Ent easy to believe Rojvah would really want me, but I felt her pulse quicken with that kiss, too. Reckon she’s got as little experience with kisses as me.

  Harder to believe what she said about me. Been disappointing folk my whole life. I can smell it even if they’re too neighborly to say it out loud.

  But she’s right about one thing, at least. Time’s come for me and Selen to have it out, as Mam would say.

  * * *

  —

  I tilt my head, inhaling. Selen’s alone, and she ent in the bath or the privy. There’s a slight rustle and a scent of paper. Not the rough parchment the guard uses for reports. I hear cushions compress as she shifts.

  She ent workin’. She’s on the couch, prob’ly readin’ a Jak Scaletongue story or somesuch.

  Selen’s pulse changes. “Know you’re lurking up there, Darin Bales, so you might as well come out.”

  Dunno how she does it, but Selen’s always been good at knowing when I’m around. I drop off the roof onto her terrace. The doors are locked tight, but there’s a tiny gap between them, and it’s all I need as I turn slippery and squeeze through. “What gave me away?”

  Selen puts her book facedown on the couch and gets up. “What do you want, Darin?”

  She smells angry. Ready for a fight.

  And I’m sick of it.

  “Ent we friends anymore?” I ask. “Shown up at your window a hundred times. Used to call it comin’ to set and visit. Now it’s lurking, and I ent welcome?”

  I can see the words hit her aura and there’s a whiff of uncertainty, but Selen ent one to budge when her back is up. “What do you need to visit with me for? Got your little ‘intended’ for that now, ay?”

  I move deliberately into the room, going to my favorite chair. It’s padded and quiet, with a view of all the windows and doors. It’s where I always set, and I make a point of plopping down. “What do you care if I’m promised? Both know you got other prospects.”

  Her scent is even madder now. “Just because your nose tells you all my secrets doesn’t mean I need to explain myself to you, Darin Bales.”

  “Honest word,” I agree. “So why do I have to explain myself to you?”

  Selen pauses for a response, but I don’t give her time. “Tell you why. Because you and Olive treat me like a child. Always have. Gotta help little Darin wipe his bum! He’d be lost without big sister!”

  Selen’s muscles unbunch, and she rubs her face a moment before going back to the couch and flopping down with a scent of resignation. “Ent like that, Darin. We just care about you, and some things are…hard for you.”

  “Some things are hard for you, too, Sel,” I say. “I been at your da’s house for Seventhday supper. Ent I always been there for you, when I can? Don’t mean I get to tell you what to do.”

  Selen sighs, her muscles going limp, but she doesn’t reply.

  “Don’t know what’s happened to us, Sel,” I say, “but I hate it. Don’t care if you’d rather kiss Perin than me.”

  “Never said that, Darin,” Selen says.

  “Not with words,” I say. “But I ent as wood-brained as you and Olive think.”

  I can smell fresh irritation and push forward. “Point is it dun’t matter. Rojvah dun’t matter. You’re my best friend, Selen Cutter. I got to give that up, just because someone wants to kiss me, for a change?”

  Selen looks at me, and her body starts giving off all the signs she’s gonna cry. Muscles in her neck and face tighten, and I can smell saltwater collecting in her tear ducts.

  Quick as a blink, I snatch a silk handkerchief from my pouch of Jongleur’s tricks, crossing the floor and putting it in her hand. I’m back in my chair before she realizes I’ve moved.

  Selen starts, staring at the kerchief. It did the trick like it usually does. Nothing stops Selen from cryin’ quicker than handing her a hankie.

  “I’m sorry, Darin,” she says at last. “Feels like everything’s changing so fast. Olive used to be my best friend, but lately it feels like I don’t even know her anymore. Then it was just us, alone on the road all those months, but now that’s changed, too.”

  “Nothing important’s changed,” I say. “Still cross a desert, if you were on the other side and needed me.”

  Selen nods. “Me, too. Darin. Always.”

  Now it’s me that feels ready to cry. I push the feeling down before it becomes a distraction. We’re so close.

