Chapter Eleven

Eleven

Lorelei woke to the crow of a rooster. She nearly launched herself from bed—and then directly into the headboard when she saw Sylvia standing by the window. She had almost forgotten they’d shared a room last night.

The light filtering through their window veiled Sylvia in white. Her hair was a sleek rope draped over her shoulder. It dripped from its ends and stained the starched white of her shirt. Lorelei’s stomach twisted itself into a knot as Sylvia tipped her face toward her. The stupid smile on her face evaporated into pity.

“What?” Lorelei bit out. Her voice was raspy with sleep.

“You have nightmares.” Sylvia winced as soon as it was out of her mouth, as though she hadn’t meant to say it. “Ah, in any case…It is a beautiful day!”

Lorelei didn’t dignify her with a response. She only rolled her eyes as viciously as she could and flung off the covers. Sylvia von Wolff, looking at her with pity. It was an insult too great to bear. Furthermore, it was far earlier in the morning than Lorelei preferred, and she saw little to be so chipper about.

When she rose, she saw the state of the room and made a helpless noise of dismay. It looked as though a gale-force wind had blown through in the night—or perhaps Sylvia had smuggled one of her infernal creatures in with her luggage. The contents of her bags—books, clothing, saber—lay scattered across the floor. “What happened here?”

“I had to get ready,” Sylvia said, as if that explained anything at all. Lorelei did not know how she’d slept through such an event if this was the result. The saber, Sylvia rescued from the pile of refuse and strapped to her hip. “Emilia mentioned there is a shop down the road. We should be able to restock our supplies there.”

Lorelei already felt a headache coming on. “We have no money, in case you’ve forgotten.”

“I am sure Ludwig can help us. Now, hurry up. I have been awake for hours!” This came floating from beyond the door. She had not bothered to finish her sentence before whisking into the hall.

“Ludwig is a merchant’s son, not a miracle worker. He already told me the money is—” Lorelei called after her, but the door fell shut.

She sighed. Ludwig could be quite persuasive when he wanted to be. His father had taught him how to haggle and run a business. It did not hurt that there was something sweetly pathetic about his face that made most people go weak in the knees.

When she went downstairs, she found the two of them already waiting by the door. Miraculously, it seemed Ludwig’s wardrobe had survived the journey. He wore an impeccably tailored cloak embroidered with cornflowers done in pretty lavender thread and twirled a ring on his littlest finger. Something about it looked vaguely familiar.

“Ready to see a professional at work?” he asked slyly.

“Where did you get such a thing?” Lorelei asked.

“This thing?” He flipped it into the air like a coin and caught it in his fist. The facets of the absurdly large gem refracted light into her eyes. “Oh, Heike gave it to me to pawn. She said she was bored of it.”

Sylvia looked quite smug, which Lorelei thought was entirely unwarranted.

Together, they walked into the cool morning light. Beyond the inn’s rickety wooden gate, the town unfolded into rows of obnoxiously bright houses, huddled together against the chill. At the end of the road, they found the shop. A crudely painted sign propped up beside the door read:

Enchanted Goods—Inquire Within

Milk— 1.00

Eggs— 0.25 (each !! )

No Refunds, NO COMPLAINING

“With that advertising,” said Ludwig, “how could we not inquire?”

“How curious! The milk is almost certainly produced by a bahkauv. As for the eggs, perhaps an erdhenne?” The interest in Sylvia’s voice was unmistakable. “I can only imagine what effects consuming them might have.”

“Nothing good,” Lorelei snapped. Honestly, she could not fathom how the woman had survived this long.

Bahkauv, although they looked like cows, came armed with sharp fangs, claws, and a priggish hatred for drunks. Sylvia’s first book had included a lengthy interlude in which she befriended one living in a fountain outside a pub. It had attacked no fewer than forty men as they attempted to stumble home. As for erdhenne, they were rather skittish creatures, said to have escaped from the coops of more powerful wildeleute. When they took up residence in mortals’ barns—and were well cared for, of course—they clucked to alert the household of danger. Her skepticism remained unchanged.

