Urtzi’s long strides shortened as he carefully stepped within the narrow rock cut—a hundred feet to the top of either plateau but only ten feet or so between one wall and the other. In recounting her journey to Luca, Amarande had called this chain of plateaus the dragon’s spine, and this proved it was more a spine than a stone river—Urtzi wedged himself between one vertebra and another, back pressed to the wall, carefully checking every inch of rock for hidden ambush points.
Luca did not exhale until Urtzi stepped away from the southern-most part of the wall and turned to face the body. Using the heel of his dagger, he tipped the man’s head up, revealing Erfu’s dark and bloated face to those watching below. “Dart in his neck and an assassin’s smile. Slowed him down and then sliced him open. His tunic is torn, too—they checked his tattoo. Carved an X through it.”
What had Ula said? There weren’t many of those with paw prints left—too easy to identify.
Osana, who’d been sold to the Warlord and held with Amarande, blinked and looked away. “That’s the Warlord for you. Stars only know how long he’s been like that.”
“He’s stiff as a board,” Urtzi answered. “Probably nabbed him half a day ago, no later.”
“Wait.” Ula squinted at him. “How do you know that?”
Urtzi’s jaw worked. “You may be surprised, but I do listen when you talk.”
“Anything else?” Luca asked. “Footprints? Horse tracks?”
Urtzi spun in a circle, testing the air. He shook his head. “The wind’s running north–south, it’s been roaring through the cut all morning at least. I don’t even see my own footprints anymore. Sand’s covered them.”
Silence descended as Urtzi picked his way back down to the trail.
“Was he left there as a message to us?” Luca asked, bile churning in the back of his windpipe. What would he tell Mannah? That his mere presence had destroyed not only her home but also the man she loved? How does one atone for that? Luca coughed, swallowing. “Or to the resistance in general?”
“Both. Hurts us, hurts them, hurts anyone who happens to see him,” Osana answered, her voice low and strained. “The Warlord is all about equal-opportunity fear—the cruelty of the symbolism is the point. ‘If you want to live, don’t be this bastard.’”
Osana wasn’t wrong. That was exactly the Warlord’s game. And exactly the hold they were trying to break on the people of the Torrent. Fear was the price paid for the supposed freedom the Warlord allowed them.
Urtzi swung himself back atop his horse. “Now what?”
Luca rattled his brain for the answer. No tracks, no clues, their guide dead—
“Now you come with us.”
Luca spun his horse around to face the new threat, sword at the ready. His companions took up position around him, weapons drawn. The voice had come from his dagger side—his open side. When his eyes found the speaker, crouched still as stone and watching from several feet away, Luca’s heart stuttered.
A ghost. The man was a ghost. One sent to the stars by Luca’s own hand and a knife, in the shadow of the Hand with Amarande fighting by his side.
Yet here he was, climbing awkwardly to his feet, one side of his body dragging as if partially paralyzed. The man took a halting step toward the mounted group.
At that, Luca found his voice, hoarse as it was. “You’re dead.”
The man accepted Luca’s accusation with a smile. “If the knife had gone an inch either way, I would be.”
The man took another painful step forward, his whole left side immobile. Luca remembered the looseness of this man’s body as he fell at the campsite as he fought himself and Amarande. Just collapsed, a puppet with his strings cut—Luca’s dagger protruding from his back.
The ghost turned and whistled. “It’s him.”
Four men materialized out of the rock face. Along with a black wolf.
Luca blinked, unbelieving as the famed sigil of the Otxoa struck out ahead of the rest. Its snout was drawn into something of a confident grin, its golden eyes still and pinned upon him.
Like him, it should’ve been extinct.
And yet, it looked him right in the face, let loose a low growl.
Ula stowed her sword and dismounted as the wolf trotted back to the oldest man in the group, settling down on its haunches beside him. “Hitz ematen dizut,” she said, baring her paw print tattoo and offering her word of honor.
