1. Tell Me about the Stars

Adrahn raced half-blind through the darkened, snow-dense forest, deeply regretting his choice to participate in the utterly arcane tradition with every lumbering, strenuous step.

Sweat trickled down his brow and over his nose under his musty, untenable mask, his strained breaths creating garbled echoes inside the hot leather. He felt as ridiculous as he must look wearing a hulking wulf's costume and chasing an unknown woman, also in disguise, but he'd come to the forest for one reason and one reason alone.

Aesylt was out there, somewhere.

Before the chase had begun, he'd searched for her in the sea of curly brunette wigs, peeling, plaster masks with garish rosy circles to mark the cheeks, and shapeless sack dresses, but the young women were dressed identical.

Once the horn had cut through the last of dusk, the night had become a blur.

A flash of brown appeared in a gap between the trees ahead. She was his "damsel," as the young women taking part in the Dyvareh were called. She could be any of the dozen girls who'd signed up, but if the night was on his side, it was Aesylt.

If anything happened to her on the debaucherous night, he would never forgive himself.

The young woman ahead broke off to the left. Rahn slid across a fallen log and pushed himself harder to keep from losing her. Regardless of who she was, he had no intention of letting her be caught by some drunken imbecile using a wulf costume to justify his miscreance. The "wulves" weren't supposed to chase any "damsel" except the one wearing the same color paint slash, but he'd heard more than enough stories about how the forest became a lawless place on the night of the chase. It was his first year participating, and he'd only agreed when he"d learned Aesylt intended to join for the first time as well.

The mask limited all except what was immediately in front of him, so Rahn had to turn his head all the way up to see the sky. Fat snow plopped into his eyes, hazing them. Scarce light remained beyond what the crescent moon provided, the reflection of snow offering an eerie glow. The wulfing hour, he'd heard one of the other men say to a fellow wulf, with a roguish laugh that had made Rahn's peaceful blood boil.

He thought of the books piled on his desk in the library, how he'd rather be reading, studying. There was an almost sentient demand to the research awaiting his cohort, but even if he wasn't concerned about Aesylt, it would have been ill-mannered to decline to take part in the annual Dyvareh after everything the Wynters had done for him.

The Chase, he translated in his head, as he always did with the modest amount of Vjestikaan he'd learned over his past year and a half in Witchwood Cross.

But for all he'd learned, he still had a long way to go before he understood. In what society was it agreeable to garb the bachelor men and unmarried young women in dilapidated costumes, in the dead of midwinter, and force them into a sybaritic chase that could end any number of dreadful ways?

The same one that sent one of their sons into the forest every midwinter to face off against a wulf for the right to hunt the forests in the coming year, he supposed.

Rahn pushed on through lofty, grueling banks. His panting was louder than the forest sounds, so he focused on slowing it, on listening. But other than the harried steps of the young woman ahead?—

Rahn seized, stilling. There was something else.

Crunch.

He shuffled sideways until he was partly hidden by a broad pine. From there he spotted a fellow wulf scaling a fallen log. The man nimbly landed on the other side, darting his head around, and took off in the direction of the young woman.

Rahn reached up under his mask to wipe the sweat before peeling away from the tree. The wulf and the damsel appeared to know each other, engaged in a seemingly cordial conversation Rahn was too far away to hear. He continued to hold his distance, trying to get a better read on the situation, but then they disappeared from view, so he relinquished his hiding place and started after them.

Several moments passed and then a shrill scream tore through the forest.

Rahn took off running.

Aesylt wasproud of herself for not screaming. She was hard to scare, but she'd always been jumpy, and Valerian often exploited that for his own amusement. So when he'd come up behind her, surely bargaining for some kind of reaction, with great delight she'd simply tilted her chin with an impudent grin and said, "Lost in your own woods, are you, V?"

Valerian groaned, long and deep. His hands went to his hips, a flare of patchy fur. "Come on, Aessy. I don't believe for a second you were expecting that."

She hadn't been expecting him to stalk her, no, but she had heard him coming. Knew it was him by the gait—smooth, cocksure. Even in the snow it was unmistakable. "Your attempt was actually quite boring and uninspired." Her mask hid her grin. Her gaze swept his costume in what might have been disbelief, had he been anyone else. "Your color is yellow, Val. Mine is red." She tapped her thick sack dress, groaning. "Wrong damsel."

