Dato closed the door with care, as if the palace might hear the latch click and decide to remember it.

  For a long moment he simply stood there, hand still on the brass handle, breathing through the aftertaste of court food and court attention. The corridor noise dulled behind the wood, but it didn’t vanish. Nothing vanished in Carlbrin. Sound only changed shape.

  His formal coat lay folded over the chair back, blue and silver and too perfect for a night that had been anything but. He stared at it with a faint, irrational resentment. On the road he’d worn leathers that smelled like horse and smoke, and no one had cared if a sleeve wrinkled or a collar sat wrong. Out there, he’d been a man with mud on his boots and a purpose that fit in his hands. In here, he was a prince again, and the palace would measure him by posture and every hair out of place.

  The lamps painted gold along the edges of everything, but the shadows never truly left. They only waited in corners, patient as old debts.

  Even here, in rooms meant for a prince, the palace did not feel like his.

  It felt like a cell most of the time.

  Dato crossed to the side table and began undoing the small, practiced pieces of himself. Collar clasp first. Belt second. The signet ring he rarely wore outside these walls. Each removal should have been relief. Tonight, it felt like being stripped down in front of an audience he couldn’t see.

  He set the signet down too carefully and forced himself not to think about how many hands would be eager to touch Kairi the same way, with smiles sharp enough to cut. A cruel reminder he took her from that easy life only to come to this life by his side to be watched.

  A fragment of dinner flickered, uninvited. His father’s voice, mild as tea.

  Were you a proper prince on the road… or did you forget your manners the moment you had her within arm’s reach?

  Dato’s jaw tightened. He hadn’t forgotten.

  He’d remembered too much. Every rule. Every watcher. Every moment he’d wanted to pull her closer and had chosen not to because Rush’s eyes were always there, because Jayce’s silence meant he was listening, because the palace was still a day away and already reaching for them.

  He moved to the washbasin and splashed water over his hands. The cold bit and he welcomed the clean snap of it.

  Another flash, sharper.

  Rush, lounging like he owned the world.

  He tried. He even made it a full day.

  Then the cruelly perfect pause.

  And then my sister smiled at him and he stopped remembering he was raised in a palace.

  Heat climbed Dato’s throat even now, alone in his rooms. Not embarrassed exactly. Something worse. Exposure. As if his heart had been set on the table between plates and politics and everyone had leaned in to inspect it. But, honestly, what did he expect. He knew how this would become.

  She was worth it though. He could handle some discomfort.

  He dried his hands and turned away before memory could sharpen its teeth further.

  On the writing desk, a stack of papers waited in neat lines. Reports. Invitations. A ribboned notice about his name day. The kind of life he returned to without being asked if he wanted it.

  Eight days.

  Eighteen now. Nineteen in eight days. The number sat strange in his mind, like a door he hadn’t meant to open yet. He didn’t feel older. He felt… cornered by time.

  His fingers drifted, as they always did, to the chain beneath his shirt. He slipped the signet ring back onto it and tucked it where it always sat before.

  He closed his hand around it, grounding himself in something that was his. Not the title. Not the ceremony. Not the Temple’s verdict.

  Just the weight of her choice.

  A quieter memory rose, soft as a breath.

  Niveus: This palace will chew on anything it can taste.

  Kairi’s calm as she returned the ring to his palm. The way her fingers lingered for a heartbeat too long, warm and sure, as if she knew he would need that warmth later.

  He swallowed and let the ring fall back against his chest.

  The bedroom beyond was too clean. Too still.

  Dato stepped into it and paused, taking it in with a kind of disbelief that he was allowed silk and warmth when so much of him felt like it belonged in a guard cot with his boots close enough to grab. The bed looked untouched by human sleep. It looked like a painting of comfort.

  On the road, there had always been sound. Horses shifting. A crackle of embers. The low murmur of guards trading watch. Even silence out there had been companionable, shared between people who knew the same danger.

  Here, the quiet pressed in.

  He sat on the edge of the mattress and felt it give beneath him, too soft, too forgiving. He imagined Kairi in her rooms a corridor away, probably looking out over the lake with that thoughtful crease between her brows, pretending she wasn’t overwhelmed, pretending she didn’t miss the simplicity of Brindlecross.

  He imagined the way she’d smiled at him at her door, as if she could reach inside him and straighten every crooked part with a sentence.

  Only you and I know the truth of it all, she’d murmured. Don’t let them fluster you.