The old man smiled, lips stretched across his dark-stubbled face, his bearing proud and upright in spite of his age. His presentation was simply another sign, along with the wolf’s heel, that this man was plainly the leader.
He nodded at Luca and gestured at the wolf. “Hitz ematen dizut, my Otsakumea. Beltza recognizes you. As do I. Follow us now. Quickly.”
Osana and Ula stowed their weapons, as Urtzi gaped as if he’d witnessed a magic trick. “I—I checked everywhere. How did I not see you?”
The ghost answered. “We live only because we cannot be seen.” The four men and the wolf—Beltza—turned. Ula remounted and kicked her horse into gear, still in the lead, but Luca did not budge. “But what of Erfu? We cannot leave him here—like this.”
The leader nodded. “After dark, we will remove him and bring him to his wife. He was a good man and to ensure his sacrifice was not in vain, it is imperative that we go. Now.”
“But his farm is destroyed. The Warlord’s men found us and burned it. His wife is displaced and—”
“My Otsakumea, I assure you, we will see to it that all debts are paid,” the leader replied, calm but firm. “Come, please. Now.”
Distrust was not a natural emotion to Luca, but now that he’d been made aware of its presence, he could not shut off the sour churn of it in his gut. These people had stayed near Erfu’s body. Clearly waiting for an encounter like this. A face like his. And this ghost man provided the identification—Luca had yet to show his own tattoo.
And yet, he still did not move.
“Your Otsakumea has one final question. Please.” Luca addressed the man from the Hand. “You are part of the resistance?”
The man turned on his good leg, very nearly toppling over. In answer, he bared his own paw print, as did the others. The wolf simply sat and waited patiently, gold eyes brilliant and unblinking. As the ghost’s tunic slipped back into place, Luca tried in vain to picture the man as a friend, failing. The man at the Hand had come to take him captive. He was sure of it. Amarande was sure of it. And he’d initiated the fight that, until this very moment, Luca thought had led to this man’s death.
When he hesitated, his entire group did, too, eyes moving from Luca to the ghost and back. Finally, Luca said, “You threw a knife at me.”
The same crooked smile spread across the man’s face. “I aimed to miss and distract your captor.”
“Not here,” the leader said, some of the calm in his voice sheeting away. “The longer we stay in the open, the more danger we are in.” He tipped his head toward Erfu. “We’ve already lost one today; let us not lose anyone else.”
All eyes found Luca—but he looked to the wolf. This creature who saw him for what he was, as impossible as they both were. In that moment, the wolf stood and approached the cleavage of the space between vertebrae in the stone spine. Once there, she looked back over her shoulder, as if saying, Follow me.
As his eyes met Beltza’s golden ones, the last Otxoa nodded. He nudged his horse forward into the gap, and the others followed.
CHAPTER 13
THE crowd anticipated a wedding announcement. What it got was a coronation.
The princess was missing and presumed dead at the hands of Pyrenee. The king was introduced, explained away, and crowned. The former Runaway Queen lauded for keeping her son safe and protected.
Because of this turn of events, Ardenia was stable and deadly—Pyrenee would be lucky to avoid a swift rebuke from the superior Ardenian army.
That was the message, anyway.
And General Koldo, in her best garnet-and-gold r
egalia—watching the commoners exit, first from the arena, and then from the castle grounds—hoped the people of Ardenia would accept it at face value as the gates were sealed at their backs.
Guards watched the crowds from atop the parapets. They’d already heard of unease about the closed gates—Sendoa had always left the Itspi open to the people of Ardenia. It wasn’t his castle as much as it was theirs, he’d said, citing the blood, sweat, and tears conscripts gave to the army, and workers to the diamond mines. Ferdinand would see it his father’s way eventually, Koldo was sure of it. But as of now he didn’t protest the closed gates—the threat of war was too great as the sands on the continent settled. No chance could be taken.
And so the doors were sealed. For safety. For security.
The general’s gaze skipped to the stained glass atop the north tower.
“I am sorry, Ama.”