"What if I say it's the right one?" He stepped closer.

Aesylt shook her head. "The Dyvareh has only just started, and already you're breaking the rules?" She felt her own wulf behind her, holding distance and biding his time, probably salivating over his free night of stalking a helpless female. She'd been hoping to lose him near the quarry, but getting Val to leave her alone was going to take some effort.

Val clapped his wulf hands over his ears and made an obnoxious singsong sound. "What rules? Afraid I didn't hear them."

She quirked a brow. "Only a fool closes his ears when Drazhan Wynter is speaking."

"I'm not afraid of your frata." Val scoffed. "What rules am I breaking anyway? I can't talk to my oldest friend?"

She ticked them down on her fingers. "Nien chasing a damsel who doesn't match your color? Nien talking and giving away your identity?" The third rule she didn't speak aloud. If you catch your damsel, no behavior beyond what they allow. She'd let Val kiss her before, and even enjoyed it. But he'd enjoyed it more. Enough that he'd thrown around the word marriage. What had followed were tense closed-door talks between the Barynovs and her brother and then... nothing. Drazhan wouldn't allow her to marry, nor even court, because he claimed none of the men in the Cross were good enough for her. And though she'd certainly imagined what life might be like with Valerian Barynov, she'd not seriously entertained it.

"When do we ever get to be alone like this anymore?" Val stepped forward again when she shivered. The night was as cold as always, but she usually wore a heavier fur than the costume allowed for. "Someone is always there. The cohort. Your vedhma. The scholar. Nik. Your fucking frata. Besides, if I'm here, your damned wulf can't get any foul ideas."

"It's not appropriate." She choked on her distaste for the refrain. Val and Nik had been her dearest friends since she was crawling around her nursery, but only since Drazhan had returned to the Cross had it been deemed unsuitable for the three to do what they'd always done.

She was grateful to have her brother home after all those years, but sometimes?—

"You know what else isn't appropriate, Aessy?" He swung his hairy, costumed arms around. There was a dark edge to his voice. "This. The village acting like the Dyvareh is anything like the sacrifice they expect me to make in a week. This is just a game, a silly, stupid game. When I enter the forest with nothing but a dagger, some dried meat, and a pelt, the games are over. I either kill the wulf or he kills me, and we know who usually wins."

"I know." Aesylt crossed her arms to hold back the chill, shifting in place. Valerian's upcoming turn in the Vuk od Varem wasn't something she'd allowed herself to think about. The idea of him never coming home was unbearable. She'd watched her oldest brother and father massacred in front of her, but it was that same trauma keeping her from addressing the one awaiting them. "You could refuse."

"And be the first? You're not that na?ve."

"I'm not na?ve at all." She wondered where her wulf was. Watching, perhaps? Waiting for them to finish so he could strike? She had no intentions of getting caught on her very first Dyvareh—no matter how thrilling the idea had seemed before the chase started.

Aesylt rotated her head and took a deep breath through the stuffy mask. She coughed, sputtering dust and layers of Ancestors knew what else. It was still better than inhaling the icy cold into her lungs. "Who ran Witchwood Cross while my frata was off on his vengeance quest?"

She could almost see the smirk behind his snout. "I'd like to think Nik and I helped."

"You kept me sane." Aesylt smiled even though he couldn't see it. "Look, I need to find a place to hide, so go. Go!" She shooed him. "Go, Val!"

"Fine... Fine..." Val raised his hands in surrender. "I'll guess I'll go. I'll—" He froze, snapping his attention to the left.

"What?" she whispered. "What is it?"

"Stay still."

"Val—"

"It's a wulf. A real wulf. And he's coming slowly our way." He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her, spinning her away from the forest. "I'll handle it. Run!"

Aesylt stumbled sideways. Her foot caught on something, causing her to flail, but her next step tried to land on air. She was flying, out and down, thrashing through blankets and blankets of pine needles assaulting her face and arms as she clamored for anything to slow her fall.

Her ankle smashed into something solid and unyielding, and she screamed.