  Sweet dreams, my prince.

  He exhaled slowly, closing his eyes just long enough to feel her absence like a physical thing.

  It was absurd how quickly his body remembered the space beside him. How quickly his mind started bargaining for more time.

  Dato opened his eyes and looked toward the window.

  Lake Aurelune glimmered pale beyond the glass. The palace roofs cut dark angles against moonlight. Somewhere beyond those angles, her rooms waited.

  He stared at the slanted lines of the roof and felt a thought slip free, reckless and bright.

  He could climb over to her window.

  It wasn’t far.

  And it wasn’t entirely unreasonable, his mind supplied immediately, as if building a case. He knew these roofs. He’d crossed them as a boy when the halls felt too tight and the air inside tasted like ceremony. He’d done it at fifteen, at sixteen, at seventeen, when being the third prince meant you learned how to disappear.

  Now he was eighteen and the palace expected him to be carved from obedience.

  He stood.

  His feet carried him to the window before he could fully decide against it. He unlaced the catch and eased it open, letting winter air spill in, cold and sharp enough to clear his head. It tugged at his hair, at his shirt, and for a heartbeat the world felt simpler: roof. distance. choice.

  He set one hand on the sill.

  He could do it quickly. Quietly. Just a few minutes. A word. A touch. Proof that she was real and near and not only a story being told around him.

  He loved her.

  He missed her.

  It would be a quick trip.

  His gaze flicked toward the roofline, measuring the climb out of habit, the way soldiers measured exits.

  And then he stopped.

  Not because it was impossible.

  Because he could already hear the palace, faint as a pulse through stone. The way it would notice a latch. A shadow. A missing prince. The way it would turn that into a story before dawn.

  Dato’s fingers tightened on the sill until the cold stung. He could be quick. Just wait till it got a little darker-

  A soft knock sounded.

  Three measured beats. Controlled. Familiar.

  Dato froze, half-turned, winter air still spilling over his knuckles.

  He didn’t need to ask who it was.

  He closed the window slowly, like sealing away a temptation, and forced his voice into something even.

  “Come in.” He called out, even as his eyes darted to the roof line once more before looking at the door.

  The door opened, and Ryder slipped inside like a man stepping between storms. He didn’t look like a king in this moment. He looked like an older brother who had learned to carry a crown the way others carried grief.

  Cold followed him in, a thin blade of it, and Ryder shut the door behind him with the same careful quiet he’d used all night. His gaze flicked once over Dato, quick and assessing, then drifted to the window and the unlit hearth like he was taking inventory of every weakness in the room.

  “It’s a little cold in here,” Ryder murmured, already moving. “You should start a fire.”

  Dato watched him cross to the hearth with familiar irritation. Ryder had always done this. Find one small, practical thing and fix it so the larger conversation wouldn’t feel like an ambush.

  “Well,” Ryder added, one corner of his mouth tugging up as he crouched. “Father lived.”

  Dato stared at him.

  Ryder’s smile deepened as he set kindling with practiced hands. “Rush didn’t throw him off the balcony. Yet.”

  Dato’s shoulders loosened a fraction before he could stop it. “Give him time.”

  Ryder chuckled, low, and struck the flint. Sparks caught. The first fragile flame licked up, then steadied. The room seemed to take its first real breath of the night.

  Ryder straightened, dusting his hands together. His humor faded as he took in his younger brother.

  “How are you holding up?”

  Dato’s first instinct was to lie. It rose out of him like reflex, shaped by years of being watched.

  “I’m fine,” he said anyway.

  Ryder’s eyes narrowed, unimpressed. “Ky.”

  The name landed differently in these rooms. Older. Private. A reminder that Ryder had known him before the court ever learned to.

  Dato’s jaw tightened. He looked away toward the window where Lake Aurelune glimmered pale under winter moonlight, beautiful enough to look like a trap.

  “Dinner was loud,” he admitted.

  Ryder’s expression softened. “That’s Father’s favorite kind.”

  Dato exhaled, almost a laugh, then fell quiet again. The fire crackled behind him, small and steady.

  Ryder waited. He was good at that. Always had been. He watched Dato as he looked out the window. He glanced at the view from here and noticed you could see part of the west wing.

  Finally, Ryder spoke the thing he hadn’t come for small talk to avoid.

  “So,” he said carefully, gaze steady. “The dream bond.”

  Dato’s fingers tightened on the chain beneath his shirt, instinctively finding the ring like a touchstone.

