There were no human words in Cordelia anymore. She wheeled away from her family’s castle and the soldiers flooding into it with no rational thoughts left in her mind. Only flight.
She opened her beak and screamed a wordless swift-scream as she dived into the shadows between the trees, ready to lose herself within them.
But the trees pressed much too close together. Their sweeping, tangling branches slowed her down. She couldn’t fly nearly fast enough to take away the pain. So she dropped to the ground and turned fox instead. Then she ran. She needed the burn in her muscles. She needed the lunge, and the pounce, and the bite.
So she caught, again and again—but then she couldn’t eat her prey. Her stomach burned and twisted each time she sensed their panic. Again and again, she let them go with high, sharp barks of frustration.
Her world was scent. It was rage. It was fear. It was …
Scent! She knew those scents. Two of them, so familiar and so hers that they pulled her toward them through the trees before she could even remember what they meant. Until …
“It’s her! I told you she’d be running wild.” It was a girl’s voice. Family. Sister.
Irritating. But Cordelia didn’t flinch or back away when the girl’s strong fingers closed in the thick fur at her nape, anchoring her in place. The boy fell to his knees beside her a moment later and wrapped his arms tightly around her back and chest. His face tipped, wetness trickling through her coat.
“Come on!” said the girl. “Turn human already!”
“Not yet,” said the boy. “Just one more minute.” He hugged her even closer.
She should have twisted to free herself, like any sensible fox. Instead, she found herself leaning into him for no reason she could understand. A low whimper escaped her throat, although her body felt no pain.
“Oh—!” The girl let go of Cordelia and swung around, bashing the closest branch hard with the long stick that she carried.
“Quiet!” The boy jerked upright. “We can’t make any noise!”
Giles was complaining about noise?
It was no good. With her triplets bickering around her, there was no way for Cordelia to hide from reality any longer. An inescapable wave of memories and awful, helpless human-ness broke through her wild fox-ness like a dam shattering.
She shifted. Giles’s arm fell away as she straightened, kneeling on the bumpy forest floor and breathing hard. “How long has it been?” Her voice sounded hoarse.
She’d screamed in swift form, hadn’t she? That would explain why her throat hurt now. She couldn’t remember much that had happened since that moment when …
When …
“Too long. You were supposed to come right here, remember?” Rosalind smacked her stick irritably against one leg, peering around the gathering darkness suspiciously. “We could have started out half an hour ago, if you’d only been waiting where you were supposed to be.”
“We wouldn’t be here at all if she ever stayed where she was supposed to be,” Giles muttered.
At that, the urge to run—again—rose up within her in a surging wave, trying to propel her to her feet. Cordelia’s hands clenched into fists on her knees, holding her down. “Is Alys all right?”
“Who knows?” Giles’s fingers rattled against his side, playing an invisible, agitated tune. He’d followed Mother’s orders, she saw; not a single lute strap hung over his shoulder. How he must have hated leaving all of them behind. “Haven’t you felt it?”
“Felt what?”
“Try talking to Mother,” Rosalind told her.
“But—”
“Do it!”
Cordelia reached out in her mind. She felt … nothing.
Emptiness.
She sucked in a harsh breath.
“You see?” Rosalind’s knuckles whitened around her stick. “She’s gone.”
Goose bumps popped across Cordelia’s arms. “What do you mean, gone?”
“They did something to her,” Giles said. “They haven’t killed her. They couldn’t have. We would have felt it if they had! But they’ve stopped her magic somehow. We can’t reach her, and she can’t reach us, either.”
“And we didn’t even try to protect her!” Rosalind whirled around, lashing out with her stick and sending leaves scattering to the ground from nearby branches. “She wouldn’t let me help, and I was stupid enough to listen. Now, all because I was a coward—”
“What could you have done?” Uncontrollable shivers rippled through Cordelia’s skin. “That stick of yours can’t stop magical lightning.”
That terrible scream …
Alys is all right. She has to be. They’ve healed her.
Cordelia’s sister glowered at her. “You didn’t listen when Mother said to stay back.”
“And look where it got us!” Giles pointed an accusing finger in the direction of home. “Now Mother’s a prisoner. They have Connall and Alys. And they’ll come hunting for the three of us next!”
Cordelia flinched.
Rosalind dug her stick hard into the ground. “Connall told them we were only servants. Remember?”
“But they knew he was lying.” Giles gave a groan of frustration. “We’re the reason they came! They’re not going to give up just because we didn’t wait for them at the gates. How are we supposed to stop them from taking us when they do come? With your pretend sword? Or one of my ballads?” He snorted, his shoulders hunching and his head ducking down. “It’s absurd.”