Rahn trippedover something he couldn't see in his limited vision and the ever-darkening night, landing in an ungainly crouch in the middle of a snowbank. He recovered and pounded through the deep drifts, aware not only of the damsel's screams but of another voice, one he recognized as well as he did the young woman's, yelling at her to stay still and don't move.

Valerian Barynov.

And Aesylt.

Both were members of Rahn's research cohort, but only one had learning on their mind when they joined the group in the Fanghelm library every morning after breakfast. Aesylt was all business when she walked through those doors, and so was Valerian, except his business was her.

"Fuck. Fuck! Opros, opros, opros, opros, Aessy. I thought..." Valerian kicked at something in the snow, his fists balled at his sides, before inching closer to a cliff. He was standing at the edge of the quarry, looking down.

"Stop apologizing and get help!"

"Can you hold on if I leave? Are you... Are you gonna fall?"

"Just go already!" Aesylt cried. Panic girdled her shaky voice.

Valerian staggered back a few steps. He tugged at the patchy fur on his mask until it slipped away and disappeared in the snow.

"Valerian, what happened?" Rahn demanded, pulling up beside him. He started toward the edge, but Valerian tugged him back.

"Careful, man, unless you want to join her." Valerian drew an unsteady breath. "Wait, Scholar Tindahl?"

Rahn shed his own mask and the ridiculous furry overdress, wrenching them to the side. "Speak. Quickly and clearly."

"I, ah..." Valerian turned and revealed his flushed, sweaty face. "I just wanted to scare her. I told her there was a wulf, but... fuck."

"And?" Rahn asked, both eyes on the edge of the quarry.

Val shook his head. "There was no wulf."

Rahn inhaled a bracing breath. "I'm asking what happened to her."

"I didn't realize she was so close." Valerian scrunched his face with a tight roar. "She's... Go look, but be careful."

Rahn glared at him before inching toward the cliff. Even had Valerian explained that Aesylt was caught on the upper bows of a tall pine, it wouldn't have prepared him for the sight of her arms spread around the broad trunk, both feet splayed across different branches.

"Aesylt, it's Scholar Tindahl."

"Scholar?" She was breathless.

"I realize this is a strange question, under the circumstances, but are you all right?"

She nodded against the bark, then shook her head. Her wig had fallen off at some point, and her pale blonde hair was a sweaty, matted mess.

"Are you injured?"

"Tak. I mean, yes. My ankle, and... I don't know how long I can hold on. Tell that ill-born to close his jaw and get help already!"

"Val," Rahn said with a swat of his hand. He couldn't even look at the boy. It was the same story, all the time. Val was always getting her into trouble. "Barynov!"

"I don't want to leave her." The boy had gone pale. "You go."

I don't know how long I can hold on. "Are you prepared to climb this tree and help her?"

Val laughed without humor. "How?"

Rahn couldn't remember ever having even seen a tree beyond books until a year ago, when he'd left Duncarrow for the kingdom, but it took only a second of deliberation before he was sliding down the treacherous embankment, maneuvering snow and plant roots to slow his fall. He hit the bark with a thud, but Aesylt's scared voice asking if he was all right, when shewas the one dangling from a treetop, was all the courage he needed to act.

Hazarding a quick glance upward, he assessed his path. The conifer reached the bottom of the quarry, but Aesylt had fallen into the uppermost boughs, a good twenty feet up from where he'd landed. Twenty feet. Just over three times his own height.

I can do this.

He reached for the branch nearest him and gave it a sound tug, ensuring it could hold his weight. With a disgusted glance back up at Valerian, he dug his boot into the rough bark and swung up.

"Go," he commanded with a grunt. "Valerian Barynov, move your legs and go! Find Drazhan. Find anyone."

"You aren't really going to climb that..."

"Go!"

Rahn paused only long enough to confirm the crunching of snow signaling the boy's departure, then reached for the next branch.

"Scholar?"

"Don't worry about me, Aesylt. Just focus on breathing and holding on."

"My arms are shaking. I can't... I can't see anything. I'm afraid I'll fall if I look for a better place."

"I'll find one for both of us. Just—" Rahn grunted when his hand slipped from a branch. Blood beaded along his palm. There wasn't time to do a thing about it, not with the way the confidence in her voice slipped with every word. "Why don't you tell me about the stars?"

