With her back against the granite mountain, Iseult stared at the cliff ten paces away. In the last few moments, gusting winds had risen, rolling fog across the ledge like waves upon a seashore. Somehow, not seeing the precipice and thousand-foot drop only made the height seem that much more terrifying.

Owl clung to Iseult’s side, little fingers fisted into Iseult’s cloak and terror spiraling through her Threads, and though Iseult knew she was the second choice—Blueberry coasted on airstreams too high to see—it left a strange feeling in her chest. A warmth that wasn’t quite pleasure, and certainly not love, but something.

Something nice that made her nose wiggle. Something nice that made her think of Aeduan, because she was, it seemed, no better than Owl for the hoping.

Leopold, meanwhile, searched the cliff for a “sky-ferry” he’d insisted would be waiting for them. Every few moments, he leaned dangerously over the edge, which made Iseult feel like vomiting and made Owl wince and whimper.

After six such instances, Leopold’s Threads finally flushed with triumph and he threw a perfect grin Iseult’s way. “I found it. I told you I would!”

True to his word, the prince had worn only honest emotions since last night. And despite what he’d claimed, it had not disarmed him at all. If anything, he was more charming when his face and feelings were in tune.

The “it” that Leopold had found turned out to be a round, flat stone that had been covered by a hundred pebbles, and after kicking the pebbles into the mist-filled canyon—which also made Iseult feel ill—Leopold began tapping a complicated rhythm with his toe. A lock-spell, she thought at first, until halfway through, the ferry began to appear. Inch by inch, tap by tap, it coalesced amidst the haze.

A glamour-spell. Awe washed over Iseult. Shaped like a wide river barge, the ferry was affixed to a long, rusted chain that ran diagonally up and vanished into the clouds. At the center of the ferry’s deck was a steel-toothed pulley over which the chain ran.

Leopold opened his arms wide. “Did I not promise an easy route? This does all the climbing for us.”

Owl was the first to speak. She tapped at Iseult’s leg. “Dead,” she whispered, pointing at the ferry. Tan confusion clustered in her Threads.

At Leopold’s own confused Threads, Iseult translated: “She says it’s dead.”

“Yes, well.” He shrugged a shoulder. “Wood is dead. But that does not make it unsafe. See?” To prove his point, he tossed the first of their supply sacks on board. It thumped down beside the pulley, and the wood creaked like a ship at sea.

The ferry itself, though, scarcely budged.

Still, Iseult and Owl did not join the prince. Iseult had no interest in peeling her back off the mountainside, and Owl had no interest in peeling herself off Iseult.

“Have you used this before?” Iseult asked.

“Many times.”

“How many?”

Leopold heaved the second supply sack onto the ferry to a second fanfare of groaning wood. “I have ridden this four times? Perhaps five? Admittedly, I don’t use it every time I visit.”

As far as Iseult was concerned, “five times” did not equate to “many.”

“And how many times have you actually visited?” she asked, even as she knew she was stalling for time.

Leopold indulged her, his grin wide. The cold air suited him. His cheeks glowed pink. “I have been here more times than I can count, Iseult. Ever since I was a boy. The new Abbot is the sixth son of a Cartorran nobleman, and the Abbot before him was the eighth son. Men like that, you see, are useful to princes.”

Iseult did not in fact see, but she supposed she would learn soon enough what Leopold meant. No more standing here clutching Owl. No more waiting for courage to find her. After three stabilizing breaths, Iseult knelt beside the girl.

“We have to get on,” she said in her gentlest tones. “I know it’s scary, but we can’t stay here any longer.”

“Why?” Owl’s Threads hummed with red resistance.

“Because it’s the only way to reach the Monastery. And this”—Iseult motioned to the fog and narrow path—“isn’t a good campsite for us.”

“Why?”

“Why … what?” Iseult’s nose twitched. She did not want to argue. Everything had been going so well with Owl since last night. Please, Moon Mother, don’t let it stop now. “Why can’t we camp here? Or why are we going to the Monastery?”

Owl nodded, and Iseult had to assume she was nodding at the second question. “Because we’ll be safe with the monks.”

“I don’t want to.” Then, before Iseult could stop her, hundreds of tiny pebbles scuttled across Owl’s body, and within half a breath, she was hidden away.

