The days run together, she'd told him. It took precious little time for Kane to see what she meant.

After his first night at the castle, sleeping in a bed across from Lena's in the room that had once been shared by Gollor's granddaughters, he woke late. The intensity of the sunlight streaming through the window told him it was mid morning. He wasn't accustomed to sleeping so long - he chalked it up to the presence of a comfortable bed after so many days without one - and allowed himself a languorous stretch before he rolled over and found Lena's bed empty.

"Did you at least eat something before you started?" he asked when he found her already focused on healing the prince.

"Yes, of course," she said brightly, though she didn't turn from her task.

He trusted that, preoccupied or not, she wouldn't lie to him, so he left her to her work and saw to his own breakfast. Gollor took him to the kitchens, introducing him to the staff as "Lena's brother, here for a visit."

"I can see the resemblance," said the cook, motioning to Kane's hair, as red as Lena's. "You tell us if she needs anything."

"They know what she is," Gollor explained. "A human girl staying in the castle on my orders? It wasn't hard for them to figure it out. They'll not report her - the prince means too much to them." They sat in the old man's study as Kane ate his meal and Gollor told him of the rumors coming from the harbor of a man and boy appearing out of thin air the evening before. The mysterious individuals had boarded a ship that had sailed out almost immediately thereafter.

The news should have comforted him - Shipman was safely beyond Cotto's reach now - but it only increased his worries. Lena was still in harm's way, and it seemed her identity was not as secret as Kane would have liked. He went to the prince's room, afraid to let her out of his sight, and sat in the room's only chair, flipping through a fantastical, childish book of Leifenish legends that he found there.

"You needn't stay if you're bored," Lena said with her back to him as she worked.

"I'm not bored," he said, stopping on a page with an illustration of a flying ship. Now, that was interesting. The artist had drawn it with little sails coming out the sides. What do those do? he wondered.

"That's a lie," she said, chuckling. "You need to work harder at controlling your emotions. You're not as good at it as Thadius."

"I'm not lying!" he said, annoyed at the accusation. "Idle" was not the same as "bored". "Alright, it is boring, but guard duty often is. Believe me, you don't want it to be interesting."

"So you're on guard duty now?" she said lightly.

"Yes, and guard duty is boring. You can't tell me this healing business is anything other than mind-numbingly dull!" he said, perhaps more bluntly than he should have, but she was riling him.

She stopped casting briefly, almost too briefly to warrant notice, but Kane saw it: a slump to her shoulders, a motion that could have been a sigh, and the white glow around her hands flickered just for an instant. He worried that he'd pushed too hard, but then she spoke quietly and he realized it wasn't his words that had pained her. "Yes, but… I had someone to talk to at first. Aryon… he wasn't entirely asleep. I could feel him. I talked, and he listened. I talked for hours. I think Aryon must know more about me by now than you do."

"But you don't talk to him anymore?"

She shook her head. "He's still in there somewhere. Just not anywhere I can reach."

She resumed her healing, but her posture remained as it was, shoulders slumped, a little more defeated than she had been before he snapped at her. You oaf, Kane thought, reminded again that Lena was not like Sarah at all, who would have snapped right back at him. "I'm sorry I spoke harshly," he said. "I just don't know what else I could be doing around here. I guess I'm not used to sitting still."

"Talk to me," she said.

"About what?"

"I don't care," she said wearily. "I just need to hear a voice other than my own."

Perhaps she does find it as dull as I do, he thought, wondering how she hadn't gone mad these past several days. He talked about whatever crossed his mind: growing up in Cornelia, training with the guards. She asked him questions, and he answered, aware all the while that he did not have her full attention, but he didn't mind.

When he grew hungry, he went to the kitchens and snagged a meal for both of them, and when Lena claimed she had reached that portion of her work that required more thorough concentration, he left her alone. He began a sort of patrol up and down the halls of the empty wing, identifying the entries and exits and defensible positions. Later, he went into town, to the tavern where his father's acquaintance had said he would bring news of Cornelia and the replies to his father's queries to White Hall. But no news awaited him there.