“So what are you saying?” Rosalind’s eyes narrowed. “You want to give up without a fight? Surrender?”
“Mother did.” Giles’s hands clenched and unclenched in the shadows. “How are we supposed to fight them if she couldn’t?”
“She didn’t want us to fight.” Cordelia’s throat felt full of pebbles. “She told us to run.”
… Just before she’d sunk to her knees. “I love you all so much.”
Cordelia knew how to be furious at her mother, but she didn’t know how to carry all of the feelings that roiled inside her now. They were too big and complicated. They hurt.
“I’m not running from anyone,” snarled Rosalind. “I’m going to rescue Mother and Alys and Connall, too.”
“Don’t be an idiot!” Giles’s voice rose to a whisper-shout. “This isn’t a ballad, and you’re not a real knight! You’ve only ever fought Mother’s practice shadows. Real people are different! And you ran just as fast as I did through that tunnel to get away.”
“I know I did.” Rosalind looked away, her voice thickening. “I can’t bear to remember it.”
“What tunnel?” Cordelia scowled up at both of them. “Mother never showed me any tunnels under the moat.”
“Well …” Rosalind wiped her nose with the back of her hand and sniffed hard. “Of course she didn’t. She’s not a fool.”
“She showed us because she knew we wouldn’t use it unless we had to,” Giles said impatiently. “She didn’t dare show you because you would’ve used it to sneak out every time you got tired of following the rules. None of us can ever trust you to stay put!”
If he had any idea how hard she’d fought to follow those stupid, suffocating rules—to sit trapped inside the castle’s walls on so many days when the sky rose high and wild above her and that hook tugged piercingly hard inside her chest …
The need to shift was a wail within her bones as Cordelia surged to her feet, glaring at her brother. “I’m trying,” she said, “to follow Mother’s rules right now. She said to stay out of sight until she comes for us.”
“But what if she can’t?” His shoulders sagged as if all the fury had drained out of him, leaving him limp. “Just … think about it, both of you. We’re in the middle of the forest. We don’t even have anything to eat—and those men came to make one of us their king or queen! I know Mother didn’t want it to happen, but … wouldn’t it be the easiest way to make them let her go?”
Rosalind’s shoulders squared, and she set her jaw. “It would be a betrayal of Mother’s honor for us to turn ourselves in without a fight—especially after she fought so valiantly on our behalf!”
“We’re not doing anything that those dukes want,” growled Cordelia.
The bearish duke of Arden didn’t even care for his own family. How could he be trusted with anything else? He’d cast aside strong, kind Alys as if she were of no value.
Families argued, but you couldn’t just pretend that they didn’t matter.
She’d already had one brother be taken captive, and the pain of that thought made her breath turn ragged and her head spin as remembered moments flashed past her in vivid accusation. Connall had tried so hard to protect her …
She wouldn’t let either of her triplets throw themselves away now.
“We can’t just go running in with sticks to rescue Mother and the others,” Cordelia told Rosalind. “They have real swords—and we don’t even understand what’s happening.”
If only any of the adults back home had ever answered any of her questions!
“What are we going to do, then?” Giles wrapped his arms around his skinny chest. He looked already defeated—and smaller, too, without his usual swagger.
It felt wrong to see exuberant Giles so cowed. He should be dancing around composing epic songs about their adventures, not crumpling into himself like a tree ready to topple. Rosalind stood fiercely on guard, which was normal … but the pale fear and guilt on her face felt horribly off-kilter, too. Rosalind was always supposed to be absurdly overconfident, no matter how wrong she might actually be.
Everything had fallen apart tonight … and it was all her fault.
But she wasn’t going to let herself think about that, ever. Instead, she said, “Everyone needs rest so we can think. I know a den nearby that’s empty. Connall and I found it last time I went exploring. You’ll both be safe enough sleeping in there.”
“What about you?” Rosalind frowned. “We’ll need to take turns standing guard.”
“No one will get past me tonight.” It was the one thing Cordelia could still be sure of.
It was a relief to turn bear a few minutes later. She stretched her big brown bulk across the entrance to the abandoned wolf den, forming a breathing wall of fur and claws between the wide-open outside world and the tiny, squabbling pieces that remained of her family.
It was her job to protect them now.
It was all that she had left.
Shadows fell across her closed eyelids. Cool night air ruffled through her fur. Owls hooted softly to each other overhead, while mice and pine martens skittered through the thick undergrowth nearby.
She was as free and unleashed as she had ever yearned to be.
And she was so lucky that a powerful, wild bear couldn’t cry … even when the girl inside had just had her entire world shattered.