"The stars?" Aesylt sniffled. His heart shattered at his bursting-with-life researcher sounding so small.

Rahn gripped another branch and hoisted himself higher. "When we started studying astronomy, you told me the stars were the Ancestors of the Vjestik. The eternities of your people." He gathered his breath and resumed climbing. He'd never in his life done anything so reckless, but he couldn't remember a time he'd ever been so scared.

That wasn't true. He could remember, if he were ever brave enough.

"It's just a thing we say..." Aesylt whimpered. "I feel so foolish. It was a damn chase. I should have been ready for it."

"He shouldn't have scared you like that." Rahn breathed deep. Almost there. "And Valerian wasn't your wulf, Aesylt. I was."

She said nothing for several long seconds. He feared she'd lost consciousness, but then she finally spoke. "Tasmin said you weren't going to come tonight."

"I wasn't." Rahn gritted his jaw, ignoring the tremors taking over his sore arms. Once he reached her, what then? Climbing up was one thing, but climbing down? Doesn't matter. She won't be alone.

"What changed your mind?" Her voice was louder, clearer.

You. "I'm a guest of your family. It would have been disrespectful to decline a second year in a row."

Her laugh was idyllic, crystalline, reminding him of the ice shimmering off the branches when the wind blew. It sounded nothing like the fear bloating in her voice. "Drazhan doesn't even want to do this anymore."

Rahn tried to remember how much time had passed since Val had left for help. Regardless, they'd be waiting a while. He couldn't fathom how the rescuers would get them down safely. Climbing down themselves would introduce the same risk he was hoping to avoid by joining her. Keep her talking. "No?"

"He's never cared about tradition. He's only doing what the people want." She paused, then said, "But I understand. For some, this is an important night. All the damsels who evade their wulves get a feast, paid for from the village's thin coffers. The wulves who catch theirs get one as well. Do you know how long it's been since any of us have had a proper feast?"

The last time he'd had one had been on Duncarrow, so he could imagine. The Wynters only lived slightly better than the rest of the Vjestik, but they lived half as well as their counterparts across the Northerlands. "Tradition shapes cultures. Their memories. Their hopes. This one also fills bellies, and that might be a better reason than any." Rahn didn't have to agree with them to understand the appeal. He recalled how giddy and excited Aesylt had been in the costume room. "I'm sorry this night hasn't gone the way you'd hoped."

"Who says it hasn't?"

Was that mischief in her voice? Couldn't be. She was holding onto a damned tree for dear life. "Enjoying yourself up there?"

"You won't believe the view, Scholar."

Rahn chuckled to himself.

"I had a pet squirrel once. I thought he was my pet anyway, because he kept coming back, following me into the keep. Not very smart, I thought, because Vjestik eat squirrels, aye? Further south, they'd turn their nose up at such a meager ration, but we take what we can get. Anyway, when he'd come to my bedchamber, he'd sleep right on the stones in front of the hearth. My oldest brother, Hraz, the one who... Well, he named the thing Squish and agreed not to tell the kitchens about my new little friend. Said he was small enough that if he got caught under the wrong boot though..." She made a splat sound. "But I liked the name. The way it sounded. Squish the Squirrel. He was smart for a rodent and a right good climber. Best I ever saw. Resourceful little creature, he was. He'd know how to get down."

"Squish," Rahn mused aloud. "Resourceful, smart. Sounds like someone I know."

Aesylt snorted. "I notice you didn't include the part about being a right good climber."

He grinned to himself. "Have I ever lied to you?"

Her laugh gave him the last bit of vigor needed to reach for another branch and heave himself up. He strained and squirmed up onto a thick blanket of needles, carefully slithering on his belly, and huffed out a triumphant sigh.

Aesylt whistled. "I'm impressed. Did not figure you for a tree climber, Scholar Tindahl."

"A reasonable assertion, given this is the first one I've ever climbed," he answered, winded from a combination of exertion and shock, and scooted himself closer to where she was gripping the trunk. "And hopefully the last." He made a conscious effort not to look down as he surveyed the situation. Behind her was a cluster of thick arms they could both sit on without fear of them breaking, but now that he was close to her, he could see her bantering had been a cover for pure terror. Her shoulders were pinched and trembly, her knuckles bone white from her bloodied fingers digging into the bark. He'd need to proceed carefully. "I want you to let go, one arm at a time, and slowly turn toward me."