Wildeleute were not mentioned in any Yevanisch dietary laws, which naturally meant that scholars had spent centuries arguing with one another about it. Was a bahkauv kosher if it looked like a cow but hunted men? Could any of the wildeleute be slaughtered without unnecessary suffering? Were they—with their strange, potent magic—containers for the divine? As far as Lorelei was concerned, the justification did not matter. No sensible person would bother with them at all.

“Only one way to find out,” Ludwig said as he pushed open the door.

A bell chimed as they entered. Inside, it was warm and cozy and smelled blessedly of coffee. Dried herbs hung from the rafters in thick, fragrant clusters. If she was not mistaken, Lorelei spied a few shards of bone knotted up amid the lavender sprigs. A tight spiral of stairs led up to what Lorelei assumed was the owner’s living quarters. A door behind the counter, studded with iron nails, rattled ominously. She caught Sylvia staring at it longingly.

The shopkeeper appeared at the top of the staircase with a shawl drawn over her shoulders. Lorelei absently noted the silver clasp at her throat, engraved with the image of a saint. The woman’s shock at seeing Sylvia there was plain, and she narrowly avoided stumbling down the stairs in her eagerness to attend them. “Your Highness, you honor me. What can I do for you?”

“We’re collecting supplies for our journey—and stories,” Ludwig interjected. “Do you know any about the Ursprung?”

“What do you want children’s tales for?”

“We’re scholars,” Sylvia said brightly.

The shopkeeper’s answering expression was entirely bemused—almost pitying, as if she thought them terribly daft. “There’ll be a woman at the festival who tells the tale much more prettily than I ever could.”

Lorelei filed that information away. With any luck, this detour would not be a complete waste of time.

“Excellent,” Ludwig replied. “Now tell us about these enchanted goods of yours.”

She was evasive in a practiced sort of way, sharing just enough to remain mysterious. But Ludwig kept up a steady stream of inane chatter as he pointed out what he wanted. Lorelei could hardly track their conversation. It flitted from harvests and rain patterns to business, the wildeleute in the area, a glade just north of the village where a plant that could summon storms grew (at this, Ludwig seemed genuinely intrigued), as well as the many virtues of her six unmarried children. Lorelei almost admired her bald-faced opportunism.

Finally, when she finished wrapping everything in paper, Ludwig laid Heike’s ring before her. The sun, evidently sympathetic to their plight, chose that exact moment to lance gloriously through the window. Its rays struck the gemstone and scattered in tiles of multicolored light.

The shopkeeper stared at it as though he had emptied a bag of snakes on the countertop. “That isn’t enough.”

He whistled. “Well, then. Your prices are considerably higher than I expected. What flexibility do you have?”

“Significantly less now,” she groused. “What can I do with a ring that fine?”

Ludwig winked. “It once belonged to the princess of Sorvig, the most beautiful woman in the world. A suitable dowry for one of your children, wouldn’t you say?”

“You certainly can’t put a price on that,” Lorelei said drolly.

The shopkeeper seemed unimpressed. “Throw in ten marks, and it’s yours. That’s as low as I can go.”

“Across the way, I saw a man selling produce for much less.” He leaned across the counter and lowered his voice as if sharing a secret. “But I didn’t like the look of his wares quite as much, if I’m honest. And he certainly had nothing enchanted.”

“And that ,” she said, with no small measure of pride, “is precisely why I charge more.”

“But, with our funds as tight as they are…” He shook his head with a grave air. “We lost so much to the lindworm, and our Mondscheinprinzessin needs to eat. We’ll settle if we must.”

Sylvia opened her mouth, clearly ready to object. Lorelei kicked her ankle.

“Fine.” The shopkeeper sighed resignedly. “I’ll take your trade.”