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  Ryder lifted a hand slightly, palm open, as if signaling he wasn’t here to pry for sport. “I need to understand it,” he said. “For her safety. For yours. For the kingdom.”

  Dato’s instinct was to bristle. It rose sharp in his chest and he forced it down. Ryder wasn’t Father. He wasn’t the Temple. He wasn’t the court with its hungry eyes.

  “It began six years ago,” Dato said, voice controlled. “I didn’t know what it was at first. Neither did she.”

  “How often?” He asked leaning back against the desk now.

  “Almost every night,” Dato answered. The words tasted like confession. “Not always long. Sometimes only minutes. Sometimes… hours.”

  Ryder’s brows rose. “Every night.”

  Dato didn’t look at him. “Almost.”

  Ryder paced a step, then stopped by the balcony doors like he’d anchored himself there. His posture stayed casual. His questions didn’t.

  “Can anyone else enter?”

  “No,” Dato said immediately. “I don’t think so anyway.”

  “Can it be blocked?” Ryder asked. “Broken? Hijacked?”

  Dato’s jaw clenched. “I don’t know. “

  Ryder’s mouth tightened at that. “Can the bond be sensed?”

  “No,” Dato said flatly. “Of they would have been testing me for the past six years” He said bitterly.

  Ryder held that answer a beat, then nodded once, filing it away.

  “If you’re injured in it,” Ryder asked, “does it carry over?”

  “No,” Dato said. “The body is dream. The mind is real. The bond is real.”

  Ryder’s gaze sharpened, and the next question came quieter, heavier.

  “Have either of you ever… died there?”

  Dato’s breath caught.

  It wasn’t a dramatic reaction. It was worse. A visible flinch he couldn’t stop, as if the question had reached under his ribs and tightened a fist.

  “No,” Dato said, too quickly.

  Ryder’s eyes narrowed. “Ky.”

  Dato’s jaw clenched hard enough to ache. He stared at the fire instead of Ryder, because looking at his brother felt like letting the question live.

  “I would never let that happen,” Dato said pointedly.

  Ryder didn’t move. Didn’t interrupt. He waited, the way he always did when the truth needed room to step forward.

  Dato’s voice dropped, rougher around the edges. “And I don’t plan on testing that. Ever”

  The fire popped softly.

  Dato forced air into his lungs. Quietly, like admitting it would make it real, he added, “I’m pretty sure something like that would break me.”

  For a moment, Ryder wasn’t a king at all. He was just Ryder, standing in his brother’s room with something tight and protective in his eyes.

  He cleared his throat, once.

  “Alright,” Ryder said, softer. “Alright.”

  Dato felt the discomfort crawling up his throat, the sense of being examined the way nobles examined horses. He swallowed it down. He could do this. He’d done worse.

  Ryder’s gaze flicked once, taking in the tension in Dato’s shoulders, the way his fingers kept returning to that chain as if it was a prayer.

  And Ryder’s voice shifted.

  Less king. More brother.

  “Has it helped you?” Ryder asked quietly.

  Dato blinked. The question was not tactical. It was not about risk.

  It was about him.

  Ryder watched him closely. “The dreambond,” he clarified. “Does it… make it easier to breathe?”

  Dato’s throat tightened in a way it never did during war briefings. He looked away quickly, anger sparking at the weakness of it.

  “It’s not relevant.”

  “It is,” Ryder said simply. “To me, Kylar.”

  Dato’s jaw clenched.

  Ryder’s voice lowered. “Kylar. You spent years in the guard and in your duties. You were good at it. Too good. But you were alone in ways none of us wanted to admit.”

  Dato’s fingers tightened around the ring until the metal bit.

  “I’m glad,” Ryder said softly, “that you had someone. All these years.”

  Dato’s chest ached. He forced the words out like they hurt to hold.

  “She is… kind,” he said, and the simplicity of it felt like exposure. “She didn’t ask for things I couldn’t give. She didn’t… make me perform.”

  Ryder’s expression softened.

  Dato’s voice dropped. “She saw me.”

  Ryder nodded once, like that was the only answer he needed. “She is really good at seeing people Ky.”

  Dato took a deep breath and met his gaze. “Rush told me you proposed to her.”

  Ryder instantly looked away and Dato saw how tense he got. He shouldn’t have said anything. Then Ryder looked back, a new edge in his eyes. “That is in the past, and I would have been bad for her. Not like you. So don’t think about it okay?”