Her laugh was shaky, forced. "You must be joking."

"Come on, Aesylt. I have a better sense of humor than that." He waited for a giggle or some sign she was easing, but all he got was a garbled sigh. "You can let go. I have you."

"What does that mean, have me? Could you perhaps elaborate, offer specifics? Run through your personal definition of this particular combination of words?" Aesylt turned her face to the side but then snapped her forehead back toward the tree.

"It means there's plenty of room for you to move around here without falling. You told me once you liked to climb trees."

"When I was eight!"

Rahn eased himself onto the cluster of branches, working to position himself behind her. "How high did you climb?"

"Never this damned high." She snorted. "I was adventurous, but I didn't have a death wish. Then..." She exhaled and rolled her head along the bark. "Val... He was always the one who wanted to climb in the first place, the one who pushed me to go as high as... but he never could do it himself. He always gave up halfway and watched me finish, cheering like it hadn't been his stupid idea to begin with."

"Maybe he believed in you that much," Rahn replied, a far more charitable assessment than the boy deserved. But he was trying to keep her calm, not get her more riled up.

"Always getting me into trouble. Even now." She squeezed tighter. "I'm not... I wish... I rarely get this scared, Scholar. About anything."

"I know."

Aesylt was fearless in a way he couldn't fathom being. It had been his first impression of her, and a lasting one.

"But as far as fears go, dangling from the top of a very tall tree isn't one to be ashamed of. Even Val knew it. It's why he froze."

"He's... doesn't matter." Aesylt angled her head sideways. "You're right behind me, aren't you?"

"I am." Rahn braced one hand on the trunk to show her.

"You're insane, Scholar. Unreservedly mad."

"I wasn't leaving you up here alone, Aesylt. Not for a moment longer than I had to."

"Why?" Another forced laugh escaped her. "No reason to risk your life for mine."

There was no answer he could give that would make sense to her, or even to himself. He could say he was doing the right thing, the only thing, but in truth, he hadn't thought about it at all. There'd been no chance of himleaving her up there alone. "Do you trust me?"

"The only time people ever ask that is when they're about to suggest something no one in their right mind would ever agree to," Aesylt quipped. Her spread arms shook and one hand lost purchase, causing her to yelp.

"Reasonable," Rahn said with a light laugh. "But I wouldn't ask if I didn't know everything was going to be all right. If you can't make yourself turn, then I'm going to slide my arms around your waist and peel you away slowly. Do you understand?"

Aesylt shook her head wildly.

"I promise you won't fall."

"I thought you never lied to me?"

Rahn moved one hand to her lower back. "I am right here, Aesylt. There's enough room for us to turn fully around, even to lie down, if you were motivated enough. Let go."

"I can't." Her voice quaked again. "Think less of me if you want, but I can't do it."

Rahn made a split-second decision. He wrapped both hands around her waist and tugged. With a scream, she went tumbling into his arms, but he pressed her close to his chest with a weighty exhale, whispering the reassurances she needed. "You're fine. I'm here. You're fine."

Aesylt shook in his arms, sobbing, but her response was so short-lived, he wondered if he'd imagined it. She peeled back. Her startled gaze darted back and forth, drinking in their surroundings. "Wow. I..." Her eyes rolled back, so he quickly reached for her shoulders and guided her back against his chest. She slid lower, her head falling into his lap as she struggled to breathe.

"All right, just..." Rahn's hands danced over her arm, unsure whether to prop her back up or let her lay across his legs. If Drazhan saw, he'd no doubt think he was being untoward with his little sister, but Drazhan wasn't there. No one was. Rahn wouldn't punish Aesylt for her vulnerability, no matter how confusing it felt.

"I'm fine," she said softly. She curled her legs up toward her arms, wiggling in his lap. "Opros. Opros."

"There's nothing to be sorry for." Rahn's hand landed on her arm. He traced it along its length, the way someone, in another life, used to do for him. She slowly calmed. "You're safe. Help is coming."