The second day, when he returned again from that same errand, he found Lena perched on the edge of the bed, speaking excitedly to the prince. "Kane!" she said, so pleased to see him. "Kane! Come and say something!"

He had hoped, momentarily, that she had conquered the curse at last, that the prince was awake and whole again, but he found Aryon just as he'd left him. "Um," he said, finding the idea of speaking to a sleeping man awkward. "Hello, your majesty."

Lena laughed, a bright sound against the otherwise quiet room. "He's excited to meet you. I've told him so much about you."

Kane could think of nothing to say, not a single word.

Lena didn't appear to notice. She spoke to the prince, recounting the events of the past few days including his and Jack's return and Jack's flight with Shipman. She paused sometimes, head cocked as though she were listening, and when she resumed speaking, the tale sometimes turned along a different line of thought. It was as though the prince had asked her a question and she was answering it, and Kane was reminded of a time not so long ago when he had wondered if soul readers could read thoughts. She said she couldn't, he thought, but perhaps she comes close.

"Kane, tell Aryon how you and Jack saved Pravoka from the pirates. He loves adventure stories!"

He felt embarrassed at the request, but she smiled so sweetly at him, he couldn't say no. "Oh... well…" he said, wondering how best to begin.

He started to enjoy himself as he recounted the tale. Lena interrupted him occasionally to interject her own comments, or to pass on a question from the prince, but for the most part, she focused on her magic, smiling as she worked. Kane finished that story, and another, and was halfway through a third when Lena made a pathetic, mournful little sound.

"Aryon?" she said, shaking the prince. "Aryon..."

"What is it?" Kane asked.

"He's gone again," Lena said, and then her lip quivered before she covered her face with both hands. In this, too, she differed from Sarah, for Sarah never cried without also raging against the tears, but Lena wept silently, giving no voice to the sadness that shook her so deeply.

At the sight of her weeping, Kane wanted to flee the room like the coward he suspected he truly was, but instead he sat beside her and let her cry on his shoulder. When she'd cried herself out, he shuffled her to the kitchens where the cook fussed over her and saw her fed; after the meal, he escorted her back. All of that took some time, so he wasn't surprised that Lena didn't finish her healing spells until well into the night, but he worried when, on the third day, it took her equally as long.

On the evening of the fourth day, as he sat in the chair reading a book Gollor had leant him, a history of elvish warfare much more interesting than the useless Leifenish legends, he became aware that Lena had stopped what she was doing and had sat back on the bed, staring down at the prince, her face drawn and pale.

"Finished?" he asked.

"No," she said, so quietly that she might have been across the hall instead of right in front of him. "I… I can't… I don't have enough." She barely responded when he led her away, her eyes wide and staring.

That night, he lay awake wondering where his father might be, wondering if the crown would help, wondering what he would do if Cornelia faced war with the elves. He knew that Lena, too, lay awake, for he could hear her unsteady breathing as she cried in that quiet way of hers. Kane thought that even when Hagen and Grifford had attacked him with their dark magic, he had never felt as powerless as he felt now.

Jack woke in his hammock below decks, the ship creaking around him. He could hear footsteps above him, the voices of the men on deck. Something had changed: the ship's rocking had settled into a more gentle rhythm. We've arrived, he thought. The captain had told him they would reach Elfheim sometime in the night. He had packed a bag the night before, nestling the flask of freshly brewed elixir among his spare shirts, ready to set out as soon as he woke, but a quick survey of the pirates currently sleeping nearby showed him only the night crew - all the others already risen for the day. He had slept later than he intended.

