NERU

  The morning air was a bit sharper than Neru expected. Cold enough to sting, but clean — blessedly clean — washing the last traces of dream-dust from her lungs.

  The Seekers mounted their horses without looking at her. When they talked, it was in low voices, and always about the mission.

  Good. Distance suited her.

  It spared her the trouble of pretending this new alliance was anything but temporary.

  Tarth grumbled behind her, rubbing his wrists and muttering threats he lacked the courage to act on. She ignored him. The real problem rode at her right, hands bandaged, jaw rigid, eyes fixed forward.

  Neru let her gaze flick sideways, studying Elios from the corner of her eye. He was a little angry with her, she knew, but that wasn’t what unsettled her. Anger was predictable. But the man controlled it too well, she could only catch it from his breath.

  After a while, he broke the silence.

  “Today we’ll ride without camping. Can you do it?”

  “You’ll have no delays from me,” Neru said, tightening her cloak. “The sooner we reach the Tower, the better.”

  A branch cracked under Tarth’s horse. The man grumbled. “More rushing into doom.”

  She almost smiled. “The way I see it, you fit this work more than anyone here, Tarth. We might need to do some illegal stuff later.”

  “Damn you, woman,” he snapped, “I wanted out. I tried so hard just to get here. And now you dragged me right back.”

  Neru let the complaint fade behind them. Her focus was shifting already. Ahead, the horizon swelled— gray, immense. The Tower waited somewhere inside that light.

  Just like Elios, Neru didn’t really enjoy the company.

  If Blackfeet could see her now, he would call her soft. Reckless, even.

  Her father would have said nothing, just given her that long, sorrowful stare that meant You know better.

  But did she?

  Her fingers brushed the hilt of her dagger. The blade felt colder than the wind.

  When this all ends, must I use this on them?

  These two Veyrans, for better or worse, would walk with her until the moment she no longer needed their steps beside hers anymore.

  Elios’s horse drew a little ahead, and he spoke without looking back.

  “When we reach Lord Viltar, let me speak. He won’t trust you.”

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  Neru snorted softly. “I wasn’t expecting the welcome, Seeker. I know what I am to your people.”

  “A threat,” he said plainly.

  She met his face with a thin smile. “We understand each other.”

  But he didn’t see what she saw — the way his shoulders tightened when he said Viltar’s name, like a man reaching toward a higher ground he hoped still existed.

  The path thickened with city-made cobbles. It bent toward the river, and Neru let her horse lengthen its stride. The Tower loomed on the horizon, only half a day of riding ahead. There lay the center of everything she needed to know — and everything she feared might be true.

  The closer they got to it, the more pressing Elios became, as if he hoped the pressure from the Tower would loosen her guard. He shared his theories about the case with her and observed her reactions. And each time he turned that quiet, dissecting gaze on her, she felt the faintest jolt of irritation.

  No man had ever looked at her like that, not even Frothena masters who trained her. They looked at the result. Elios looked for the stories behind it.

  Perceptive. Annoying, even.

  However, that was nothing she couldn’t handle. Most of what she had told him was the truth anyway, so she didn’t mind him double-checking it.

  They stopped only once to water the horses. Elios took the time to study a gold shard of drovar dust from Tarth's pocket under the sunlight. His fingers hovered over it like a scholar.

  “You won’t tell me how you knew about this thing’s application to meteorite steel, will you?” He asked, without looking at her.

  “I’m a Frothena,” Neru mocked his voice from earlier. “Of course, I knew more about it than a Veyran.”

  “If it’s something most Frothena know, I would know it too,” Elios said flatly.

  How arrogant.

  She replied with an amused tone.

  “My whole mission is about this substance. Don’t you think I would be more informed than normal people?”

  “As a Seeker, I know how it's done,” he said, brushing dirt from the fragment. “You might learn what it looks like, how it smells, what it feels like. Maybe some alchemy. But not this.”

  “What’s your point exactly?” she asked.

  “It’s exclusive knowledge. Whoever sent you would never have given you such an unrelated, yet so important piece of information like that, unless you mattered more than you claimed.”

  Not bad.

  Neru hadn’t thought about it that way.

  “You think I lied?”

  Elios inhaled softly — not offended, just… deeply thinking. Rare, for a man who could break a skull with a single kick.

  Finally, he shook his head.

  “No,” he said. “You told me I could verify it in the Tower. You wouldn’t say that if you were lying.”

  “What’s this about, then?” Neru tilted her head.

  “You said your personal identity didn’t matter. I think it does.”

  Elios stood up and tossed the fragment back to Tarth. “You're someone crucial in that operation, aren't you? We need to get that clear.”

  The truth was, she had acquired that knowledge from her father. However, under no circumstances did she want to get him involved in this.

  Neru laughed lightly. “Oh. No wonder you studied me so much in the last hour. Me being a merchant can’t explain all that?”

  Elios just stared at her silently.

  Neru gave a short nod, then laughed. If he wanted the truth, she would give him the truth.

  “Fine. You guessed half-right. I indeed know someone important among the smugglers.”

  Elios’ gaze sharpened.

  “And you didn’t mention it because?”

  Neru clicked her tongue reluctantly, her thumb tapping the handle of her dagger.

  “Because…he’s my betrothed.”

  Silence.

  “I’m here to kill him.”