  “Now Olive’s in her office all day, with everyone bowing and scraping,” Selen says, “and I’ve got guards that have seen me get my bum paddled asking my permission to use the privy.”

  I nod. “Olive wants it that way. Heard her tell Arther she wants folk used to you givin’ orders.”

  Selen looks up at that. “Why?”

  “Know why,” I say. “You’re princess of Hollow, too. Someone’s got to stay home and be in charge while she goes off to the Spear of Ala, or wherever the Damajah is sending her.”

  “Like night I’m staying behind.” Selen looks ready to spit. “Already told her that.”

  “ ’Course not,” I agree.

  “And I got a message for Olive,” Selen says, “if she’s going on that witch’s errand over rescuing her own mam.”

  “Hold your glove for you,” I say, “you want to slap the fool out of her. Don’t think it will change her mind. And maybe it don’t matter. Might be Inevera’s right, and we’re better off without Olive on this hunt.”

  “Oh, ay,” Selen rolls her eyes. “Why would we need someone who can arm-wrestle a wood demon?”

  “Because we need to sneak,” I say, “and after Prince Ramm’s little stunt, Olive ent going anywhere without a briarpatch of spears around her.”

  “She could sneak.” Selen throws my own word back at me.

  “Folk would lose their minds, she disappeared again,” I remind her.

  “Ay, but no one would miss me?” Selen asks.

  “ ’Course they would, but I got thoughts about that,” I say. “Maybe we can do without Olive, but I can’t do it without you.”

  Selen cocks her head at me. “Why’s that? I ent got special magic, and I can’t carry a tune. What can I do the others can’t?”

  “Thought about leaving you behind, that night after Olive was taken,” I tell her. “Reckon I could have run those horses down, I’d really leaned in.”

  “Why didn’t you?” Selen asks.

  “ ’Cause I was scared,” I admit. “ ’Cause I might be able to run them down, but what was I going to do, then? Ent a fighter like you.”

  “You’d have figured something out,” Selen says. “Ent always about fighting.”

  “Ay, maybe,” I say, “it’s about heart. And I ent got any when I’m by myself. Never would have made it to Olive, you hadn’t been there with me.”

  Selen looks at me for a long time. Then she gets up and holds out her arms. “Know you don’t like hugs, Darin, but…”

  I’m in her arms before she can finish the sentence.

  Barely past sunrise on a cold Solstice morning, the streets are lined with cheering crowds, packed behind the barricades as we pass. Any building with a terrace or flat roof is covered with folk, and more lean out of windows, all vying for a view of the parade.

  I look back at the seemingly endless line of horses, riders in military dress uniforms, spears pointed at the sky. They stretch all the way up to Mother’s keep, winding down the hill to the Corelings’ Graveyard, the market center of Cutter’s Hollow.

  The graveyard was so named because it was on that very spot Arlen Bales first taught the Hollowers to kill demons. If there is a place more sacred in all Hollow, I don’t know of it. Mother was crowned onstage at the graveyard’s famous bandshell, and Arther wants the same for me.

  The parade has been an excellent reason to get to know the infantry and cavalry captains, and drill with the Hollow Soldiers. They are more formal than Gared’s Cutters, but if there is one place I am at home after my time in Krasia, it is the training grounds.

  The Hollow Lancers all ride Angierian mustang, giant animals that make the full-sized coursers we rode from Krasia look like ponies. After escorting us to the city center, the lancers will ride out to the larger fields outside the city to perform drills for cheering crowds.

  There are Solstice Festivals happening in all the boroughs of Hollow, with music and dancing and the traditional bonfire against the longest night. Folk give small gifts, especially to children, as friends and family gather from afar to celebrate. Winter Solstice was always my favorite day of the year, sweeter for its shortness. I would spend months working on my Solstice dress, and trying to find a dress Selen would consent to wear.

  Neither of us wears a dress today. Not out in the open, so soon after Prince Ramm’s visit. Not on coronation day. There are guards everywhere and Favah herself cast the dice and saw no threat to my life. Still, I cannot deny my unease. Asome said there would be three, and it stands to reason that none of my brothers would be fool enough to wait for me to take power.