“I’m so glad to hear it. But surely,” Ludwig pressed, “you could give us a bit more. Her Highness won’t ever forget that sort of kindness.”

They left the shop weighed down with food, boots, snowshoes, winter coats, and assorted charms and talismans. In the end, he’d even managed to extract a tray of pastries, balls of deep-fried dough. Some had been dusted in sugar, others glazed with chocolate and marzipan. It seemed to Lorelei a pointless extravagance, but well, that was Ludwig.

Unfortunately, he’d also purchased a pint of milk and a dozen eggs, most likely because he knew it would irritate her. The eggs were disturbingly translucent, frigid to the touch, and contained a glittering black liquid that reminded Lorelei of the Vereist’s waters. Even Sylvia was forced to concede they did not look particularly appetizing or salubrious. The milk did not seem terribly out of the ordinary, but Lorelei made a mental note to pour it out before Sylvia could get her hands on it. That no-refund policy existed for a reason.

Once they dropped off their supplies at the inn, Ludwig said, “Why don’t we take these pastries and go on a little excursion? I’d like to find that storm-summoning plant she mentioned.”

They climbed the switchbacking roads just outside the inn, and when they reached the end of the trail, they slipped through pasture fences. Red-coated cattle lifted their immense heads to watch them pass, silver bells jingling from the ribbons around their necks. Soon, the fields yielded to fragrant pine. Bars of sunlight dappled their path, and overhead, branches framed jagged swatches of sky. Even this late in the morning, frost glittered on the stiff grass.

Ludwig walked with his eyes focused on the ground, the long train of his cloak sweeping the earth behind him. His silence struck Lorelei as unusual. It was almost as though he forgot he was among company, for he looked uncharacteristically pensive.

“Is there something—”

He held out an arm in front of her, halting them. “Watch your step. Irrwurzel.”

He pointed it out to her: a plant with delicate feathered fronds. To her untrained eye, it looked like a common fern. However, she recognized the name from Ludwig’s publications. Stepping on it would lead you astray of your path; you’d be cursed to wander aimlessly until the following dawn.

Sylvia peered down at it. “Have you figured out how to collect a sample yet?”

“God, no. I haven’t dared try again.” He flashed Lorelei a mottled scar on his hand. “Keeping it on you attracts vipers. Who would have thought?”

Sylvia made a sympathetic noise, but she was smiling as if lost in reverie. “It is rather funny in retrospect, isn’t it?”

“Funny? I almost died!”

“I did not realize the two of you went on expeditions together,” Lorelei said.

“It was nothing so formal. Many years ago, we spent long afternoons roaming the grounds of his country home together.” Sylvia stepped around the irrwurzel and onto a fallen log. She walked across it with her arms extended for balance. “Ludwig inspired me to pursue my work.”

“Now, I wouldn’t go that far. If anything, you had the greater influence.” He reached out and took her hand, helping her down from her perch. “You infected me with your recklessness.”

They hiked and hiked, and with every passing minute, Lorelei’s mood darkened. Cold air flowed down the slopes and pooled in the basins. There was nothing but trees here. Spruce trees and beech trees and fir trees, covered with thick coats of moss. It was unendingly green, so perfectly picturesque as to be mundane. What were they doing here? She’d come no closer to untangling anything, and without their equipment, they had no hope of—

“I think this is the glade the shopkeeper mentioned,” Ludwig said.

The interminable trees had thinned out to a clearing carpeted with crocuses. At the far end stood the corpse of what had once been a stately maple. Its trunk was split in twain and blistered with char, and what remained of its branches were skeletal and blackened, clawing at the surrounding greenery. Clearly, it had been felled by lightning. Lorelei liked its stark beauty far more than what had come before.

As Ludwig forged ahead, Sylvia settled herself in a sunny patch of grass. The thin light played in the waves of her hair and illuminated the broad planes of her face. Even the scar on her cheek gleamed like ice. It was unfair, Lorelei thought miserably, that someone could be so effortlessly beautiful.

