“Kerrigan! Kerrigan!” a voice cried, jolting her awake.
She snapped out of her vision, jerking out of the water and coughing spastically to clear her lungs. She’d fallen all the way under. Any longer, and she might have drowned. She sucked in deep breaths as she tried to make sense of what in the gods’ name was happening to her.
“Oh my gods, are you okay?”
Kerrigan cleared her green eyes enough to see who had found her and kept her from drowning. “Audria,” she said in surprise.
“Are you all right?” She fiddled with a loose lock of her blonde hair.
“I’m… I’m fine. Thank you,” Kerrigan said, suddenly tongue-tied.
Audria was beautiful and royal and… a friend from home. A friend she could never be again because Kerrigan didn’t want anyone to know where she had come from.
“What are you doing down here?”
“I could say the same to you.”
“True,” Kerrigan conceded, running a shaky hand back through her red hair.
“But… I came to find you. I wanted to talk.”
“About what?” Kerrigan asked, retreating in the water but Audria stepped forward.
“I saw you were training with Fordham.”
“Yeah,” she said warily.
“How’s that going?”
“It’s… grueling. I think he takes pleasure in me being in pain.”
“That sounds like the House of Shadows.”
Considering what Kerrigan knew about the House of Shadows from Fordham, she would be even more inclined to agree. They weren’t just brutal to those they thought were beneath them; they were like that to their own too. Brutality was built into their being from a young age. No one could come away from that unscathed.
Audria continued when Kerrigan didn’t reply, “What’s he like?”
“What do you mean?” Kerrigan crossed her arms over her chest. The last thing she wanted was a line of interrogation from Audria.
“You’re the only person he talks to,” Audria said with a small shrug of her shoulders. “I’ve tried to get to know him, but he has no interest in talking.”
“I don’t know,” Kerrigan said softly. “He’s exactly what you’d expect.”
It was a lie. Fordham wasn’t what she had expected at all. Yes, he brutal, strong, arrogant, but there was something else underneath it all. She didn’t know what exactly. She was just now discovering it. But he didn’t have to train her for this fight and he was anyway. That said something about his character. Maybe he wanted everyone to think he was a brute. Maybe it was easier.
“If he was exactly what I expected, then he wouldn’t be training you,” she said gently. “I don’t mean that how it sounded… I’m not…” She cringed again. “I’m not prejudiced. I am completely pro-rights for all marginalized people. I just think that he wouldn’t be.”
“I don’t know why he’s training me,” she admitted.
Why was she still talking to Audria? She couldn’t be friends with this girl. No matter how nice she was.
“Okay,” Audria said uncertainly. “But just be careful, okay?”
“I can take care of myself.”
“I don’t know if you heard or knew that someone died recently,” Audria said, her voice lowering to a whisper. “It was tragic. He was only seventeen. I heard that he was a pro-rights sympathizer, and now, he’s dead.”
“I do know. He was my friend.”
“I’m sorry,” Audria said, her blue eyes rounding with worry. “Then you should know that the rumor going around is that Fordham was responsible.”
“What?” Kerrigan gasped.
“Apparently, he was the last person to see him alive.”
Kerrigan went cold. He was the last person to see him alive. But that didn’t make him Lyam’s murderer. “Fordham didn’t do it. Why would he be helping me if he killed Lyam?”
“Well, I don’t know. I don’t want to speculate.”
Except that was precisely what she was doing.
“It doesn’t make sense.”
“I’m not saying he did it,” Audria said quickly. “I’ve just… seen you two together a lot, and I was worried. I don’t want it to happen to anyone else. Just be careful.”
“Thanks,” Kerrigan said, retreating once more. This was a lot to take in. She didn’t want to think it was Fordham, but she didn’t know either. “I have to… head to bed.”
“Oh. Right. Yeah. No problem.” Audria smiled, and it was brilliant. All teeth, and her eyes glittered. There were so many layers to Audria Ather. “You know… you really do remind me of someone.”
Kerrigan shot her a pained smile and hastened out of the pool. She slid on her clothes and exited the hot springs.
A pounding began in the back of her head and was slowly spreading to her temples.
So, others saw what she and Fordham were doing, and they immediately thought the worst of him. It would be easy to do so, considering the history of the House of Shadows. But that just didn’t seem like the person she had been training with or the person who had saved her from the assassin or carried her to a healer so she didn’t bleed out.
She didn’t want to think about him betraying her. That he might be a part of all of this in some twisted way. It was possible, but her visions kept propelling them together. Even this last one with the tournament had had Fordham in it.
Gods, she needed to sleep—to really sleep. She couldn’t process all of this. She didn’t even know where to begin. Three visions in three weeks? She had no basis for what to do about any of this. She was just one person, and the visions were getting more frenetic. She needed someone to tell her what was happening. But she didn’t have anyone like that.
She straightened in the empty hallway.
Or did she?
* * *
Gelryn slumbered high above in the barely lit eaves. Kerrigan strained her neck to catch a glimpse of the fierce dragon. Even
