Tempt the Stars

into his flesh. Something wild and strange and unexpected. Something I didn’t understand except as a trickle of that dark emotion I’d felt on seeing Pritkin again, trapped and coddled at his father’s court, dressed in finery he had no use for, surrounded by sleek, sterile perfection instead of his usual cheerful mess, with none of the things he loved in sight, no potions, no books, no crazy weapons for fighting the creatures that were his jailers now.
    Just a man lost and bitter and alone, in a world he hated. A man surrounded by the jealousies of a court who would happily see him dead. A man who was suffering for one reason, and one reason only.
    Because he had dared to help me.
    And suddenly, the trickle became a flood.
    “I will
take him
,” I said, knocking Rosier’s hand away, “anywhere I damned well please,
demon
!”
    “Ah, there it is,” he hissed. “
There it is!
The arrogance of the goddess. Unfortunately, you are not your mother, girl. You do not have the power to back it up. You don’t have the power to do
anything
. Why you’re not dead yet, I will never understand, but I have the strong suspicion that it has a great deal to do with bewitching my son.
    Somehow.” He looked utterly baffled. “Somehow you managed to tie him to you, to drag him into your fights, to endanger his life again and again. But no more!”
    “That’s for the council to decide.”
    “It’s not their concern!” Rosier snapped, and pulled on his son’s arm. “Any more than it is yours. Come, Emrys.”
    Pritkin didn’t move.
    His father made a disgusted sound. “You know how this will end!”
    “He doesn’t know!” I said. “None of us do, until the council rules. And my mother said—”
    “Your mother hasn’t seen the council in thousands of years! She doesn’t know anything about it! She was lying to you, girl, probably to get you to stop plaguing her life!”
    I flinched, because I’d had a similar thought myself. But I didn’t really believe it. And even if it was true, it wouldn’t change anything.
    What other choice did we have?
    “I don’t know what will happen if we go in front of the council,” I told Pritkin honestly. “But I know what will happen if you go back there, back to that life. And so do you.”
    He didn’t look at me—it was almost like he didn’t even hear me—and Rosier smiled.
    “Yes, he knows. He’ll be the prince of a great house. You would have him a pauper. He’ll rule a large court, and have influence in countless others. You would have him a servant, running your errands, cleaning up your endless debacles! I will give him a vast kingdom—what would you give him?”
    I looked up, so angry I could hardly see. “His freedom!”
    Rosier snorted out a laugh. “That hoary platitude. Sometimes I forget what a child you are.”
    “It isn’t childish to want to choose your own life!”
    “No, it’s criminally naive. The only free person is the beggar in the gutter. And he’s only free to be cuffed about by his betters. Everyone of any substance has obligations. It is time for Emrys to live up to his.”
    He pulled on his son’s arm again, and this time, it worked. Pritkin got up. And I grabbed his other arm in both of mine, because this wasn’t happening.
    “Pritkin,
please
. Mother wouldn’t have sent me here if she didn’t think there was a chance!”
    Nothing.
    “Why won’t you play for that chance?” I said, my voice rising in panic because I didn’t understand this. I didn’t understand any of this!
    “You’re better off if I don’t,” he told me, lifting his head.
    “What?” I asked incredulously. Because he looked like he meant it.
    “Finally, he comes to his senses,” Rosier said, pulling his son away, only to have Caleb step in front of him. “Have a care, war mage! I have taken no oath to spare you!”
    “Right back at you,” Caleb said, eyes steady and feet planted.
    “You’re as foolhardy as she is,” Rosier snapped. And then kept on talking, which he liked to do as much as his son didn’t. But I wasn’t listening.
    “How can you say that?” I asked Pritkin. “How can you just give up?”
    “I’m not giving up. I’m accepting reality.”
    “What reality? You
don’t
want to go back there! And I need you—”
    “You don’t, as you’ve made clear these past few days. If you can break into my father’s court, fight off the council’s own guards, force a meeting . . ” He ran a hand through his hair.