“You are still in a fine mood, I see.”

Lorelei nearly let out an undignified sound of surprise. Sylvia had bitten into one of her pastries, and powdered sugar smudged the tip of her nose. Lorelei focused, perhaps too intently, on the one imperfection she could find in her. After a moment, Sylvia self-consciously ran her thumb along the corner of her mouth, brushing away an invisible crumb. That did not help matters.

“I am still in mourning,” Lorelei said, “about our equipment.”

“We don’t need equipment to find the Ursprung.”

Lorelei did not even want to touch that statement. Instead, she said, “We will need it to collect data. Without it—”

“Data cannot give you a complete understanding of something.” Sylvia’s expression was unreadable, but Lorelei did not like it. It veered too close to pity. “Where is your sense of wonder? Sometimes I think you would sooner let a cyanometer tell you what color the sky is, rather than simply looking up.”

Lorelei opened her mouth to protest but promptly shut it again. Sylvia’s words oddly stung. Perhaps as a child, she had believed Ziegler’s lies: that the world outside the walls of the Yevanverte was full of magic. But she had seen the truth of it time and time again. It was a brutish and violent place—one that had rejected her. If she were to become a naturalist at the end of this, she could do her work with the cold certainty of rationality. There was no need for things like immersion and wonder to factor into it.

“Well,” Lorelei said. “It would certainly give me a more precise shade.”

Sylvia laughed, a warm, startled sound that Lorelei felt like a caress against her face. Before she could muster up some snappish retort, Ludwig gave a shout of triumph. He stood on the opposite side of the field, grinning like a fool and holding a fistful of golden flowers aloft.

In an instant, the skies darkened to a surly gray. Dread—more potent than she’d ever felt it—spread through her entire body. All the hair on her arms stood on end, and her fingers tingled with a frenetic energy. Sylvia’s hair reached skyward and billowed as though she were underwater. She stared back at Lorelei with a look on her face that suggested they’d arrived at the same conclusion.

Lightning strike.

Ludwig threw the flowers into the woods and bolted toward them.

Everything flashed white. A crash split the world, so loud it felt as though it would crush her skull.

The world stilled. Lorelei lowered her hands from where they’d clamped over her ears and took stock of herself. Her mouth tasted of metal, and the iron chain around her neck was vibrating against her collarbone, but all of her limbs seemed to be attached. Behind the fractal pattern seared onto her retinas, she could see Ludwig and Sylvia coming out of their stupor. The two of them stared at each other for a second. Then, they began to laugh.

“You’re both completely mad!” Lorelei cried.

A light rain began to fall through the canopy. Water dripped from the fir boughs like beads of silver and stirred up the sweet, sharp smell of ozone. Her thoughts went quiet as she drank it in. Her heart beat. Her chest expanded with every breath. Somehow, with fear and relief making a muddle of her thoughts, she could not find it in herself to be angry.

By the time they returned to town, the festival had sprung up like a work of fairy magic.

Market stalls lined the streets, bursting with produce: jewel-bright apples and grapes, cartons of strawberries and bundles of green onion, stacks of cabbages and potatoes, vibrant bouquets tied off with twine and arranged in buckets. Children tore down the alleys with wooden swords, others running after them with their arms outstretched like wings. And then there were the cows.

They trundled by in a line that stretched several blocks. Some were crowned in fir boughs and heather, others garlanded in roses and daffodils, others still in bright headdresses embroidered with the images of saints. Mottled cattle dogs darted back and forth along the parade line, barking and nipping at their heels. She could barely hear herself think over the noise.

Only in Albe, she supposed. She could not fathom how such a small village could make such a commotion.

Sylvia’s eyes practically sparkled with excitement. “Oh, what fun! Shall we look around? Our springtime festival had all sorts of activities. Carnival booths, eating contests, feats of strength—”

Lorelei leveled her with a flat stare. “What of those things sounds like it would appeal to me?”