This time, Iseult’s nose really wrinkled. Stasis, she reminded herself, even as fire sparked in her fingertips.

“I like it here,” Owl added, a tiny mouth appearing in the stones. “So I will stay.”

Ah, Iseult thought, and just like that, her frustration bled away. She had heard these words before. She had said those words before—ten years ago. I like it here. So I will stay. Her mother had tried to pull her from a tree in the Midenzi settlement. It was the tree Iseult had always sought refuge in when the other children had turned on her.

On that particular day, Iseult had refused to come down when Gretchya called, so her mother had snipped, “Fine,” before walking away. It had made Iseult’s heart drop to her toes. Made her whole body feel empty. She had wanted her mother to argue with her. She had wanted her mother to ask why she was even in the oak tree at all.

But Gretchya hadn’t asked that day, nor did she ask on any other.

Iseult wouldn’t make the same mistake.

“Why don’t you want to go?” Iseult aimed a taut smile at the stones.

“Dead,” Owl replied.

“Yes, but lots of things are dead, Owl. The inn we stayed at was dead. The leather on the saddle you rode was dead. It doesn’t mean it isn’t safe.”

More confusion in her Threads. Then a tiny frown.

“It’s the only way we can reach the Monastery, Owl. We have to take the ferry.”

“You could tell the rocks to bring you.” A tremor waved across the earth. It wobbled Iseult and knocked stones straight off the cliff.

Leopold’s Threads flared with white alarm.

Iseult, though, kept her face neutral and body calm. “I don’t have the magic you have, Owl. Remember? Neither does the prince. So we cannot ask the rocks to carry us. We have to take the sky-ferry instead. I bet Aeduan has ridden it, you know.”

It was the right thing to say. Green curiosity wavered in Owl’s Threads. “Will he be there?”

Iseult scratched her nose. She did not want to lie, but she also feared what might happen if she said no. “Maybe,” she offered casually, and she supposed it might even be true. He might be there. One day.

The green sharpened, Owl’s interest growing keener. Any moment now, she would abandon her camouflage.

So Iseult turned a cool eye toward the ferry, where the prince, to his credit, leaned against the railing and inspected his fingernails. A perfect display of fearlessness. See? he said with his body. This is easy. No need to be afraid.

His Threads, however, matched Owl’s. Bright green interest, and a hint of beige anxiety.

“Aeduan grew up at the Monastery,” Iseult went on. “Don’t you want to see what it looks like? I know I do.”

And there it was: a rumbling crunch of rocks, and soon, Owl herself appeared. The girl still shook, though, and the gravel still danced. Subtle enough to be mistaken for wind, but if the pebbles bounced higher at the Monastery … If Owl decided to bounce boulders instead …

“Owl,” Iseult said, pumping authority into her tone now, “you will have to stop using your magic once we reach the Monastery. Just like Aeduan told you before we entered Tirla, you will have to keep it hidden away from the monks.”

For once, the girl did not ask Why? But the question was evident in her wide, frightened eyes.

“Magic can always be taken away,” Iseult explained. “There are Cursewitches out there who can steal a person’s magic. Did you know that?”

Owl’s head wagged ever so slightly. The fear pulsed brighter in her Threads—but Iseult was going somewhere with this. Following a trail Habim had once followed with her, long ago when she’d been a fresh arrival in a city fraught with things to hide from.

“This is why,” Iseult explained, “it is always better to do things quietly. If you hide your powers, then people will underestimate you. And if they underestimate you…” She pointed at Owl’s chest. “Then you’re the one with all the power. And you are, aren’t you, Owl? You have Blueberry, and you have the stones. As long as you have that, and as long as no one knows you have them, then no one can ever, ever hurt you.”

Owl blinked. Three contemplative shutterings before aquamarine understanding melted across her Threads. The gravel stilled around her feet.

“No one,” she said softly, and Iseult couldn’t help it: her lips slipped into a smile.

And her grin only widened when Owl abruptly said, “Go. Now.” Then, without waiting for Iseult, she hurried for the sky-ferry, impatience bright in her Threads.

It took every ounce of Iseult’s Threadwitch training not to punch the air in triumph. She had coaxed Owl all on her own. No argument, no frustrated fire sparks.

Take that, Aeduan.

* * *