He moved gingerly, every inch of him sore from days of constant casting. He had never before questioned the physical toll of magic: soul and body were connected, and one without the other meant death. It had always seemed natural that working the aether inside his soul would leave his body worn and weary. Given what he'd learned from the witch, though, now he wondered. Would a real black mage feel this way? Or does it affect me worse because of the impurities in the raw aether?

The elixir had done nothing to help this particular problem, forcing him to wonder yet again if it actually worked. He hadn't found any proper potion-making supplies aboard ship, had had to make do with whatever he could find in the galley, and had poured the result in a silver hip flask that had once contained Pravokan whiskey. He had tested it on himself, only a small sip, but couldn't be sure it had made any difference; besides his exhaustion from working the aether, there was technically nothing wrong with him. He winced as he swung his feet to the floor and waited for a moment of dizziness to pass. When he looked to the corner where he'd left the bag with the elixir, it was gone.

"Thad," he growled, making for the stairs.

The rising sun had only just cleared the horizon; it shone brightly down on Elfheim's harbor, as lovely as it had been the first time they'd made port there. He could see the captain on the docks, speaking to an elven official of some kind, a dockmaster perhaps, while the crew milled about the deck doing whatever it was sailors did when they weren't sailing. At a raucous laugh, Jack turned his attention to a cluster of pirates at the front of the ship, where Thad stood over the potted ochu, tossing it chunks of what must have been fish. It snatched the morsels out of the air with its remaining arms, to the delight of the men watching. Jack was pleased he hadn't had to kill the creature to brew the elixir, having only needed to go through two of its tentacle-like vines before he succeeded; in fact, the little plant seemed none the worse for the experience, thriving in the open air and sunshine as it likely had not been able to in Matoya's cave.

"Thad," Jack said.

"Oh, hey, Jack! Watch this!" Thad said, tossing another tidbit high into the air. It landed quite tidily in the ochu's open, waiting mouth. The men hooted in laughter, cheering.

"Thad," Jack repeated, grabbing the boy's shoulder for emphasis. "Where is it?"

"I don't know what you mean," Thad said, smiling in a way that was almost cruel.

"Thad, I'm serious. I've no time for this."

Thad rolled his eyes, handing the rest of the fish off to Felder. "Keep an eye on Oscar for me," he said, walking off toward the captain's cabin.

"You named it?" Jack said, catching up to him within three strides. "The ochu isn't a pet!"

"It is now," the boy said with a shrug, opening the cabin door and slipping inside. He stood beside the big table where the light from the windows at the rear of the ship played over untidy piles of maps and sea charts. "I want to go with you."

"Thad, we've discussed this. It's not safe for you there."

"It's not safe for Lena either! If you're going to rescue her, I'm going too!"

"This isn't a rescue," Jack said, struggling to maintain his patience. "I'm merely delivering the elixir. We have no reason to believe she's in any more danger now than she was when we left."

"Then why can't I come?"

"Because the elves think you're a spy!"

At the sound of the door opening behind him, Jack turned to find Captain Gabbiani. "There's a problem," the gruff man said, jerking a thumb toward the docks. "Elf fella says the harbor's flush with castle guards."

"Do you see, Thad? This is exactly what I was talking about."

The captain shook his head. "It's not just the boy they're after. They're looking for you. Or someone of your description, at any rate."

"Me?" Jack said. He glanced at Thad, who crossed his arms over his chest, smiling smugly.

"Poofed into the middle of the harbor town, didn't you? In the company of a known spy, too - no offense, Shipman. Magic like that gets noticed."

"Great," Jack said witheringly. "That's great."

"What's the big deal?" said Thad. "You can just Teleport us past them, can't you?"

"In point of fact, I can't."

The boy frowned, cocking his head. "Why not? It's not that far. You did it last time."

"Because I'm tired, alright?" Jack nearly shouted. "I don't have time right now to explain the intricacies of aether work to you, but I've spent the better part of a week casting and I'm done!"

"Fine," Thad said, shrugging casually as if Jack hadn't just unloaded on him. "So how are you planning to get past the guards?"