“You are just afraid of losing.” Sylvia preened. “I suppose that’s wise. I was the champion tree climber in my village.”

Ludwig winked at Lorelei. “I for one would love to see that. Maybe they have their own competition here.”

“Perhaps they do! I will report back.” Sylvia needed no further encouragement.

She vanished into the crowds, leaving Lorelei and Ludwig alone once more. He flashed her an easy smile. “Shall we have a look around?”

Lorelei opened her mouth to say no, but if they’d pinned their hopes on a fairy tale, she supposed she might as well hear it. “If we must.”

They passed through the sprawl of market stands, half of them selling some variety of sausage. The stench of woodsmoke and roasting pork was beginning to make her feel vaguely ill. Outside a pub, they’d set up rows and rows of tables, where people sat chattering over their beers. A man had climbed on top of one, hoisting his glass in the air. Another was offering his ale to one of the headdressed cows, who blinked at him with bland, adoring incomprehension.

Then, someone dropped a glass.

Lorelei flinched. Her every sense sharpened, latching on to the smell of spilled beer and sweat, the sound of jeering laughter. Just like that, she was here, a grown woman with her feet firmly planted in Albisch soil, and she was a child again, running blind through the streets of the Yevanverte. Memories crowded in urgently. Teeth bared and glinting in the dark. Raised fists. Blood and shattered glass on the cobblestones. Water drip, drip, dripping from Ziegler’s limp fingers and pooling on the floor below.

“Whoa,” said Ludwig as he steered her out of the street. “Easy now.”

Goddamn it. Not again.

He helped her sit on the grass and sat silently until her breathing evened out and she had worked sensation back into her fingers. Then, he offered a paper bag to her. Inside were roasted almonds, candied and dusted with cinnamon. Her stomach turned. She’d had quite enough sugar for the day.

“No, thank you.”

“You’re all right?” he asked.

Lorelei bristled with resentment at the pity in his voice. She knew how she must look, with her haunted, vacant eyes. Like someone barely holding herself together.

“Yes, I’m fine,” she said, more snappishly than she’d intended. More gently, she added, “The stress must be getting to me.”

But she couldn’t afford to crumble yet. She had foolishly let this morning slip away from her, and now she was back where she had started. If Johann had not done it, she had to set her sights elsewhere. Her life depended on it.

Across the way, Lorelei spied Adelheid and Heike standing together at a flower stall. Heike was weaving a crown of daffodils into Adelheid’s hair; Adelheid endured it nobly. When she finished, a self-satisfied smile curling on her lips, she glanced up and made eye contact with Ludwig.

He waved at her. Immediately, her expression turned chilly. Without acknowledging him, she averted her eyes.

Lorelei couldn’t keep the amusement out of her voice. “Did she just give you the cut?”

“I think so,” he said cheerfully. “I suppose because I’m consorting with the enemy.”

The woman could certainly hold a grudge. Lorelei respected that. “And you genuinely like these people?”

“I do. Most of the time, anyway. It’s complicated.” She must have looked skeptical because he asked, “Why? Did someone say something?”

He was a terrible bully, Sylvia said of Johann, and liked to make Ludwig do all sorts of ridiculous things because he was so desperate to fit in . “No,” said Lorelei. “No one said anything.”

He seemed to relax some. “Good. Really, most of what you hear is drivel. Wilhelm in particular has a flair for the dramatic, especially when it comes to his war stories. I’m sure you’ve heard the one where he secured a glorious, bloodless victory during the final battle of his campaign.”

Everyone had heard that. Wilhelm, resplendent on the back of his dragonling, had flown over the battlefield. The enemy had laid down their arms in awe, and Brunnestaad was at last unified. “Of course.”

“It’s true no blood was spilled in combat,” Ludwig said offhandedly. “But Imre”—his dragon, Lorelei assumed—“was…shall we say, misbehaved in his adolescence. A few miles away from the battlefield, he burned an entire village to ashes.”

