Page 24 of Stars May Fall

“Hm.” She listened for a moment longer. “We survived the night too.”

I tightened my arms around her. “We did.”

“Will we always be like the birds? Will there always be night after night to anticipate and try to survive?”

I stepped back and pulled her around to me so I could see her face. It was strangely expressionless. This quiet, pensive version of my wife was the hardest to read by far. “Sophie, the whole reason we stood up to Lord Lyrason was so we could live without fear of death. I won’t let myself or my men be put in vulnerable positions ever again. We are stronger now.”

She pressed her lips together; a crease appeared in the middle of her forehead. “The king could be summoning us because he has a chance to arrest us in Adenburg. He knows he can’t reach us in Kasomere. He’ll want the power of the starstone, even if he doesn’t understand what it is.”

My heart clenched as I saw the worry in her face. “If you’re worried about this, we’ll just stay in Kasomere and refuse to follow the king. We can close our borders and shut out the world.”

Sophie looked down and closed her eyes. “Life’s not that simple, though. The people here will suffer. Families will be separated. It will be harder to trade for resources. Fenland will set embargos.”

I hated that I couldn’t take all her fear and worry away. “Still, I can make it work. Sophie, we may not have a choice. If the king tries to arrest me or you, or if he doesn’t believe us when we claim that I’ve lost the power of the starstone and demands it for himself, I’ll have no choice but to resist him here in Kasomere.”

She nodded. “If we have no other choice, then so be it. But…” she looked up at me with tenderness in her eyes. “Kasten, do you remember what you said when I asked what you’d like to happen to your father? You said you wanted to be free of him without being the cause of his death. But you also said that if you found out that he was a monster, working with Lord Lyrason to create the halfsouls, that you couldn’t let a man like that rule.”

I clenched my jaw. “That was before I almost lost you. When you were dying, Sophie, I realized the only thing that mattered was you. I won’t put your life in danger if I can avoid it.” The words came out harsher than I had intended, but she didn’t flinch.

The corners of her eyes tightened. “Do you want to know if your father played a part in orchestrating the halfsouls?”

I blew out a breath. This was the question that had been tormenting me all week. “No.” I pushed my hand through my hair. “Not anymore.”

Sophie took my hands in hers. “Is that because you fear that he is involved? And once you know for certain, you will feel likeyou should intervene? But instead—now—you want to stay here where we’re safe.”

I grimaced. “We’ve been through so much, Sophie. We’ve achieved so much. Isn’t it time somebody else worried about these things? Annabelle is determined and curious. She’ll work out what to do.” I squeezed her fingers.

Sophie frowned slightly and raised our entwined fingers to my heart. “Kasten, though I wish I could keep you all to myself here forever, you have this power inside you. This great and terrible power. You can change things that nobody else can. That is something that can’t be ignored.”

My heart rate picked up. The last of the dying light left her face shadowed. Her hair was becoming pale silver. “What do you want to do, Sophie?” Part of me dreaded her answer, yet I knew she would be right.

She took a deep breath. “You understand these matters better than me, Kasten. And I understand if the king forces our hand, we’ll become outlaws here. But so far, he hasn’t. There’s still so much information we don’t have. We don’t know if the halfsouls have been dealt with once and for all now Lord Lyrason has been exposed. We don’t know what they were for. We don’t know if the king still plans to use them. If the king is truly immoral, we need to know who we can trust and vouch for to take his place. We need to know more about Prince Stirling, Princess Annabelle, and Prince Clarence.”

As she spoke, it was as if she’d crystalized our future around us. A small smile tugged at my lips at her boldness. “Are you saying that you wish to know if the king has and is still going to use halfsouls? And if he is, you want us to lead a coup to dethrone him?”

She swallowed and let go of my hands, taking a half-step back. Her voice became more determined. “Yes. If he is going to create more of those creatures, he must be stopped. And weare in the best position to stop him. We have the power and resources.”

Her selflessness made my chest clench. I hoped she never lost this fierce ability to hope in something better.

Sophie looked down and wrung her hands. “But…he is your father. And while he has wronged you far more than me, I understand if you don’t want to challenge him. However, I also worry that if things stay unresolved, they will haunt you, no matter the distance you put between them.”

“He isnotmy father. Not since I was very young. He has long forfeited that right.” I saw how the bitterness in my voice caused Sophie’s face to become sorrowful and gave her a quick, teasing smile. “I never put you down as an orchestrator of treason, Sophie.”

She took another little step back. “Well, I…I…”

I huffed a laugh and kissed her forehead as she became flustered. “If anyone is guilty of experimenting and murdering their own people, we will make them fall. Then nobody will become halfsouls again.”

She nodded, the tension leaving her body, and a relieved smile curved her lips. Meanwhile, I could feel the tension entering mine as hundreds of scenarios played out.

“But I refuse to lose you again.”

She took my hand and looked out over the darkness of the garden with a determined expression. “You won’t.”

The strategic part of my brain was already starting to take over. We had much to do in a small amount of time, and we had few allies in Adenburg. There were hundreds of ways this could go wrong. But if we failed, we would likely only be back where we started; outlawed to Kasomere.

The sound of birdsong died, stolen by the night.

ANNABELLE

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