Nesryn said quietly, “Yes.”

The prince blinked.

“I will go with you,” she clarified.

A small smile tugged on his mouth. “Good.” Sartaq jerked his chin to the archway through which the servants had vanished down the minaret. “Pack lightly, though—Kadara is already near her limit.”

Nesryn shook her head, noting the bow and quiver stocked with arrows already atop Kadara. “I have nothing to bring with me.”

Sartaq watched her for a long moment. “Surely you would wish to say good-bye—”

“I have nothing,” she repeated. His eyes flickered at that, but she added, “I—I’ll leave a note.”

The prince solemnly nodded. “I can outfit you with clothes when we arrive. There is paper and ink in the cabinet by the far wall. Leave the letter in the box by the stairs, and one of the messengers will come to check at nightfall.”

Her hands shook slightly as she obeyed. Not with fear, but … freedom.

She wrote two notes. The first one, to her aunt and uncle, was full of love and warning and well-wishes. Her second note … it was quick, and to the point:

I have gone with Sartaq to see the rukhin. I shall be gone three weeks. I hold you to no promises. And I will hold to none of my own.

Nesryn shut both notes in the box, undoubtedly checked often for any messages from the skies, and changed into the leathers she’d left from the last time she’d flown.

She found Sartaq atop Kadara, waiting for her.

The prince extended a callused hand to help her up into the saddle.

She didn’t hesitate as she took his hand, his strong fingers wrapping around hers, and let him pull her into the saddle before him.

He strapped and buckled them in, checked all of it thrice. But he reined in Kadara when she would have soared out of the minaret.

Sartaq whispered in Nesryn’s ear, “I was praying to the Eternal Sky and all thirty-six gods that you’d say yes.”

She smiled, even if he couldn’t see it.

“So was I,” Nesryn breathed, and they leaped into the skies.

25

Yrene and Chaol hurried to the Torre library immediately after lunch. Chaol mounted his horse with relative ease, Shen giving him a hearty pat on the back in approval. Some small part of Yrene had wanted to beam when she noticed that Chaol met the man’s eyes to offer a tight smile of thanks.

And when they passed through those white walls, as the mass of the Torre rose above them and the scent of lemon and lavender filled Yrene’s nose … some part of her eased in its presence. Just how it had done from the first moment she’d spied the tower rising above the city while her ship at last neared the shore, as if it were a pale arm thrust toward the sky in greeting.

As if to proclaim to her, Welcome, daughter. We have been waiting for you.

The Torre’s library was located in the lower levels, most of its halls ramped thanks to the rolling carts the librarians used to transport the books around and collect any tomes that careless acolytes had forgotten to return.

There were a few stairs where Yrene had been forced to grit her teeth and haul him up.

He’d stared at her when she’d done it. And when she asked why, he’d said it was the first time she’d touched his chair. Moved it.

She supposed it was. But she’d warned him not to get used to it, and let him propel himself through the brightly lit corridors of the Torre.

A few of the girls from her defense class spotted them and paused to fawn over the lord, who indulged them with a crooked smile that set them giggling as they walked away. Yrene herself smiled at them as they departed, shaking her head.

Or perhaps the good mood was from the fact that his entire foot from the ankle down was regaining feeling and movement. She’d forced him to endure another set of exercises before coming here, sprawling him on the carpet while she aided him in moving his foot around and around, in stretching it, rotating it. All designed to get the blood flowing, to hopefully awaken more of his legs.

The progress was enough to keep Yrene smiling until they reached Nousha’s desk, where the librarian was currently shoving a few tomes into her heavy satchel. Packing up for the day.

Yrene glanced at the bell that had been rung only a few nights ago, but refused to blanch. Chaol had brought a sword and dagger, and she’d been mesmerized while he’d buckled them on with such efficiency. He had barely needed to look, his fingers guided by sheer muscle memory. She could picture it—every morning and night that he’d put on and removed that sword belt.

Yrene leaned over the desk and said to Nousha, who was sizing up Chaol while he also assessed her, “I would like to see where you found those texts from Eyllwe. And the scrolls.”

Nousha’s white brows crossed. “Will it bring trouble?” Her gaze slid to the sword Chaol had positioned across his lap to keep it from clacking against his chair.

“Not if I can help it,” Yrene said quietly.

Behind them, curled on an armchair in the large sitting area before the crackling hearth, a snow-white Baast Cat half slumbered, her long tail swishing like a pendulum as it draped over the edge of the cushion. No doubt listening to every word—likely to report to her sisters.

Nousha sighed sharply in a way that Yrene had witnessed a hundred times, but waved them toward the main hallway. She barked an order in Halha to a nearby librarian to mind the desk and led the way.

As they followed, the white Baast Cat cracked open a green eye. Yrene made sure to give her a respectful bow of the head. The cat merely went back to sleep, satisfied.

For long minutes, Yrene watched Chaol take in the colored lanterns, the warm stone walls, and endless stacks. “This would give the royal library in Rifthold a run for its money,” he observed.

“Is it that large?”

“Yes, but this might be larger. Older, definitely.” His eyes danced with shadows—bits of memory that she wondered if she would glimpse the next time she worked on him.

Today’s encounter … It had left her reeling and raw.

But the salt of her tears had been cleansing. In a way she had not known she needed.

Down and down they went, taking the main ramp that looped through the levels. They passed librarians shelving books, acolytes in solitary or group study around the tables, healers poring over musty tomes in doorless rooms, and the occasional Baast Cat sprawled over the top of the shelves, or padding into the shadows, or simply sitting at a crossroads—as if waiting.

Still they went deeper.

“How did you know they were down here?” Yrene asked Nousha’s back.

“We keep good records,” was all the Head Librarian said.

Chaol gave Yrene a look that said, We have cranky librarians in Rifthold, too.

Yrene bit her lip to keep from grinning. Nousha could sniff out laughter and amusement like a bloodhound on a scent. And shut it down as viciously, too.

At last, they reached a dark corridor that reeked of stone and dust.

“Second shelf down. Don’t ruin anything,” Nousha said by way of explanation and farewell, and left without a look back.

Chaol’s brows lifted in bemusement, and Yrene swallowed her chuckle.

It stopped being an effort as they approached the shelf the librarian had indicated. Piles of scrolls lay tucked beneath books whose spines glittered with the Eyllwe language.

Chaol let out a low whistle through his teeth. “How old is the Torre, exactly?”

“Fifteen hundred years.”

He went still.

“This library has been here that long?”

She nodded. “It was all built in one go. A gift from an ancient queen to the healer who saved her child’s life. A place for the healer to study and live—close to the palace—and to invite others to study as well.”

“So it predates the khaganate by a great deal.”

“The khagans are the latest in a long line of conquerors since then. The most benevolent since that first queen, to be sure. Even her palace itself did not survive so well as the Torre. What you stay in now … they built it atop the rubble of the queen’s castle. After the conquerors who came a generation before the khaganate razed it to the ground.”

He swore, low and creatively.

“Healers,” Yrene said, scanning the shelves, “are in high demand, whether you are the current ruler or the invading one. All other posts … perhaps unnecessary. But a tower full of women who can keep you from death, even if you are hanging by a thread …”