Aesylt laughed, sniffling. "Don't count on it. Val probably ran home."

"He cares about you. He wouldn't do that." The words grated, but they were true. Val was a lot of things—brash, selfish, wild—but he loved Aesylt. If he hadn't been chosen for that year's Vuk od Varem, the boy's father might have eventually worn Drazhan down about a proper betrothal.

"Maybe," Aesylt replied, conceding. "But it's not Valerian Barynov comforting me at the top of a giant tree, is it?"

Rahn grinned to himself. "If I'd stopped to think about what I was doing, it wouldn't be Adrahn Tindahl up here coddling you either."

"Shocking behavior from Witchwood Cross's foremost scholar, I must say."

"Has your esteem of me been damaged?"

"No, I rather think it's gone up after your foolhearted climb." Aesylt turned her head upward at him and smiled. Her crystal-blue eyes sparkled with old tears. "Thank you, Rahn."

Everything within him skidded to a halt. His pulse. His breath. His resolve. Rahn. Not duke. Not scholar. "Of course." He swallowed and tried again when his voice broke. "Of course, Aesylt."

She rolled her face back toward his leg and breathed deep. "I suppose Drazhan will be relieved to find my honor is still unblemished. All the real action is happening in the forest. Not much I can get up to at the top of a tree."

"Was it ever in question?"

"I wish," she said, and they both laughed. "You know how impossible he is."

"He'll relent one day," Rahn said, shocked at how hard the words were to say, to hear. "He wants you to be happy."

"I am happy," she said. She drew her hands up and propped them under her head. "I'm happy with you, in the library. I'm happy to be learning something new every day, to be spreading the knowledge to others. There's just something missing is all, a piece of me I'm bursting to share with more than just Draz and Imryll. To be close to someone..." She shook her head. "Oof, forgive me. You didn't climb a tree in the dark to hear me whine."

A knot formed in his chest at how familiar, how aching her confession was. To be close to someone... He'd given up on that dream a long time ago. King Carrow had offered him several brides, perfectly wonderful women Rahn had known all or most of his life, who would have made perfectly wonderful wives. But none of them saw him. They smiled patiently at his passion for learning but never shared it. They warmed his bed but never his heart. Even Teleria, who hadn't been much older than him when she'd taken him in as a young orphaned duke and had mentored him, loved him but didn't fully understand him. "It's a privilege to listen to you whine."

She removed her hands from under her face and swatted his knee. "You think I don't know when someone is messing with me?"

"I wouldn't presume anything to get past you," Rahn said and squeezed her arm. "It never does."

He felt her smile form against his thigh. "I don't know what I expected from this evening, but I can say with certainty, I never would have imagined this."

Rahn chuckled. "Nor I."

"But you know, Scholar? There's no one I'd rather be stuck up a tree with."

"Not Nik or Val?"

"Val ran." She shifted. "Nik... He wouldn't have run, but he's not built for this kind of excitement either."

Aesylt's two closest friends could not be more different men, in or outside of the library. But Rahn would take sensitive, thoughtful Niklaus over hothead Valerian any day. "And we are?"

"We're here, aren't we?" She leaned her head upward to look at him. "You were right. This is fine." Her eyes closed. "I might just..." Her words faded, her shock becoming a crash.

Rahn traced his hand once more along her arm, eyes pointed at the forest and the gentle silence blanketed by an eerie veil of fresh snow. A few rogue flakes landed on them through the gap in the bows, restoring peace to his harried thoughts. "Rest, Squish. I have you."

You don't bother trying to figure out who your wulf is. You don't care because he will not catch you, right? Run. Run hard and far. You know these forests better than most, and you'll know where to hide until the time runs down.

It's not like it used to be, Draz. No one has to marry the wulf who catches them.

But you'd be alone with him, and there will be no one to... look after you. None except yourself.

And I cannot look after myself? Have I not, for most of my life?

Aesylt's consciousness danced between past and present, the boundaries so distorted, she couldn't anchor herself to any point in time.

She was both at the top of a tree and in Fanghelm Keep.

With Rahn. With Drazhan. With Tasmin.

She was accustomed to living between realities, being the only individual in the Cross to have the curse of starwalking. But this was not that.