Cold horror prickled along the back of her neck. “Dear God.”

“Sylvia and Adelheid were quite cross with him, from what I recall.”

“And Johann?”

“He thought it was funny.” Ludwig popped an almond into his mouth. “There are a thousand stories like that, but no one wants to hear them. No one wants the truth.”

“Which is?”

Ludwig smiled wryly at her. “They’re not heroes.”

Lorelei frowned at him. Apart from Johann’s initial outburst, it was the closest she’d heard one of them come to criticizing Wilhelm on this trip.

“Of course, they’re all remarkable people,” he added hastily, “and I love them dearly. I’d never speak ill of any of them. Ah. There goes Adelheid.”

Sure enough, Adelheid passed by them as she shoved against the current of the crowd. Her drawn expression caught Lorelei off guard. Without thinking, she began following her. Ludwig made a sound of protest but stumbled after her. The dirt-packed roads gave way to mud beneath their boots, still damp from the rain Ludwig had summoned. No one seemed to mind. The farther she pressed into the heart of the village, the more raucous it became. A makeshift stage had been assembled in the square, where Lorelei assumed folk dancers or musicians would give their performances throughout the night.

She wove through revelers in bright-colored gowns until she found Adelheid standing before a cart boasting the largest cabbage of the season. She was glaring at it as though it had personally wronged her.

“Enjoying yourself?” Ludwig asked.

Adelheid startled at their sudden appearance. She looked as crisp and immaculate as ever in her gown of plain white. Colorful ribbons, which had been curled into ringlets against a knife’s edge, tumbled from her flower crown and framed her unsmiling face. “We do not have things like this in Ebul,” she said, which Lorelei supposed was answer enough.

“Of course not. Only grim duty and hard work and dirt beneath your nails.” His reverent tone somehow gave the impression of an eyeroll.

The displeasure on Adelheid’s face deepened, and Lorelei sensed she had stumbled into an old argument. Admittedly, the two of them looked ridiculous side by side: the lavish caricature of a nobleman and a fairy-tale maiden with her austere, downtrodden beauty.

Once, Ebul had been renowned for its tulips and lush vineyards. Now the fields lay in ashes. When Lorelei thought of it, she imagined a countryside salted and burned, an infrastructure buckling under the weight of a surging population. As the easternmost province, it lay between Neide—the royal seat of what was now Brunnestaad—and its age-old rival, Javenor. It had served as their battleground for so long, nearly everyone there spoke both Brunnisch and Javenish.

“Right,” Ludwig said, clearing his throat . “ Well, I’m going to see if I can watch Sylvia climb a tree.”

When he left them, Adelheid sighed. “I imagine you understand. The excess astounds me, but I cannot begrudge these people for celebrating their good fortune. It is no wonder Sylvia is so beloved.”

Adelheid nodded toward the gathering crowds behind them. Lorelei turned and blinked into the dwindling sunlight. She spied a flash of snow-white hair. Sylvia had forded the cattle river and was drifting through the festival, stopping to chat with vendors or crouching to speak with the children brave enough to approach her. Lorelei wanted to be disgusted. Truly, she did. But with her head thrown back in laughter and her cheeks pinkened from the alpine cold, Sylvia looked happy in a way Lorelei had rarely seen before.

She forced herself to look away.

“Last harvest season,” Adelheid said, “the people called for my father’s head.”

“And did they get it?”

Adelheid smiled ruefully, but the glint in her eyes was as bright as steel. “No. He fled.”

“And is that why you’ve come on this expedition?” Lorelei pressed. “To hide?”

“No. To hide from my duty would be cowardly.” Her voice dripped with disdain. “My father has never protected Ebul’s interests, but I will. I have Wilhelm’s ear—and once he claims the Ursprung’s power, he will stabilize the region. If we stand united, no armies will come to our doorstep again.”

