Walking through the forest soon calmed my agitation. The slight hint of autumnal chill in the air, the smell of leaves and flowers, and the sounds of animals hidden in the underbrush filled my senses. Nothing could be further from the human bustle of the city.
I had gathered four promising branches when I caught a sound that didn’t fit. Pausing, I listened more carefully. The jingle of a harness cut through the trees, followed by a distant sound I recognized as the cadence of spoken words.
I tilted my head, straining to hear more. We sometimes encountered other woodcutters, but they came on foot with donkeys, like us. These people were on horseback.
Honest travelers venturing off the road for a cool break among the trees? They were deep in the forest for that.
A pleasure party of nobility, then? The nobles sometimes made it this far, seeking a longer ride than could be afforded in the extensive palace gardens.
I had once been part of such excursions myself.
My heart skipped slightly. Was it the younger royals I could hear? I had learned to ride in their company, and all four of them were skilled on horseback.
Something uncomfortable crawled its way from my stomach toward my throat, but I couldn’t tell if it was excitement or anxiety. It had been more than three years since I had seen the princess or any of the princes. Not being a glutton for emotional pain, I avoided the processional days when I might have glimpsed them from afar.
I couldn’t deny the desire to see them now, though. Adara was my oldest friend. In that difficult first year with Nyla, I had as often cried myself to sleep over the loss of her companionship as over my father’s death.
The itch to see the princess again was strong. But a brief glimpse—or even an exchange of words—wasn’t worth the pain of opening old wounds.
And as for her brothers…I had done my best to forget the mischievous twins altogether. My childish preference for Prince Xavier and Prince Xander had been foolish then, and I would be wise not to give way to it again, even for a moment. They had been handsome enough when we were just turned fifteen—the talk in the market suggested they had only grown more attractive in the three years since.
Foolishness!I upbraided myself. The riders were unlikely to be my old royal playmates. Adara and her brothers had always ridden in the morning, and the voices that were growing louder sounded both older and harsher than the voices of my childhood.
I was still standing, frozen with indecision, when the first glimpse of movement showed through the trees. The band of riders was bigger than I’d expected—no wonder I’d heard them from so far away.
One glance was enough to tell me they weren’t a pleasure party. Dressed alike, they wore the brown leather and short kaftans of the city guards.
The sight of their uniforms returned the feeling to my legs, and I stumbled back several steps with a sinking sensation in my stomach. Navid’s earlier words about danger in the forest echoed ominously in my mind. What were the guards doing all the way out here? Who were they pursuing?
“Have we lost the trail?” called a voice, younger and smoother than the ones I had heard from afar.
I froze again, recognizing the speaker instantly despite the passage of years. The one royal sibling I had no desire to see.
Someone replied to him, but I didn’t hear their words, my eyes trapped by the white horse which stepped to the front of the group. A tall, straight figure sat astride it, his eyes turned away from me, toward the captain of the guards.
He had grown—both in height and the breadth of his shoulders—but his dark hair curled at his neck just as it used to, and his voice still carried the same whiplash of command, delivered instinctively with every word he spoke.
In the course of three years, I had turned him into a stranger in my mind, but one glance and my memories rebelled. Happy times sprang to mind—a gaggle of children, running free through the palace gardens, Rek at our head.
But that was before he grew away from us—less Rek and more Crown Prince Tarek every day. And that was before I became a servant, and he convinced Adara they could no longer associate with me.
I knew my friend wouldn’t have cared about my change in rank on her own, but her brother had always cared deeply about his role as crown prince. And the worst of it was that I couldn’t even blame him—not if I was being fair. They were royalty, and I had no place in their lives anymore.
This tall young man was a stranger, whatever my memories said.
Although I didn’t move or make any sound, something drew his attention. His seat shifted as he swung his head in my direction, scanning the now silent forest.
I felt it in my belly the moment his eyes found me, his gaze locking with mine despite the distance. I had no idea what my face showed, but his expression changed as suddenly as if he’d been struck.
“Zaria?” The single word contained astonishment and some other emotion I couldn’t name.
Several guards twisted to stare in my direction. But before any of them could speak—and before I could decide whether to approach or to turn and run—their attention was seized by their captain.
“There!” he shouted. “I saw one of them! Quickly now!”
The captain had been looking away from me, unaware of the short interchange between me and the prince, and I hadn’t seen whatever had attracted his attention. His men responded instantly, wheeling their horses to follow their captain’s lead, streaking away from me through the trees.
Only Prince Tarek hesitated, his eyes still on me. But his guards were retreating further from him, pulling his attention in their direction. With a single look back at me, he muttered angry, inaudible words and spurred his horse after the rest of his group.