You are as inimitable as a star in our interminable sky. Rahn's words, but not from that night.He'd said them months ago, before the others had joined in their library endeavors. When it had only been the two of them—the duke and his eager disciple—and their thirst for mining and sharing knowledge.

Aesylt moaned and twisted. A warm hand stayed her from shifting into danger.

Draz didn't want me to go, but he's worried about the unrest if he exempts his own sister.

There's already unrest.Tasmin.

More of it then.

She strained to recall the conversation from earlier that day, when she'd gleefully bedecked herself in costume, secretly hoping to be caught. She and Tasmin had been talking about the rising pressure from some families to put an end to the long-standing Vuk od Varem, which had always been controversial, from the very first season the Vjestik had settled into the village, centuries past. They were tired of losing their sons to wulves every year, just for the chance to safely hunt the forests for a season. It had been almost two hundred years since the accord with the wulves had been made, and it was time for a new one, a new way, they said. Drazhan's own son, Aleksy, would probably one day face a wulf, and the odds were no more in his favor than any who had come before—even if Drazhan himself had bested the wulf when it had been his season.

Aesylt had no intention of having children of her own, because she refused to offer even more to such a taking forest.

Her breath hitched.

Val.

Val was this year's chosen son.

The one she prayed and prayed would buck the overwhelming odds and win... but was more likely to lose, like most sons of the Cross.

No matter how heroic the sacrifice, Drazhan could never know Valerian was the reason his little sister was stuck in the bows of a towering timber in the middle of the night, or he'd have his testicles for breakfast.

Soft snow dusted her face. She swatted her cheeks, but a soothing voice told her to relax, that everything was fine.

Scholar Tindahl.

Could it be that he was really at the top of a pine tree with her?

Surely she was dreaming.

If your wulf catches you, it won't matter if he does nothing, Aesylt. Everyone will assume he's done whatever he wants. And then I'll have to kill him, right? So don't get caught.

Later, Tasmin had accused her of wanting to get caught. She wasn't wrong, but it wasn't for the reason her friend supposed. The past decade Aesylt had thrown herself into crisis after crisis, hoping to feel something.

Rahn. Duke Rahn Tindahl was the one cradling her in his arms. The scholar who had reignited her life when he'd come to Witchwood Cross—the man who had said she was inimitable as the stars in their interminable sky.

I know how these traditions must seem to you, Scholar, coming from royalty as you do. Like we're savages.

Rahn had set down the quill, removed his spectacles, and met her eyes. He always gave her his full attention. I don't think you're savages.

Then you'll come?

I have so much work to do. But I promise to try, Aesylt.

She'd started the chase so full of excitement. There'd only been the briefest hesitation at the start, when the horn had blasted. Her wulf had placed a hand—Rahn's hand, though she hadn't known it then—between her shoulders to stir her from her daze, and she'd bolted, ready for anything the night had to offer.

Ready for the freedom Drazhan seemed determined for her never to have.

The last clear memory she had before losing her footing was of the foothills of the Northern Range, how they colored the tops of the trees like one continuous painting, stretching higher until they joined with Icebolt Mountain in the Northeast. Behind her, Fanghelm Keep had loomed high on the cloudy horizon, but she'd been looking ahead, not back. If she'd been looking sideways, she wouldn't be stuck in a tree.

In the distance, a horn sounded.

The Dyvareh was officially over.

"When we don't return, they'll come looking," Rahn said, more to reassure himself, it seemed. Had he really climbed a tree to save her? The tenderhearted, studious duke who had come to Witchwood Cross to learn and teach, and had given her purpose?

She should tell him her ankle was broken. It had happened when she'd landed, and if she hadn't managed to catch hold of a firm branch on her way down, she'd have broken everything else too. Even the thought of putting weight on her foot sent her stomach churning. She was too tired to shift into the celestial realm and heal herself—and too scared the return might somehow create instability in their little haven of branches—so she'd have to wait to address it. Once she was safe, she'd have to let the vedhmas heal it up for her, or Drazhan would know she was still starwalking when she'd promised not to.