Lorelei suppressed a shudder at the fervor in Adelheid’s eyes. Like Johann, Adelheid believed in Wilhelm. Years of surviving outside the Yevanverte had dashed the last of Lorelei’s optimism. Still, she could only pray Wilhelm would keep his promises to her as well.

“This expedition must mean a great deal to you, then,” Lorelei said.

“It does,” she replied, “to almost all of us. Some of us, I fear, cannot set aside ambition for the greater good.”

“What do you—”

The sound of a horn tore through the festival, and Lorelei swore in surprise. The dogs wailed, and the crowds whooped. Clearly, the performances were about to begin. Lorelei craned her neck to get a view of the square—and saw that an old woman had taken her place on the stage. But the woman held no instrument and wore no costume—only a crocheted shawl wrapped around her narrow shoulders.

“Back in the days when wishes still held power,” she began, “a barren woman prayed to God for a son.”

The storyteller, then. Lorelei scrambled to produce a pen and her notebook from her bag. She would have to transcribe this tale exactly if she had any hope of extracting something useful from it.

“He listened, and when the child was born with silver hair, it was said he would one day become a great king. And so he grew up much beloved in his village.”

Lorelei’s hand stilled over the words silver hair . A strange, prickling dread crept down her spine.

“Now, in those days, there was a dragon that lived within the bowl of the moon. Once each month, he swept down from his perch and left the sky dark, with nothing but stars to light the way. With his wings, he pulled in the tides, and with his breath, he filled ships’ sails with wind. But in exchange for his service, he took a price as well. He gorged himself on sheep and maidens gone out against their mother’s wishes, enough to sate him for another month. The village had fallen on hard times, for they could not produce enough lambs or maidens to keep him happy, and no one worthy had emerged to slay him. All who had tried had perished.”

Lorelei underlined the word worthy after she wrote it. This vague idea of worthiness was a consistent feature of all Ursprung tales. It always chose who would wield its power.

“One night, the silver-haired boy devised a cunning plan. He would climb to the top of the tallest mountain and kill the dragon while he slept.” The woman paused. Beyond her shoulder, the jagged mountain range unfolded. As the sky darkened, the fading sunlight limned the tallest peak in bloody red. “He made the treacherous journey with his lance clenched between his teeth, and when he reached the summit, he pierced the moon. The dragon let out a terrible cry, and his blood poured from the sky. It ran like a stream down the mountainside and pooled in the stone’s hollow. The boy lost his balance in the dragon’s death throes and plummeted toward the earth. He braced himself for death, but he fell into the pool of dragon’s blood. When he rose again, however, he found he could pull the tides and bend a river’s course to his will.

“So begins the legend of Saint Bruno, the first king of Albe.” The old woman smiled. “And today, we are blessed with the presence of his descendant, Miss Sylvia von Wolff.”

Lorelei rounded on Adelheid and hissed, “Did you know about this?”

“To a certain extent,” Adelheid replied. “I’ve never heard the story told, but I know it’s important to her mother. Sylvia has always hated it.”

Apparently only Albisch children grew up on tales of their silver-haired royal family.

“Miss von Wolff,” the old woman said, “will you honor us with a few words?”

It felt like some horrible inversion of the evening of the ball. Lorelei standing stock-still, watching the crowds part around Sylvia. There was dirt on her cheek and flowers clumsily woven into her hair, as if done by a child’s hand. It truly was no wonder that her people adored her. She was not just benevolent and charming. It wasn’t only that she genuinely wanted to know the name of their favorite horse and how many lambs had been born that season. She was a symbol—a fairy tale—come to life.

Mondscheinprinzessin.

“Free Albe!”

The first shout went up—then caught like a flashfire. It spread through the crowd until they were all stoked to a fervor. They all gazed up at the stage as though Sylvia had come to deliver their independence to them herself. Her lips parted in surprise. Lorelei could practically see her mind working as she arranged her features into something resembling composure.