  Then he hesitated. Just a fraction. The king-mask sliding back into place.

  “I spoke with the Phoenix Temple ahead of your arrival,” Ryder said quietly, changing the subject to avoid talking about his own feelings.

  Dato’s head lifted, attention sharpening at the subject change, but the temple was an issue he wanted to know more about.

  “They’re expecting Kairi and Darius tomorrow,” Ryder continued. “They were… pleased to hear she’ll request training. Less pleased that she arrived under so much secrecy.”

  Dato’s mouth pulled into a thin line. “They want to own the first story.”

  Ryder didn’t deny it.

  He paused, weighing something, then looked at Dato directly. “Go with her.”

  Dato blinked. “What?”

  Ryder’s tone stayed even, but the insistence was there. “See what they will require of you,” he said. “As her future companion.”

  Dato’s mouth twisted. “Companion,” he repeated, dry.

  Ryder’s brows lifted faintly, like he expected resistance.

  Dato leaned back a fraction, the sarcasm a shield he could still hold. “Rush didn’t call it that on the way here.”

  Ryder’s eyes narrowed slightly. “What did he call it?”

  Dato’s gaze slid away, half-annoyed, half… warmed against his will. “Mate,” he muttered.

  The word sounded too animal in his mouth. Too honest. Too permanent.

  Ryder’s expression shifted, the faintest flicker of surprise. Then something like amusement tried to surface and failed, caught by the seriousness underneath.

  Dato exhaled and rolled his shoulders once, as if shaking off the memory.

  “He told me and Darius what Tearian customs will demand,” Dato said. “Not in full detail. Just… enough to make it clear I’m not courting a girl. I’m courting a kingdom’s sacred symbol.”

  Ryder’s gaze sharpened. “And?”

  Dato’s fingers found the chain again. “And he said if I intend to stand beside her, I need to be willing to stand where she’s called. Even if I don’t like the people doing the calling.”

  Ryder watched him a long moment. “You don’t.”

  “No,” Dato said softly. “I don’t.”

  Ryder’s expression tightened, thoughtful, and the firelight caught in his eyes like something burning down to coals.

  “Then go tomorrow,” Ryder said, quiet but firm. “Let them see you. Let them understand you are not a decoration they can hang beside her.”

  Dato’s jaw clenched.

  He wanted to say no. Not because he wouldn’t do it. Because once he stepped into the Phoenix Temple’s circle, the game changed. The rules became holy. The stakes became permanent.

  He looked toward the window again, the dark rooflines beyond it, and for a heartbeat he saw himself climbing toward Kairi’s room like a boy with a foolish heart.

  Then he looked back at Ryder.

  “…Fine,” Dato said, as if the word didn’t cost him anything. “I’ll go.”

  Ryder’s mouth curved faintly. “Good.”

  And then, because Ryder was still Ryder, he added, “Try not to let the priests call you ‘consort’ to your face. You’ll make that expression.”

  Dato’s glare was immediate.

  Ryder’s smile widened. “That one. Glad you have it on hand.” His smile faded back into something sober as the fire settled into a steadier burn. He shifted his weight, gaze flicking once toward the door as if checking that the palace hadn’t slipped an ear under it.

  “And,” Ryder added, like it was merely another item on a list, “there’s still the parade through town before your name day.”

  Dato’s gaze flitted to his desk where the name day schedules laid untouched.

  Ryder kept going anyway. “The banquet beforehand. The masquerade afterward.”

  He said simple, like a schedule. He didn’t say it like a warning, but it was.

  Dato stared at the flames until they blurred. He could already see it: the streets lined with people, cheering for a prince they didn’t know, throwing petals for a story they’d been fed. A banquet hall full of eyes. A masquerade where masks made boldness fashionable, and anyone could say anything if they smiled while doing it.

  “Eight days,” Ryder said, quiet. “Eight days of attention you can’t avoid.”

  Dato’s mouth pulled into a thin line. “I’ve managed for years.”

  Ryder’s brows lifted faintly. “You’ve managed by disappearing.”

  Dato didn’t deny it.

  Ryder’s gaze flicked toward the chain at Dato’s throat, the subtle movement of his fingers as they found it again without thought.

  “And now you can’t,” Ryder continued. “Not if Father wants to control the first story.”

  Dato’s lips flattened. “He will.”

  Ryder nodded. “He will. And you can’t disappear if you want her on your arm.”

  For a moment, only the fire spoke.