Jack sagged into a chair, hanging his head, fighting the urge to rub his temples. "I don't know."

"Gosh," Thad said. He went to a cupboard on one side of the room. From it, he retrieved the bag that held the elixir and swung it over his shoulder. "If only you knew someone who was good at sneaking around."

Jack groaned.

Kane must have slept at last. It seemed that he blinked and suddenly it was full daylight. Lena was already gone. He splashed his face with the water in the wash basin, then, in light of how tired he felt, he stuck half his head in the bowl. He came up sputtering, ran his hands through his soaking hair, then belted on his sword and set out for the kitchens.

He hadn't gone far when the sound of raised voices brought him up short.

"Please!" he heard Gollor say. "They're not spies! They're here to help us!"

"It doesn't matter," someone said in reply. "The king has ordered us to bring them in. Step aside, Gollor."

Guards? Kane thought. And coming this way. He tried the knob on the nearest door, found it mercifully unlocked, and had just enough time to duck into the room before a half dozen guards turned the corner, striding purposefully toward the room where he'd been staying.

The old man stumbled along behind them. "Please! They mean us no harm!" he begged.

Too late, Kane thought, peeking around the doorframe as they passed. We stayed too long. His heart pounded as he slipped into the hall and hurried toward Aryon's room, making for the narrower hallways of the servant's passages rather than the wide main corridors the guards were most likely to take.

He worried they would be there already, but the royal wing appeared just as abandoned as ever. He sprinted toward Aryon's room, bolting inside. "Lena!" he called. "Lena, we have to go! Now!" but then his eyes took in the sight in front of him.

Lena knelt on the bed, bent over the prince as she healed him, but the prince was not the motionless sleeper he had been. He thrashed violently, bucking beneath the small white mage as she pressed her glowing hands against him. "I can't leave him like this! He'll die!" she said desperately.

"Please, Lena, the guards are coming. It's too late." He grabbed her shoulder, but she twisted out of his grip, moving across the bed and away from him.

"Not yet!" she snapped.

"Woman, I will carry you out of here if I have to!" he said, stepping around the bed to do just that, knowing she couldn't fight back. As he reached for her, a white flash filled his vision, knocking him back, as a Protect spell coalesced around her. "Lena! Don't do this!" he cried, reaching for her again, but he couldn't touch her.

She ignored him, pouring her attention into Aryon as if nothing else mattered.

Jack tried to appear casual as they walked through Elfheim. At this time of morning, the city bustled with elves going about their daily affairs. Some looked askance at the pair of humans, but most ignored them, too busy with their own business to care. It was nothing like it had been when he walked the streets with Lena, her white mage attire drawing every eye. Yet, still, Jack felt inordinately exposed.

"Come on," Thad said, oblivious to Jack's discomfort. "The guards don't usually patrol this street until first chime. We can cut left across the market to the castle wall. You can Teleport us inside from there, right? It's hardly any distance."

"Yes," Jack said, his voice creaking with tension.

To Thad's credit, or perhaps discredit, he really was good at sneaking around. He'd led them swiftly and stealthily through the harbor town, and once on the long road to the city itself, they had only had to skirt around one contingent of guards. Thad had grudgingly admitted he didn't know the first thing about sneaking through a forest, so they'd cautiously taken a wide detour; they had encountered no other guards since then, due in part to Thad's knowledge of their patrol patterns through the city.

Jack grew more nervous as they drew closer to the castle wall. He could see the wide front gate farther down the street, but Thad ignored it. "This is the spot," he said, ducking into a clear space down an alley between two shop buildings, too far from the street to accommodate a market stall.

Jack stepped after him, stopping at the alley mouth when something caught his eye, for at the gate, a thin man stood arguing heatedly with the guards. His hair was ragged, and his clothes were filthy, but his shirt, under the grime, was clearly a disturbing shade of yellow. Jack waited until the guards pushed the man back into the street before he called, "Refial!"