  Riding at my side, Selen looks radiant in her new wooden armor, glittering with warded enamel. I tested the breastplate myself when it arrived, thrusting a practice spear so hard the steel tip shattered without leaving a scratch on the surface.

  I remember the sound of the arrow striking Faseek, and am relieved that Selen will be protected if someone aims for me and misses.

  Over the suit she wears a captain’s tabard with my house colors and sigil, and the warded cloak that was Mother’s last gift to her. The rounded shield slung from the saddle of her giant mustang carries the sigil of House Cutter, a two-headed axe crossed with a machete before a goldwood tree.

  I wear Chadan’s Tazhan armor, but I know the black steel scales—so distinctly Krasian—unsettle some folk. My house tabard matches Selen’s, covering my chest and falling around my legs like a skirt. Mother’s blue warded cloak softens my shoulders.

  The helm is slung in easy reach from my saddle, but I cannot afford to hide my face from the people. It has only been three moons since I stopped shaving my head, but the royal hairdresser made the most of the scant inches he had to work with, affixing it in place with a jelly that dried hard as cement, while giving the appearance of hair slick with oil. At my brow is one of Mother’s warded diadems, a brilliant sapphire at its center.

  From the cheers of the folk and ribbons of paper that rain down upon us, it appears we have struck the right note. The armor sends a less-than-subtle message, but it’s a needed one. I don’t want panic, but now is not the time for Hollow to become soft.

  There are still dangers in the night.

  Hary Roller likes to make jokes at his own expense, but I am coming to understand the value of a skilled royal herald. In one meeting, I told him what I wanted my people to know about me, about what happened out in the desert, about what’s to come. He began composing The Ballad of Princes Olive on the spot, stroking his bow against the cello strings as he plucked the most emotional elements of my tale and began humming them into lyrics.

  It took him three days, but I could tell Master Roller was inordinately pleased with himself when he sat down to play us the final piece. Hary took some…liberties with the truth, lionizing not just me, but all my companions, and glossed over the uglier and more sensitive bits. But in its entirety, it’s a fair summation of what happened, and who I am. Plus it has a nice melody.

  Hary has set Jongleurs along the parade route, all of them playing the ballad loud and often throughout the parade. We hear it fade in and out as we wind through the streets of Cutter’s Hollow.

  There’s a verse about my ill-fated borough tour with the young folk from Apple Hill, and the next time it comes up, there is a great cheer up ahead.

  “Ay, look!” Selen points to a group of familiar faces crowded at the parade barricade. I see a flag with a red-appled tree atop a verdant hill. I wince as I glance down and see it rises from the back of a wheeled chair. Boni is there, waving at me like an old friend, but for a moment, all I can see is my memory of her screaming until she passed out as I frantically tried to tie her arteries in time for Micha to amputate her leg.

  But I wave, and the folk of Apple Hill cheer again. I see Tam, who had nearly been eviscerated by a demon talon, walking with the aid of a cane. Cayla stands beside him, offering support. Six from Apple Hill died that night, nine more injured. All because I was stupid and impulsive and left Mother’s greatward, drawing demons to our camp.

  Yet still they are here, cheering the sight of us when they have every reason to cast shadows and blame.

  “Ent that a sunny sight,” Selen breathes as we catch sight of Oskar. “Guess we weren’t the only ones who found a calling on that tour.” I remember the tall boy with arms like a blacksmith standing side by side with Selen, bathed in glory as they attacked a rock demon with their spears. Now Oskar stands in the dress uniform of a Hollow cadet.

  I have to swallow a tightness in my throat. “Oskar is your ajin’pal,” I say. “Your blood brother.”

  “Ay?” Selen asks.

  “You fought side by side the first time you shed demon ichor in the night,” I say. “In Krasia, there is no greater bond between warriors.”

  Thoughts of the battle bring other sights to mind. Gyles, lifeless on the ground. Elexis, still shrieking as she was eaten alive.