  Then Ryder’s tone shifted, lighter on the surface. The kind of light that meant he was stepping carefully around something sharp.

  “Celeste will be furious,” he said.

  Dato’s eyes narrowed, instant. “That woman is annoying.”

  Ryder chuckled, quiet. “You say it like you haven’t been avoiding her for years.”

  “I have been avoiding her for years,” Dato said.

  “And now you’ll be in public,” Ryder replied. “Constantly. Parade, banquet, masquerade. Nobles will treat it like sport.”

  Dato’s gaze went flat, and his voice went flatter. “Then I’ll show favor for Kairi before the announcement.”

  Ryder stilled.

  Dato didn’t look away. He said it like it was a simple solution. A small correction to the world.

  “Let Celeste see where she stands,” Dato added, calm as ice.

  Ryder studied him for a long moment, the amusement was gone entirely.

  “You can,” Ryder admitted. “And you should.” His eyes sharpened. “But hear me.”

  Dato’s fingers tightened around the chain.

  “Until the crown gives the official announcement,” Ryder said quietly, “Celeste will still think she has room.”

  Dato’s jaw flexed once. “She doesn’t.”

  Ryder’s voice stayed level. “She’ll believe she does anyway. And if she does…”

  Ryder paused, brief and deliberate, letting the words settle where they would do the most damage.

  “…she may bully Kairi.”

  Dato went very still. Not stiff. Not startled. Held. Like every instinct in him had gone silent at once to make space for that possibility.

  The fire cracked softly. Somewhere far off, a door closed. The slight shift of Ryder watching him.

  Dato’s gaze drifted toward the window without seeing it. He saw Kairi instead. Her hand on his wrist. Her calm smile at the dinner table. The way she looked at servants like they were people, not furniture.

  He saw her standing alone in a corridor while some silk-sweet noblewoman cut her to ribbons with courtesy. The thought of Kairi being cornered in his home made something in him go cold and clean.

  A small, controlled inhale.

  When Dato spoke, his voice was even. That was the terrifying part.

  “I have to trust she can handle the women.” Dato managed.

  Ryder held it. “Ky.”

  Dato exhaled slowly, temper leashed back into place by habit and a lifetime of practice.

  Ryder continued, voice quieter now, “This palace is not gentle with women who aren’t claimed on paper.”

  Dato stared into the fire again.

  Claimed. On paper.

  His jaw tightened until it ached.

  Kairi wasn’t a thing to be claimed. She was a person. A promise. A fire.

  And he was running out of time before the palace tried to decide what she was for him.

  Dato stared into the fire for a moment longer, letting the crackle steady him. The palace wanted paper. Titles. Announcements. Permission.

  He wanted something simpler. To stand beside her and make the world accept it.

  “I’ll go with her to the temple tomorrow,” Dato said finally.

  Ryder’s gaze sharpened a fraction, attentive.

  Dato didn’t soften the statement. He didn’t dress it up as duty. He let it be what it was.

  “I want to be seen with her,” he added, quieter but no less firm. “In any way possible.”

  The words tasted like defiance. Like a line drawn in a place that loved to erase lines.

  He stood and crossed the room before the weight of it could settle too deep. Motion had always been his answer. When emotions threatened to unmake him, he became practical.

  His gaze snagged on the row of cloaks hanging near the wardrobe. Too many. Too formal. Too carefully chosen for a prince who had spent weeks living in the same worn leathers.

  He reached without hesitation and pulled one down.

  Dark fabric. Heavy enough to be warm. A Lyon clasp at the collar, subtle but unmistakable if you knew what you were looking for.

  He held it for a beat, fingers curling into the fold, imagining it around Kairi’s shoulders. The way it would change how people looked at her. Not because it made her his.

  Because it told the palace she was not alone.

  “And she can wear one of my cloaks,” Dato said, like the decision had been waiting for him all along.

  Ryder watched him in silence, eyes moving over the cloak and then back to Dato’s face. There was no mockery there. Only understanding.

  He nodded once. “Good.”

  Then Ryder’s expression shifted, the king returning like armor sliding into place.

  “Father will announce Rush and Kairi formally tomorrow evening,” Ryder said. “Be prepared for curious noblemen who will try to speak with her wherever they can catch her.”

  Dato’s fingers tightened on the cloak.

  Ryder’s gaze held his. “Especially at the banquet.”

  Something low and rough moved in Dato’s chest, halfway between a sound and an instinct. His jaw clenched hard enough to ache.

