Thom’s mouth worked before his gaze dropped to the sand-strewn floor.
He didn’t answer her. He didn’t need to.
It was all the heartbreak Kestrel could take. The room was collapsing around her. The dusty air filling her throat. The heat pressing against her flesh.
He saw it in her eyes before she spun on her heels.
“Wait!” Thom cried out, attempting to hobble after her.
But the room was a labyrinth of tables and chairs that would take him forever to maneuver around. And Kestrel was already gone.
Chapter 9
To Trust a Prince
KESTREL
There was only one place Kestrel thought to go, the only place she had ever known. But she couldn’t go back to their tower now. Not that she even knew where it was.
Kestrel was lost.
Stranded.
Alone in a world that she knew nothing about.
So she ran as fast as her feet would carry her, without a destination in mind. She ran until her legs were throbbing, until the heels of her feet felt as if they had split down the centers. And then she ran some more. Through the tight alleyways and heaps of goods that shop owners had left behind. She ran until she lost track of that irksome tavern somewhere long, long behind her.
All that mattered was putting distance between her and Thom—orDariusor whoever he was.
So Kestrel kept running.
It wasn’t until she whipped past the town gates and into the dark desert that she finally succumbed to the sobs clawing at her lungs. Kestrel collapsed to her hands and knees beside asparse cluster of wildflowers and cacti. And once the tears came, it seemed like they might never stop. Like the acidic pain around her broken heart would burn through her before she ever saw the sun again.
She didn’t know what hurt more: Thom’s lies about the state of humanity, the false identity he’d upheld in her presence, or his complete and utter lack of respect for her and their relationship.
Kestrel’s life had been a tightly spun spool of deception and now it had completely unraveled—shewas unraveled.
And the worst part was that now that she was out here in the quiet, in the dark, with no one around for as far as the eye could see, all she wanted washim. To throw her arms around Thom’s neck and have him tell her that everything would be alright. That it had all been a big misunderstanding. That he would tell her everything.
Her heartache seemed endless. Her tears bitter with misery.
The sobs were just starting to crescendo again, when something rustled in the flowers before her. Kestrel jolted onto her knees, reaching for her knife. She had forgotten about what dangers could lurk out in the open desert until just now. If it was the scourge, one knife wouldn’t do much against their hundreds, but it seemed better to face them armed than completely vulnerable.
When the thing behind the flowers whimpered though, Kestrel knew it wasn’t anything so frightening.
She parted the tall flowers. An orange, fluffy bundle of fur leapt out at her.
“Fox?” Kestrel yelped as the creature curled into her arms. “What in the Hollows are you doing out here? How did you even find me?”
The contented fox licked her face in reply and Kestrel let it nuzzle into her lap.
“Oh, it doesn’t even matter. I’m just happy to see you. You have no idea how much I…”
The heartbreak almost pushed itself back up again, but Kestrel fought through it with a new realization. She wasn’t alone after all—not that a fox would be much company for most people, but she had survived off far less.
“Thank you for finding me.” She scratched the top of the fox’s head. “It’s just you and me now.”
The fox tilted its head, as if in question. So Kestrel told it everything. She told it about the prince. About their private, shameful kiss. About the tavern, and finding Thom there amongst all his friends. About the name he’d been called that bore with it a lifetime that Kestrel had never known.