The pirate started in surprise, hurrying over to him. "Jack! You're alive!"

"Yes," Jack said. He took in Refial's appearance: not only was his once-fine shirt stained beyond hope of repair, his face was covered in several small scratches as if he'd walked into a tree. He bore a sizable lump on his forehead just at the hairline, and there was blood in his greasy hair. "And from the looks of things, I've had a better time of it than you. Where have you been?"

"I got lost! I've been wandering the groves for days!"

"Alone?" Jack said. "What happened to Redden and Orin?"

"I could as well ask you the same thing! They went off looking for you and Kane!"

"They went back to the Keep?"

Refial nodded.

There were more coming, Jack thought. Dark mages, the Brotherhood… What if we've lost them?

"Jack, what's wrong?" Thad said.

"Useless," he said. "We traveled all that way, were gone for so long..."

"But we have the elixir now!" Thad pointed out.

"Do you think those guards would let us through if we show them the crown?" Refial said.

"What?" Jack asked, whipping his head up so fast that his neck twinged. "You have it?"

"Of course!" said the pirate. "Why did you think they sent me back on my own? I tried to explain it to Gollor's girl over there, but she said she couldn't let me in."

"Segeth is guarding the gate?" Thad asked, peeking around the corner at it.

Refial sighed in exasperation. "I just said as much!"

Before Jack could stop him, the boy ran past, toward the gate, directly toward the shorter of the two female guards, though she still towered over Thad, was taller even than Refial. "Segeth!" he cried.

At the sight of the boy, the other guard tensed, whether to run inside or to grab him, Jack wasn't sure, but Segeth held her hand up, motioning her companion to hold. "Thadius! What are you doing here! It's not safe for you!"

"But we have the cure for the prince!"

"We have orders to take you before the king," the other guard said, tension heavy in her voice.

"We also have orders to keep everyone out for the next hour, Rill. We need only obey the one!"

"Segeth!" Rill hissed, seeming scandalized.

"You don't believe he's a spy any more than I do!" Segeth said. She knelt before the boy. "We don't want to capture you, Thadius, but we'll have to if you stay here."

"If we give you the cure, can you get it to Lena?" Jack said.

Segeth looked up at him, eyes wide. "I… can't…" she said slowly. On the other side of the gate, Rill had pinched her eyes shut in a pained expression.

Thad looked rapidly between the two of them. "Why not?"

"Is Lena alright?" Jack said.

Segeth stood, face set. She was sweating, but Jack didn't believe for an instant that it was because of the heat. The guardswoman looked him very deliberately in the eye as she said, "I cannot say."

He heard Lena's voice in his memory: She wanted to tell us, I could feel it.

"Can't, or won't?" he asked.

She nodded, even as she repeated her negative answer. "I cannot say."

"Alright," he said, considering his options. He was tired. He was sore. His stomach turned at the thought of casting one more spell. So look for a bit of aether that's already shaped like the spell you want and cast it from there, he thought. He called up his aether sight, and though the guards flinched as a corona flared in his eyes, neither moved against him. At a wave of his hand, the aether swirled around them in an approximation of Sleep.

"What are you doing?" Refial gasped as the two women sank to the ground.

"Possibly something I'll regret later. Come on." He strode through the now-unguarded gate, already looking for the aether he needed to cast the spell again.

The curse writhed beneath her spells like a thorned snake, coiling and striking and stinging no matter where she applied her will. She ripped and tore at it, a gardener pulling a malevolent weed, but the roots ran so deeply she couldn't cut them off at the source.

She could hear Kane behind her, knew he was begging her to leave with him, but she couldn't make out his words over the roar of her power in her mind. She could feel his fear, his desperation, just as she could feel Aryon's, but they paled in comparison to her own despair.

