had told him he had a few days at most. A few days before what? I didn’t want to think about it, but I couldn’t help myself. I couldn’t stop turning the visuals over, and over in my head.

  I didn’t want to see him transform into the thing I had almost turned into.

  Finally, moments after the carriage dipped into a wooded area, it started to slow. Maybe the horse was getting tired, or maybe the Viscount had decided that he had ridden far enough; or maybe we’d reached the Darkwood Forest. Either way, I knew, he was probably going to open that door in a couple of moments, and I was going to get caught.

  “Rell,” I whispered, “Rell!”

  “What?” he asked, not opening his eyes. “I’m trying to get some sleep.”

  “We’ve stopped.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “He’s coming down!”

  Rell opened an amber eye and looked at me. “What did you think was going to happen eventually?”

  “I don’t know what to say to him.”

  “Well, why don’t you start with hello?”

  The carriage stopped completely. I heard the horse snort and beat at the ground with its hooves. A moment later, the carriage shifted as the Viscount stepped off the driver’s seat. I heard his boots land as he jumped off it and saw him go around the back of the carriage. By some miracle, he didn’t look inside.

  “What are you waiting for?” Rell asked, beaming the words into my mind.

  “I don’t know!” I thought, “He’s going to kill me.”

  “Whatever you do, do it quickly so I can get back to my nap.”

  Swallowing hard, I peeked up and out of the back window. He had raised the trunk, so I couldn’t see him from where I was sitting. I was going to have to step outside. Mustering all my internal willpower, I reached for the door handle, but I hadn’t yet opened it before he spoke.

  “You aren’t as quiet as you think,” said the Viscount, and I froze like a puddle of water in a blast freezer.

  CHAPTER 15

  He knew I was here, in the carriage, stowed away like… well, like a stowaway. I wanted to open the door with confidence, to step outside and confront him like I meant it, but I was frozen, unable to speak, to move even one of my muscles. Even breathing had suddenly become almost impossible.

  Because that’s the problem with you, Avery; you never have a finished plan, only half-cocked ideas.

  “You should probably stay inside,” the Viscount said. “I cannot guarantee your safety out here.”

  I swallowed the ball of anxiety that was sitting inside of my throat. “Why not?” I asked.

  “Because we are no longer in Emerald Hall.” He shut the trunk, and I caught a glimpse of his chestnut hair as he moved around the side of the carriage. When he stopped right in front of the door, he stared at me, his eyes boring holes into me. “May I come in?”

  “Oh… uh, sure.”

  I opened the carriage door, and the Viscount stepped inside. His frame was large enough that it was a squeeze for him to get through, and when he sat down, he almost had to duck his head a little to avoid the roof. He was holding a roll of fur in his hands, dark and thick. He set it on his lap and looked across at me, holding my eyes.

  “What are you doing here, Avery?” he asked, calm and collected.

  “I have to be honest,” I said, “I’m not totally sure.”

  His eyes narrowed. “If you’re lying to me, I’ll know.”

  “Look, I’m not sure, okay? Of anything. All I know is I saw you riding off and I couldn’t let you go on your own.”

  “And why would you come with me instead of taking your place at the Favoring?”

  I could feel blood flushing to my cheeks as I remembered Rell’s words from earlier. You’re only here because he’s pretty, or something like that. He was only half right… okay, maybe he was fully right. I was here because of him, because it was him, and because he was my best shot at going home—not the Favoring, and certainly not Invidia.

  “Do I really need to answer the question?” I asked.

  “You do.”

  “Does it even matter?”

  “It does.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I will be the one who has to explain to the Duchess why the Lady of Emerald Hall disappeared to go chasing after me. If the excuse is not good enough, it will mean the end of my political career, and possibly more.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know what to tell you. I’m here. I’m here for you. You can take my help with whatever it is you’re doing out here, or you can take me back to the house.”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “Or, I could leave you on the side of the road and continue on my journey.”

  “You wouldn’t.”

  “I would.”

  “The Rite of Protection—”

  “—no longer applies, remember?”

  Crap. I had forgotten. He had warned me the first night I had dared to flee the House that he wouldn’t be under any obligation to help me if I left… and yet, he had. He had raced after me, crushed that massive butterfly without even touching it, and he’d taken me back into the house. And when that wasn’t enough, he took into himself the creature that was trying to transform me into something else.

  Now it was doing the same thing to him.

  “If I may interject,” Rell said.

  Shit. An image of Rell being sat on flashed into my mind. He had been sitting where the Viscount sat now, only he wasn’t there anymore—he was next to me. I had forgotten he was even here, in the carriage with us. The Viscount’s presence was intoxicating, enough to confuse me, and take me out of the moment.

  I hated it.

  “You brought the lizard with you,” said the Viscount, his eyebrow arched up. “Why am I not surprised.”

  “I’m not a lizard,” Rell said, “I’m—”

  “Part drake, part sprite on your mother’s side—why are you here as well?”

  “I kind of just jumped on board with the idea. I decided to stop resisting her insanity.”

  “Insanity?”