Sir Caelan had broken a man's knee two months ago, and if it happened again tomorrow, he wouldn't stop himself. No one in the palace knew it was him.
Below the colonnade, cadets ran drills, wooden blades cracking in rhythm, dust rising with every step. He watched Halric laugh with two kitchen girls by the well, easy and untouched, like his leg had never buckled under a strike that came from nowhere on a moonless night. Caelan had put it there. He still didn't feel sorry.
Then a door opened across the yard, and every other thought went quiet.
Seraphine. The king's only daughter, the reason he'd broken every rule he'd sworn to keep. She was staring at a letter, shoulders dropped low the way they did when she was scared. He crossed the yard before he'd decided to move.
“Sera.” Her name, the way only he said it.
She looked up. “My father's chosen someone. Prince Adrien. He announces it tomorrow.”
Caelan didn't move. “When does he arrive?”
“Three days. There's a ball. Father wants me on his arm all night.”
His hand went white around the hilt at his hip. “If he puts his hands on you, I won't ask twice before I put a blade through them.”
“Don't,” she said, catching the look in his eyes. “I need you here. Not gone behind your eyes. Not like after the feast.”
He said nothing. There was no version of the truth that wouldn't frighten her — that he hadn't disappeared that night, he'd found Halric in the east corridor and made sure his hand remembered what it did.
“Three days isn't much time,” he said instead.
“It's enough. If we finally do it.” The fear in her face hardened into the stubbornness that had carried them three years — stolen minutes, locked doors, near misses that should have ended them both. “We said we'd know when it was time.”
“And this is it?”
“If I don't leave before that ball, I'm never leaving at all.”
“Then it's already decided.” Caelan's voice dropped, low and certain. “I've had a way out mapped since spring — a cart at the east gate, a captain at the border who owes me his life. If you walk, you walk. If someone tries to stop you, I carry you out over my shoulder. Either way, you're not spending one night as his.”
Her breath caught — not fear this time.
Neither of them noticed the maid in the doorway.
Mirelle stood with folded linens in her arms, and she hadn't moved in almost a minute. She'd heard every word — the ball, the escape, the east gate, all of it.
She didn't move to leave. She only smiled, small and slow, and thought of exactly who in this palace would pay to know a princess planned to vanish before her own wedding.
By morning, someone would know. She just hadn't decided who yet — and she meant to enjoy every second of choosing.