She had to save him. She'd worked too hard, for too long, to lose him now. She knew him. For all that she'd never once heard his voice, he had heard hers when it seemed that all the world had stopped listening. Aryon had listened as she laid out her hopes and dreams and fears and she had felt his, even if she could not yet put words to them. She wouldn't let him go.

She flailed against the curse, and it burned her wherever her power touched it. She roared in defiance and held tight to it anyway. She heard Kane call for her as she screamed, felt him push against her Protect spell again as he tried to reach her. The curse ducked out of her grip, fleeing deeply into the prince's soul.

No, she declared. No, you can't have this one. She wrapped her power around Aryon's soul just as she might take a kitten into her arms, and she knew she wept at how small and frail his aura's light was, but her body, her weeping, seemed far away, removed from this place where her power resided.

The curse screamed as her power enclosed them both, prince and curse together. It screamed as a cornered animal might scream, shrinking back from her, cowering in Aryon's shadow, not dead or defeated but beaten back for now.

"Aryon," she said, a croak of a whisper, back in her own self now as she knelt over the prince, cradling his face in her still-glowing hands.

He slept still, but he was there. She could feel him, she could feel him as clearly as if he were speaking to her, and what he said was "Leave me."

"No," she told him. "No."

She could feel him, a mixture of hope and despair and regret, of gratitude and resignation that she heard as a voice in her ear whispering, "It's too late for me."

Kane seized her arm, pulling against her. Her Protect had faded. She realized she hadn't the power to cast it again. "I'm sorry," she said, bending close to Aryon, kissing his forehead. "I'm so sorry." She wept as Kane hauled her away.

"This way," Kane said, pulling Lena along as he ran for the rear stairs. He heard shouting behind him, the sounds of pursuit. A quick glance back showed a cluster of five guards, striding toward them at a determined pace, not quite running, almost as if these guards had no desire to catch their quarry. It's because they don't, Kane realized as they headed downstairs. No matter what the king's ordered, they know she's only a white mage. Had the guards arrived that minute, or had they been waiting for Lena to emerge, waiting until she finished healing the prince?

The rear stairs let out near the servants' quarters, on a series of hallways that spiraled through the castle's ground floor. A left here would take them back to Gollor's rooms, where Kane knew the guards might still be waiting for them. Right would take them to the kitchens, to the exit he was most familiar with, but he heard shouting that way. Forward seemed the only option left to them.

"No!" Lena said, as Kane dragged her after him. "They're coming! I can feel them."

He backtracked, taking the left-hand turn just as the first guards from the kitchen area reached their hallway. He ran, Lena with him, speeding down the passage that would eventually take them past the dead-end corridor that contained Gollor's rooms, and as they ran, another guard stepped into view ahead of them. Kane turned back, but those in pursuit blocked his way.

He snarled, drawing his sword, wondering how he would fight them from two directions at once. I'll have to charge the lone one, hope I can cut him down before the others reach us, he thought, but he hesitated when he felt Lena's gentle hand on his sword arm.

Her eyes were so green in her pale, serious face. "Don't," she said.

"I can't get you out of here without a fight."

Lena shook her head. "Please don't kill for me."

"I swore I'd keep you safe," he said, knowing even as he said it that he had lost his chance. Ahead of him, more guards stepped into view, surrounding the one he had hoped to overpower.

The guards closed in from both sides.

"It's that door!" Thad said.

Jack nodded. Of course it's the door with the guard on it, he thought, flicking a bit of Sleep-shaped aether toward the hapless man just as he noticed their approach.

Refial squeaked as the elven guard pitched forward, his pike clattering loudly against the floor. "That was the eighteenth one!"

"More, if you count those servants he did," Thad said, stepping over the guard to reach the door.

"Yes, I think I'm getting the hang of this," Jack said sarcastically.

Thad tried the knob, but it seemed to be locked. "One moment," he said, digging in his pockets, coming up with feathers and string before he settled upon what looked like a sturdy playing card that he slid into the space between the frame and the door. It opened for him after only a moment's fiddling.

