Salt wind pressed cool against Cassandra's cheeks as the ship found its rhythm.
She leaned against the rail, cloak drawn close, the healer's bindings stiff beneath her dress. The sea stretched endless—a pale sheet under the morning sun—its breath filling the sails with a sound like thunder softened by distance.
This voyage was meant to be freedom: away from the estate, away from pitying stares and whispered judgments.
Instead, it felt like exile.
Since waking, decisions had been made for her—where she would live, what she would study, whom she would trust. Her voice, once welcome in council, had fallen quiet beneath words like recovery and safety. Even her brothers' affection felt distant now, heavy with unspoken fear.
Through it all, Leoleta's absence had been the hardest to bear.
He was more than a knight. He had been her confidant—the one who spoke plainly when others flattered, who treated her not as a noble heir but as a person with a mind worth hearing.
To wake and find him gone—to learn her escort had been reassigned without her say—felt like losing the last piece of herself still allowed to speak.
At first, she told herself he must have been wounded, or sent ahead to report. Yet days passed. No word came. And when she finally asked, her brothers' faces told her everything.
Leoleta had not been dismissed—he had been forbidden.
The Lords had placed him under review, bound by their order not to approach her, not to speak unless summoned. He had obeyed, as a knight of House Delmar must.
And though she understood the politics—the need for formality, for appearances—the knowledge hollowed her out.
He was her sworn guard, her responsibility. Even that bond had been taken from her without her consent.
She waited until evening before seeking her brothers.
Their shared cabin smelled faintly of ink and oil—maps spread across the table, candlelight pooling over shifting lines of coast and sea. Alfonse stood over a chart, posture rigid; Alistar sat at the desk with two fingers pressed to his temple.
They looked up when she entered.
"Cassandra," Alfonse said cautiously. "You should be resting."
"I've rested enough," she answered, voice even. "Now I'd like an answer."
"About what?" Alistar asked, though the weight in his tone said he knew.
"My life," she said. "And why it's being decided without me. You've arranged my departure, my courses, even my escort. The man sworn to my service has been stripped from me—without my word. Without my consent."
Alfonse set the brass compass in his hand down with care. "Leoleta is under investigation. The Lords deemed it unwise for him to remain in your service until matters are clarified."
"Clarified?" She stepped closer. "He saved my life. Does that require clarification?"
Alistar's gaze lifted, cool. "It requires discipline. Even a warlock answers to command. His failures—"
"His failures?" Her voice sharpened. "He stood between me and a summoned beast. I am alive because of him."
Silence creaked with the hull.
Alfonse spoke first, softer. "You were unconscious for days. You did not see the aftermath. There were breaches in the wards, failures in the perimeter—things that raise questions. We cannot ignore them."
"And yet you can ignore me."
"We're protecting you," Alfonse said.
"By keeping me blind?" Cassandra's composure thinned. "By silencing the one person who ever told me the truth?"
Alistar pushed back from the desk. "You think truth is owed to you in every breath? You are our sister, not our sovereign. You will learn what you need when it is time."
Her breath hitched. "And until then, I am to play the obedient ward you send where you please?"
Alfonse's expression wavered; Alistar's did not.
"The Academy is for your safety," he said. "As for Leoleta—his loyalty is not in question. But his proximity invites risk. Let him serve as escort, not confidant."
The word landed like a slap.
"You have taken everything from me but my name," she whispered. "And even that feels borrowed."
Neither answered. The candle guttered. The sea knocked faintly at the hull, a distant heartbeat.
"Cassandra—" Alfonse began.
"I know where I stand." She turned before they could see her cry.
The corridor heaved with the tide. The sea kept its rhythm—steady, indifferent—a pulse that belonged to neither of them.
She left them to their maps.
~
The ship was crowded, yet silent. Knights spoke in clipped tones, servants moved with downcast eyes, Liaerin kept near but offered only quiet company. Grief had come aboard with them; it settled in the timbers, in the wind, in her bones.
On the third day, she overheard it—
a servant's slip, quickly silenced, too late to be taken back.
Leoleta was on the ship.
The name struck like a blow.
For hours she could think of nothing else. Her ribs ached with the force of her heartbeat. He was here.
He had been near all along—yet hidden from her, as if she were a child to be protected from the sight of her own protector.
Anger rose first, hot and shaking: anger at her brothers for secrecy, at Liaerin for compliance, at him for obeying. Beneath it came relief, fierce and unsteady—he still lived, still kept vigil somewhere close. Beneath even that, a hurt she could not name: the ache of being deemed too fragile to know the truth.
At meals she promised herself she would not look for him, that she would prove she no longer needed him.
Yet her gaze drifted anyway, chasing ghosts through lanternlight and shadow.
At night she dreamed again—of fire, of blood, of a voice pulling her back from the dark. Each time she woke, the absence of that voice pressed heavier on her chest than any bandage.
On the sixth night she saw him.
The deck lay quiet, stars scattered like salt across black water. Cassandra stepped out for air, the ache in her side a dull reminder of what she had survived.
And there he was—crossing the planks with the stillness of a man who carried his duty like armor.
She froze.
His once-untamed hair was shorn close; his jaw clean, the old scar catching light. For a heartbeat she did not know him. He seemed taller, colder—an officer where once had stood her confidant.
Her breath caught. She meant to speak—but her voice faltered.
He did not see her. Or if he did, he chose silence.
He passed into shadow, the soft click of his door closing like a verdict.
Cassandra gripped the rail until her nails bit wood. Relief warred with betrayal; longing with anger. He was here—changed, unreachable—and still he would not come to her.
Sleep did not take her.
She turned in her cot, restless, replaying the sight of him: the clean line of his jaw, the restraint in his step, the distance he now held as if it were law. He had once been the only person she could speak to without fear of consequence. Now even he had joined the silence surrounding her.
By the seventh night, she could bear it no longer.
The ship slept uneasily, timbers sighing with the pull of the waves.
Cassandra waiting for her guards to change bare feet whispering over the boards. The hem of her nightdress brushed the deck; her breath sounded loud in the hush.
She had been kept apart for too long—from her choices, from her life, from him.
Tonight, she would not be denied.
She knocked on his door.