“Thank you for telling the tale so beautifully.” She scanned the crowd as if acknowledging each of them. “The strength of a nation lies in its people—the common people. Stories like this shouldn’t be forgotten. They teach us about who we are and where we come from.”

Sylvia was deluded if she believed her own words. Stories taught them nothing of how they actually were. They were like molten steel, ready to be molded into a weapon by one clever enough to wield them.

“I have traveled to many places around the world and across the kingdom. Saint Bruno’s story is our own, but many of our folktales are told across Brunnestaad—perhaps not with the same words, but with the same heart.”

Murmurs broke out among the crowd.

“I know many of you do not consider yourselves Brunnestader. Some of you may even be older than Brunnestaad itself.” She smiled indulgently at the shouts of agreement. “I hear your yearning for the day that Albe will be independent again. Perhaps some of you have even begun planning to fight for that day.”

Lorelei could only look on in horror as the murmurs intensified to a steady yes, yes, yes. What was she doing , encouraging these incipient sparks of rebellion ?

“However,” Sylvia continued, “the world is changing, and we cannot stand alone.”

The crowds fell silent.

“Our enemies beyond our borders are many. I have fought alongside His Majesty King Wilhelm before, and when the time comes that he calls on our might again, I will stand with him. In turn, he will protect us, just as Saint Bruno once did, and I believe he is a worthy successor to his power.” She rested a fist over her heart. “Wilhelm is the king of all Brunnestaad—the king of Albe. Will you join me?”

There was no more than a beat of silence before the crowd erupted into cheers. Sylvia’s expression remained determined, but Lorelei could see the strain behind it.

The greatest threat to Wilhelm’s reign is Albe. What if he chooses to charge me with Ziegler’s murder?

Lorelei could not imagine how much it cost Sylvia to stand in front of these people and pledge her loyalty to a man she worried might turn on her. Lorelei recognized that desperate fear in her eyes all too well. It was the look of someone with something to prove.

Sylvia stepped off the stage. The crowds parted for her, some people dropping to their knees at her feet, some reaching out to touch the snowy fall of her moonlit hair or catch the hem of her cloak. With utmost grace, she grasped their hands and blessed them with her smiles.

A group of villagers pushed wheelbarrows into the square. Inside were three crude effigies made of bundled straw. One wore a Javenish flag around its neck. The second she thought was meant to be Wilhelm, with his scarlet regalia and a crown woven crudely from branches. The last wore a black coat with a golden ring stitched on the lapel: a Yeva.

Lorelei’s stomach curdled. Common enemies, indeed.

Adelheid seized her elbow, and Lorelei could not find it in herself to pull away. “You need to leave.”

Two men hoisted Wilhelm’s effigy onto their shoulders and began parading him through the square to raucous laughter and chants of All hail the king of Albe. Through the chaos unfolding, Lorelei watched a woman raise a torch to the remaining two effigies. Flames ripped up the straw. The sight of that blistering black coat struck Lorelei cold with dread.

“Now, Lorelei,” Adelheid said sharply.

“Fuck,” Lorelei muttered, feeling oddly dazed. “Right.”

But where was she supposed to go? Where could she go? The hot press of bodies hemmed them in on all sides, jostling them as they whirled and shouted.

Sylvia’s gaze found Lorelei’s in an instant, as though drawn to her by a tether. Panic—and regret—knifed its way into her expression. Lorelei could hardly bear to look at her. The fierce, protective determination in her eyes felt in that moment like an unbreakable shield.

Sylvia fought through the crowds, but in the numb haze that had befallen Lorelei, it felt almost as though Sylvia had appeared at her side. The hem of her cloak fluttered behind her as she walked, revealing her hand curled around the hilt of her saber.

“Stay close to me.”

What could Lorelei do but obey? All she could see was Sylvia’s white hair stained blood red as fire leapt into the darkening sky.