The morning mist clung to Doranelle’s cliffs like a living thing—cold, cutting, relentless. The scent of it struck me first: salt, pine, the faint tang of iron. The air here had always been sharp enough to wound, the kind that sliced through memory as easily as flesh.

It had been a lifetime since I last stood on these stones. Since Maeve had ordered me to war. Since the clash of blades and the chorus of screams had drowned out anything resembling peace. I’d once believed the years and the blood would cauterize whatever tenderness had survived in me. But the moment I saw her, I knew that lie for what it was.

When I’d left, she’d been little more than a shadow of what she would become—too young for Maeve’s court, too honest for its venom. She used to linger at the edge of the training grounds, pretending she had messages to deliver, though we both knew better. There had been light in her eyes back then, wild and unguarded, a kind of brightness that dared the darkness to touch her.

I remembered the way she’d smiled when I caught her watching me train—half boldness, half embarrassment. Once, she stumbled over a discarded sword, and I caught her before she fell. My hands had circled her arms, her pulse a wild thing beneath my fingers.

It should have meant nothing. It was nothing—or should have been. A flicker. A heartbeat. Gone before it ever began.

But then Maeve sent me away, and I buried myself in battlefields, trying to forget that softness had ever had a face.

Now Doranelle shimmered again with its cruel beauty. Maeve had summoned the court for another of her endless celebrations. I would have traded it for war in an instant.

The great hall blazed with gold and candlelight, the music sweet as poison in the air. And there she was, standing beneath the chandeliers.

No longer the young female with wind-tangled hair and trembling hands. She was steel now—tempered, luminous. Her gown flowed like liquid silver; jewels gleamed in her hair. Time had chiseled her into something poised, untouchable. Whatever I had remembered had been replaced by a woman who looked carved from starlight and resolve.

It unsettled me more than I’d expected.

I stayed in the shadows, watching. She laughed at something one of Maeve’s courtiers said—softly, politely, the sound controlled. The voice was the same, but sharpened now, trained to move through this court like a blade through silk. The girl who once snuck into the training yards was gone.

And then Lorcan stepped into the light.

All dark armor and colder eyes, he leaned in close to murmur something to her. She met his gaze evenly, the corners of her mouth curving in quiet amusement. My chest tightened, unbidden.

Everyone knew what Lorcan was—Maeve’s hound. Brutal, loyal, efficient. A weapon she never needed to sheath. That she would stand so near him, speak to him as if he were anything but dangerous, made no sense. I told myself it was none of my concern. She wasn’t the girl I’d left behind.

But when Lorcan reached out, fingers brushing a strand of hair from her face, my hands curled into fists before I could stop them. The cold air bit deep, the taste of pine and frost thick in my lungs. I turned away before the jealousy showed—before anyone could see what I’d thought long buried.

And then without meaning to, I was standing before them both—smiling that same cold, brittle smile meant more for him than her.