A shadow skimmed by her as the royal party passed—Geneva, now called Queen Mother—deep in conversation with Satordi as they disappeared into the red bowels of the castle. Ferdinand paused outside the entrance.
“Koldo, a word, if you would, please. In the library.”
“Yes, my king.” The general’s voice was stoic and professional—the exact tone she would’ve used to address a similar request from Sendoa. She’d had decades of practice in hiding her real feelings in public. It would be no different with her son. That was her price to pay in all of this. A small cost in the scheme of all she’d already paid, and lost.
The pair walked silently in to the Itspi and up the stairs. Even with the hidden brace, the king had an obvious limp from his tussle with Amarande. They turned into the great library—a roomy, brightly lit space full of stacks and stacks of manuscripts ranging from poetry to treatises to maps of every known surface of the earth. Like everything else at the Itspi, and in Ardenia for that matter, its holdings had swelled under Sendoa’s watch.
Koldo followed her son to the bank of windows that looked upon the training yard, and they sat beneath a giant tapestry of Sendoa’s grandfather, pictured as a child, mounted regally atop a similarly regal orange-and-black tiger, holding a book. Though his great-grandfather was depicted with butter-blond hair, the resemblance to Ferdinand was striking. He sat under the whimsical portrait and stared at the general with Sendoa’s eyes.
“I cannot mention this to the council or to Geneva,” Ferdinand said, “but I—I was under the impression that we were only to say that Amarande was missing. To tell the people she is dead, when we—and a handful of guards, I might add—know that she is alive and breathing, is too far for me. Why tell a lie that we cannot take back?”
For once, Ferdinand sounded uncertain—more like a boy his age than the ruthless leader Geneva clearly hoped he would become.
The general did not break eye contact, nor did she hesitate. “It must be done.”
It was clear from Ferdinand’s narrowed eyes that her answer did not sit well with him. “Surely there is a way to amend this. I am not one to lie.”
“A lie got you here.”
He grimaced. “But it didn’t have to. We could have told the crowd I am illegitimate—that I am your son—and had been made legitimate in light of recent events.”
Koldo’s heart leapt at the thought. She ignored it. What was done was done.
“The easiest way to lead peacefully is not to invite questions. All the caveats you list allow for too many—ones that we don’t have the time or latitude to answer.”
Ferdinand’s voice dropped to a furious whisper. “She is my sister. You are my mother.” He took her hands in his. Koldo’s breath caught. “I don’t like that we’re hiding her away. I don’t like that I have just found you and now I must act as if you are nothing to me.”
Koldo slipped her hands from his grip and immediately regretted it. When would she be able to hold her son again? Then, as she must, she swallowed her feelings and became the stoic general once more.
“Your Highness, there is much to being king that you will not like, but you will do because it is the best route to keeping your people safe.”
“I have learned that lesson from Geneva.” Of this Koldo had no doubt, given what she’d long known. “I just thought in this position it would be different.”
After a moment, Koldo answered, “I can tell you that it is good that you feel this way.”
He glanced up, surprised. “Good?”
Koldo wove her fingers together so that she would not grab his hands or touch his shoulder or do anything else she craved. Instead, she smiled tightly. “Your Highness, tough decisions never get easier. Even for those with the best of intentions, because no decision is perfect. And those with the worst intentions do not care.”
CHAPTER 14
LUCA had ventured underground into the diamond mines of Ardenia only a few times. Dark and claustrophic, they weren’t a place to play, but, as always, if Amarande wanted to go, he had followed.
The pro-Otxoa resistance lived underground, but the world Luca and the others entered under the cover of new dark was nothing like those mines. In fact, instead of a tight, dangerous burrow, these tunnels almost felt like the halls of a castle. The ceilings weren’t as high, the walls were made of smoothed bedrock instead of stacked stones, but they were brightly lit with torches every few strides in a way that mirrored walking through the Itspi at night.