"You've a real talent for that," said Refial.

"Thanks," said the boy.

"I'm not sure I meant it as a compliment," the pirate muttered.

Jack ignored them, pulling the elixir from his bag. So much was riding on this concoction. He didn't know if he had brewed it properly, had simply followed a basic potion recipe and hoped for the best. He could still smell traces of whiskey as he unscrewed the lid.

Gods, please, he thought, pulling the prince's head up, forcing the flask between his lips, and pouring slowly. "Please work," he begged aloud.

His heart sank as he watched a bit of the precious brew dribble down Aryon's chin to his neck, but then the prince's throat moved as he swallowed.

Kane fought against a wave of pain that made him physically ill. Hands bound tightly in front of him, he could hear his shoulder grinding with every step he took. Dislocated, he suspected, when the elven guards had tackled him to the floor.

"Please, let me heal him," Lena said from a few steps ahead, surrounded by guards, with her hands tied as if she were as big a threat as he was. Compared to her elven captors, she was so, so small.

The guards looked between her and Kane with pity in their eyes, just following orders, no matter how it displeased them to do so. Kane understood, but he didn't have to like it. "It's fine, Lena," he said.

"It's not fine! I can feel it! Please," she said, this last bit directed at the guards.

The guards said nothing as they led the pair of them out of the sparse hallways of the servants' quarters into a part of the castle much more fine. The corridors were wider here, the carpets and wall-hangings in pristine condition. There were more guards as well, some falling into step beside them, others lining up to watch them pass by.

They came to a wide doorway flanked by carved wooden pillars but with no door. Kane knew instinctively that it was the entrance to the throne room, though it was nothing like Cornelia's. Though the room was just as large as he expected, it was darker - it lacked the Cornelian throne room's large windows, the colorful ensembles of the ever-present courtiers. There seemed to be no elven courtiers at all, only a crowd of castle guards, with here and there a liveried servant cowering among them.

Their guards marched them before a raised platform that held a throne occupied by a haggard man who might have resembled Aryon in better days. He frowned as he squinted down at Lena from the throne.

"She is the one I told you about, your majesty," a stocky elf beside him said. With his thinning hair and black mage robes, Kane knew him from Gollor's description: Cotto.

"You!" the king said. "The servant? You lied to me?"

"No, your majesty," Lena said, her voice small and steady. "All white mages are servants. I serve life, until life's appointed end."

Cotto sneered. "She is the spy, sire. She serves Cornelia."

"She's no spy!" Kane snapped.

"Silence!" the king commanded. To Lena, he said, "You came from White Hall?"

Lena looked down at her feet. "Yes, sire."

"And do you deny that you've been reporting to White Hall about elvish matters of state?"

"I don't know anything about that, sire," Lena said.

The king glared, grabbing a paper out of Cotto's hands and throwing it down to them. It floated lazily to their feet. Kane could clearly make out his father's handwriting, his request for aid from White Hall, apparently intercepted by Cotto before it had ever been sent.

"It mentions you," the king snarled. "It specifically mentions a white mage infiltrating my palace. Do you still claim ignorance?"

Lie, Kane thought. Just lie. If ever there was a time to break the Oath, this is it.

"No, sire." Lena's whisper carried through the hush of the massive throne room as clearly as a shout, and Kane's heart broke.

"Kill her," the king said, so coldly and quietly that Kane wasn't sure he'd heard correctly. No one moved. No one breathed. "Kill her!" he repeated, shouting it this time, and Kane could see the madness in his eyes.

"No!" Kane said, trying to move in front of Lena, but the guard nearest him grabbed his injured shoulder and squeezed until Kane saw stars. Even as the pain drove him to his knees, he struggled to put himself between Lena and their captors.

Still, the guards didn't move. They hesitated, hands to their sword hilts, obviously unwilling to draw. The guard who held Kane was shaking.