  Selen sees my eyes go distant and gives me a shove, keeping me in the now. “Any rules in Krasia against kissing your blood brother?”

  “Ay, I hope not.” I force myself to smile and wink. “Kissed mine.” Selen honks a laugh.

  Oskar leans back, and I catch my breath as another familiar face appears, round and soft with bright eyes and full lips. The top button of her dress is still undone, even in the winter air, and I feel my face heat as another memory comes to mind.

  Lanna.

  She waves, bouncing up and down with excitement, pretty as a sunrise. I wave in reply, and we reach hands toward each other as I pass, but from atop my giant mustang we might as well be separated by a chasm.

  There’s no way to stop a parade, but I glance down at the footman pacing my horse. “Have the Apple Hill delegation escorted to the graveyard and given a place of honor in the royal section.”

  “Of course, Highness.” The man steps smoothly out of the procession, quickly disappearing behind us.

  The festival stretches all through the town, with special sales, storefront games, and decorations on every street. The main attractions will be at the bandshell in Corelings’ Graveyard, where already teams of Jongleurs provide music that wafts down streets like a gentle breeze.

  The market pavilions have been cleared from the center of the great cobbled plaza, but vendors work the crowd with warm food, noisemakers, and banners bearing the spear and olive. There are games to play, prizes to win, and classes in dance, singing, and crafts.

  The coveted tiered benches near the bandshell are crowded when we arrive. Likely they filled the moment the plaza opened. Guards limit the crowd size, but folk crowd the barricades, hoping for a chance to be let in as others exit.

  Next to the bandshell on the opposite side from the bleachers is the royal section, walled on three sides and roped in front, with alert guards on patrol and stationed atop buildings around the city center.

  There’s a raised viewing platform with shade and comfortable seating around Mother’s wooden throne, where she would sit to witness the games and performances, occasionally coming out to kick off a contest, or inviting folk in to stand before the throne as she bestowed awards.

  I remember years of playing on that platform with Selen, and years more sitting next to Mother, clapping and cheering.

  Now I’m expected to sit on that throne and be Mother. To cut ribbons and toss ceremonial horseshoes, to bless folk and settle their disputes with a word that is law.

  Selen and I ride up to the central fountain, the space around it cleared with ropes for special events. The fountain is dry this time of year, and an oil fire burns in the bowl held aloft by its twenty-foot-tall statue of Arlen Bales. In densely populated Cutter’s Hollow, the fire is only symbolic, but in the outer boroughs, folk chop sacrificial trees for Solstice and build massive bonfires to ward against the long night.

  The crowd cheers as we dismount. Without thinking, I revert to Mother’s training, giving the crowd a moment to revel before I raise my hands for silence.

  “Good folk of Hollow!” I boom, as the hubbub dies down. “I know I have been away, but I have never missed a Winter Solstice Festival in Cutter’s Hollow, and I don’t mean to start!”

  Again the crowd explodes with cheering, noisemakers, and applause. I let the wave crest, as Mother would say, and then speak again, welcoming, thanking, blessing, and formally opening the festival.

  Darin, Rojvah, and Arick are already in the royal section. I know Darin struggles on festival days. So many folk crowding the plaza and cheering at irregular intervals—not to mention the noisemakers, festival crackers, and toss bangs—gave him fits when we were kids until we started packing his ears with wax. Even then, he appeared late and vanished early.

  Darin has his hood up against the morning sun and looks a little drained, but he seems regulated. Nevertheless, Rojvah hovers by him protectively. Among Hollow’s elite, everyone wants a little time with the mysterious son of the man whose statue stands just a few yards away.

  But every time some noble or courtier ventures over to offer greetings, Rojvah interposes herself, smiling and charming and doing most of the talking. Most folk might not notice, but I do.

  I feel torn. Selen is my best friend, and instinctively I want to take her side in any dispute. But looking out for Darin Bales is a direct path to my favor. Whatever her motives, Rojvah seems to take their relationship seriously, and that’s what Darin deserves.