Tala, the leader, gestured Luca in first, followed by Ula, Urtzi close on her heels as usual, with Osana bringing up the rear. In front of him, perhaps a quarter mile down, loomed the glow of a much wider space—and with it, the low whisper of faraway voices.
His people.
In that moment, Luca hesitated, and the black wolf, Beltza, skirted past him. She paused, too, realizing he’d stopped moving, and turned his way, her yellow eyes bright, intelligent, and encouraging.
Luca’s fingers flexed, wishing to touch her coat—this extinct symbol who shouldn’t exist but did, just like him.
The black wolf closed the space between them, backtracking, until she was by his side. She nuzzled the top of her head against his palm, waiting.
Luca smoothed her fur, squared his shoulders, and set his attention to those who had been waiting for him all this time.
With each step, an audible thrum of energy welled up from the walls, growing until it was more than a hum, a buzz, an ache. The promise of what they’d come for, the swell of it vibrant, an energy and presence.
The wolf walked with him, perceptive eyes glancing up at him so often that he finally smiled and bent to her with a whisper. “Do not worry, Beltza. I haven’t changed my mind—I want this.”
And then, when the noise and sound and movement from beyond were so great they made Luca’s ears ring, the wolf again halted and sunk to her haunches, waiting silently with her snout tossed over her shoulder, watching Luca advance.
Luca closed his eyes and thought of Amarande.
In the meadow devouring their lunch after swordplay, eyes alight over lemon cake.
In the slim shadows after their escape, kissing him for that first time.
In the firelight at the Hand, sharing her heart.
And, now, back at the Itspi, repairing the damage the Pyrenee wedding had done, awaiting the messenger with word that he had connected with the resistance.
Soon they would be together. Forever this time. And nothing would stand in their way.
I want this.
One final step and Luca, the Otsakumea, beheld the vast, open cavern filled with hundreds—no, thousands—of people.
Yes, his people.
The black wolf tipped her face to the ceiling and howled.
All movement ceased. All eyes fell upon Luca, standing above and before them.
For the first time in seventeen years, the people of the Otxoa beheld their Otsakumea.
Luca stared back, not sure what to say. This was something he should’ve prepared for. He should’ve been ready; he should have—
Tala took a commanding step forward
and yanked the neck of Luca’s tunic aside, exposing the wolf on his chest.
At once—silence.
Then an explosion of noise that nearly tipped him back—the crowd, loud and speaking as one.
“My Otsakumea, we have been waiting for you.”
As the sound filled the space, the black wolf howled again, joining her voice to theirs.
And then every one of those thousands of people began to clap. It was completely overwhelming—in that moment, and then even more so as Luca, the black wolf, and the crew picked their way along the switchback ramp that guided them the rest of the way down.
Luca, Tala, and Beltza hit the ground level to a crush of people and hands and repeated exclamations of “My Otsakumea!” that echoed across the cavern.
Luca’s reaction was to do what he’d seen Amarande do nearly every day of their life together. He clasped every hand. Repeated every name. Eye contact, eye contact, eye contact.
“My Otsakumea! You are the very vision of King Lotyoa!”
“My Otsakumea, your timing could not be better!”
“Oh, how I have prayed to the stars for this day, my Otsakumea! Seventeen years! I daresay I was beginning to believe the stars had grown tired of my requests!”
Finally, after almost everyone had had a chance to greet Luca, Tala clapped his hands for attention, addressing the throng.
“For seventeen years, we have had the people, the placement, the plan.” Tala turned to Luca. “All we needed was you, my Otsakumea.”
It was meant to be a compliment. This was his destiny, his duty. Luca looked out into the crowd and into the faces of those who had hope in him long before he knew who he was meant to be.
“I am yours. The wait is over and the Warlord will be defeated!”
Again, Tala clapped his hands. “Let stage one commence!”
The great room cleared as everyone spun into action, hundreds of people streaming down several high-arched passageways that radiated from the main cavern. Everyone knew exactly what those words meant and their role. Everyone but the piece that set it all into motion.
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