"None of you move," said a uniformed man near the throne. "She's mine." He was older, an officer of some kind, wearing a sword that looked more ceremonial than functional. The gold and silver filigree of the hilt glinted as he drew the blade, a whisper of steel against the quiet tension. The man approached the guards that ringed Lena in, touching one lightly on the arm to get him to step aside.

Sparing his subordinates, Kane thought. But the officer's face was pale - Kane knew the man didn't want to do this. "Don't! Please!" he yelled, fighting against the guard who held him.

The officer stepped forward, raising his sword.

"I forgive you," Lena said, her voice as quiet as a summer breeze. Her eyes never rose from the floor. "I forgive you."

The old guard hesitated, sword held high. He need only strike and it would all be over.

"Kill her!" the king shouted. "I order you to kill her!"

The sword wavered for an instant, an instant Kane was sure heralded the beginning of the end, but the fatal stroke never came.

Instead a voice yelled, "Stop!"

It echoed through the throne room, hitting the assembled guards like a force of nature, like a blast of cold air. Every eye in the room turned to the entryway, where a figure stood supported by two others: Prince Aryon, held between Jack and Refial. Kane could see Shipman hovering behind them, eyes wide with worry. In one hand, Aryon clutched Asura's crown so tightly that his knuckles were white.

Whoever holds the crown is king, Kane remembered. All elves are bound by blood to obey their king.

"Stand down," Aryon said, his voice clear and forceful regardless of how weak he appeared.

The guard who held Kane released him. Kane immediately pushed to his feet, shoving Lena behind him, but needlessly - the officer who stood over her stepped back, not only lowering his sword but dropping it altogether as though it burned him.

"Aryon?" the king said, standing, gazing across the room at his son in wonder and confusion.

"No, your majesty!" Cotto said, desperately. "He must be an imposter!"

"Cotto Arastel," Aryon said coldly. "I charge you with high treason, aiding in a conspiracy to usurp the throne. Guards, seize him."

The guards surged toward the raised platform, but they stopped when Cotto leaped to the mad king's side, pulling a curved knife from beneath his black robes. The king was in no condition to fight him off, still confused at the sudden appearance of his beloved son. "Move and he dies!" Cotto shouted. "I mean it!"

There was a sound from the back of the room that Kane could only describe as a squeak, a sound he knew from experience came from none other than Refial. The knife fell from Cotto's hand seconds before both Cotto and the king collapsed in an untidy pile beside the throne.

"I'm sorry!" Kane heard Refial say. "I panicked! It's a reflex!"

Kane turned just as Lena ran for the door, toward Jack, toward Aryon, but it was Aryon who opened his arms to her, who all but collapsed against her as he caught her up and held her. The two of them sank to the floor, clinging to each other, the gems of the crown Aryon held shimmering red against Lena's hair.

She wouldn't have seen Jack turn and walk away, Kane thought, not while she cried tears of joy against Aryon's shoulder. This time, she did not cry quietly.

Author's Note: 10/7/16 - Another glimpse into the contents of Thad's pockets. Was that a Triple Triad card? The world may never know.

So, I hate to do this to you guys, but there's going to be a hiatus after chapter 32. I just can't keep up with the "1 chapter per week" goal I set for myself when I started this thing and need time to get ahead. I'm really sorry about it. This is the first long-fiction story I've ever done; I didn't know when I started how hard it would be to maintain the pace.

Chapter 31 next week will take us through the end of part two, and 32 is sort of an interlude between parts two and three. It's technically the first chapter of part three, but it's a good place to take a break, sort of before the action in Melmond picks up, not too cliff-hanger-ish. I just don't want to reach a situation where I leave you guys hanging in the middle of an action sequence or something.

I'll have more details regarding hiatus length and dates when I post 32 (depending on how much I get done between now and then). Meanwhile, I hope you stick with me.