  He didn’t like imagining men who smiled like knives trying to corner her with politeness.

  He didn’t like imagining Celeste’s “courtesy.”

  He didn’t like any of it.

  Dato’s voice came out controlled, but there was something animal on the edge of it anyway.

  “I wish my name day was tomorrow,” he muttered, and it was very close to a growl, “so we didn’t have to wait for which beast claims me. So, we can get through all of this.”

  Ryder’s mouth twitched, sympathetic and grim all at once. “You’re impatient.”

  Dato’s eyes flashed. “I’m tired.”

  Ryder’s gaze softened again, just slightly. “I know.”

  Dato looked down at the cloak in his hands, the Lyon clasp catching firelight.

  He pictured Kairi with it around her shoulders. Not hidden. Not pushed to the side. Seen.

  Ryder’s gaze flicked toward the balcony doors again, then back to Dato, as if weighing how much truth to hand him, before the night took over.

  “And the masquerade,” Ryder said quietly. “That’s where they get bold.”

  Dato’s eyes narrowed.

  “Because they can hide,” Ryder continued. “A mask makes people brave. It makes them cruel. It makes them think consequences are optional.”

  Dato’s grip tightened on the cloak. “Then I won’t let her out of my sight.”

  Ryder’s brows lifted, the faintest hint of approval there. “Good. Because you won’t be the only one watching her.”

  Dato’s jaw flexed. “Let them.”

  Ryder gave a low, tired chuckle, like he’d heard that tone before in training yards and war rooms. “That’s the problem, Ky. They will.”

  He rose from the chair near the hearth, the movement unhurried, but the weight of kinghood settling back into his shoulders as he stood. He glanced once at the window, the lake beyond it, then at the cloak in Dato’s hands.

  “You’re doing the right thing,” Ryder said, voice softer. Not a decree. A brother’s reassurance.

  Dato didn’t trust himself to answer with anything other than the truth, so he kept it simple. “I know.”

  Ryder’s mouth curved faintly. “Try to sleep.”

  Then he turned and let himself out with the same careful quiet he’d entered with, leaving the room to lamplight, a steady fire, and the lake breathing beyond the glass.

  The door clicked shut.

  Silence pooled in the corners again, thick as velvet and twice as watchful. Dato stood still for a long moment, listening. Not for Ryder’s footsteps fading down the hall. For the smaller sounds. The ones that didn’t belong. A shift of cloth. A pause where there shouldn’t be one. The faint suggestion of presence.

  A spy. A servant with loyal ears. A shadow that wasn’t his.

  He forced himself to breathe and dragged his mind back to what he could control.

  Darius was in her rooms.

  Kairi was safe.

  The thought didn’t soothe him so much as it gave his worry somewhere to stand without collapsing.

  Dato hung the cloak over the chair again, the Lyon clasp catching the firelight like a quiet promise. Tomorrow, he will put it around her shoulders. Tomorrow, he will be seen with her. Tomorrow, the palace could choke on that truth if it wanted to.

  He turned toward the bed and felt the old, familiar irritation at how untouched it looked. Too clean. Too soft. Too quiet.

  At least, he thought, a small sharp edge of comfort cutting through, at least I can spend my days with her now. And his nights.

  The thought landed differently than it should have. Less lust, more relief. The simple fact of proximity. Of not having to count down hours until the dream took him. Of being able to steal moments in corridors and doorways and the spaces between ceremonies.

  He began preparing for bed with the same disciplined efficiency he used when he didn’t want to think. He banked the fire slightly, loosened his shirt, and set his boots in their place. He paused at the washbasin and splashed his face again, cold water chasing the last of the palace’s heat from his skin.

  Then he lay down.

  The mattress gave beneath him, too soft, but exhaustion was heavier. It settled into his bones with a slow, inevitable pull, the kind he’d only felt after long roads and longer days pretending to be unbreakable.

  Dato stared at the ceiling for a moment, listening to the fire’s quiet crackle.

  Soon, he told himself.

  Soon the meadow would take him.

  Soon the grass and the open sky and the hush of that dream world would ease the tightness in his chest. Ease the loneliness that Carlbrin always tried to feed. Soon he would see her again without the palace watching. Soon he would hear her voice without an audience.

  His hand drifted once, lightly, to the chain beneath his shirt, confirming the ring was still there.

  Then he let his fingers fall away.

  He exhaled.

  And let sleep take him like a door closing gently on a room full of eyes.