For all Rahn Tindahl had taught her, she knew so little about him. He was one of the handful of people in the kingdom who had come from Ilynglass, the mythical land beyond their kingdom no one had ever been capable of traveling to. His family had perished in the same shipwrecks that had eradicated most of the Duncarrow refugees, and he, only a little boy, had been taken in by Duchess Teleria Farrestell, a young widow who had lost her husband and infant in the same disaster. The king and his court hadn't known what to do with the child duke, the sole heir to House Tindahl, so they'd given him the task of teaching the children born on Duncarrow.

Whatever had happened over the next two decades was a mystery. Even why he'd left the royal isle was unclear, only that he'd shown up in the Cross one day, unannounced, and decided to stay.

He never called himself a teacher in their small learning cohort, and he disliked the term student for his research assistants. We're all equals in this endeavor, he would say, though everyone but him seemed to know how untrue it was.

Rahn Tindahl was a god among men, even if he didn't know it.

"A god," she muttered, rolling her face along the warmth of?—

Aesylt froze when her mouth connected with something thick and solid.

Oh, for the love of the Ancestors.

The poor man was rock hard.

Rahn gently adjusted her toward his knee without a word.

"Aesylt," he said softly. He brushed her hair from her eyes and said it again. "Listen."

What she needed to do was lift her head, move away, and give them both some dignity, but she was too horrified to do more than nod against his trousers.

"I hear someone." Rahn's voice sounded dense, almost choked. "Several someones." He adjusted forward, straining. "Oh, thank the gods. They brought ropes and ladders. You see?"

Aesylt dragged herself up with a tight, inward cringe. She'd never be able to look the man in the eyes again after rutting around in his crotch, delirium or no. And what would Drazhan think? He might have been joking about having a chastity belt forged for her, but his next stop would be the foundry if he knew she'd had the scholar's appendage pressed against her mouth, clothed or no.

"How..." She squinted at the large group moving their way. If she focused on the rescue, perhaps she could distract herself from the horror of what she'd carelessly done, which was somehow even more crushing than the throbbing pain in her ankle or the skinned flesh of her palms. "They're not going to pull the tree down with the ropes..."

Rahn shook his head straight ahead. "Do you remember what you told me when I asked you what you wanted to achieve in the cohort?"

The question surprised her enough to make her do the last thing she wanted to do, turn toward him. "What?"

His cheeks were rosy from the cold, softening his smile. A bang of his dark, wavy hair dipped over one eye. "You said you would take any adventure, in whatever form offered."

"Well, yes, but..." She laughed and gestured around. The way his grin persisted made her realize he was trying to show her it was all right, that nothing had happened that couldn't be forgotten when they stepped through the library doors tomorrow, ready to embrace the truths of the world.

How she prayed it was true.

Rahn reached for one of her wrists and angled her palm upward with a tight frown. "Gods. Let me wrap this before we do anything else?—"

Drazhan's booming voice cut through the quiet forest. "Aesylt? Can you hear me? Rahn?"

"We're here!" Her voice cracked with her scream. She pulled her hands back in case her brother could see. "We're here, Draz!"

"Oh, glory be to the fucking Ancestors." Whatever he said next seemed to be for the men with him. Then he yelled, "Don't move. We're coming up."

Aesylt shook her head. "If we all get stuck up here..."

"We won't, cub. Sit still, and it will be over soon."

She huffed a hard breath.

Rahn leaned close, enough for his breath to send a fresh chill ripping through her, and whispered, "When they ask you if your wulf caught you, what will you say?"

Aesylt's heart almost burst through her chest. The way he'd said it, roguish and playful, was far from the way she felt it. It wasn't the first fluttery pull she'd felt toward her mentor, a man a decade her senior, but all she'd had to do before was remind herself she was with him to learn and enrich herself, not act like a lovestruck maiden.

The same reminder now only made her pulse shoot to the same stars he'd tried to distract her with.

"Aesylt?"

"I don't know." Her attention was torn between Rahn awaiting her response and the melee of men in the snow below. "What do you think I should say? You scaled a mighty tree for me, but is it the same thing?"

"I don't think anyone could ever really catch you, Aesylt, any more than a man could catch a cloud in his hands."

You are as inimitable as the stars in our interminable sky.

Aesylt let his words be the blanket that kept her warm and safe as she waited for their rescue.