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“I’ve kept trees alive longer than I should have,” he says. “Knowing what to do doesn’t make me willing to do it.”

I look up at him. Which tree had he been unwilling to lose?

For once, I leave the question alone.

We turn back as the light starts to fade. At a narrow place between two trunks, Daurek stops and lets me go ahead. I pass close enough to smell cedar and the damp leaves on his shoulders.

I want to know how warm his skin would feel against my palm.

Instead, I take several sensible steps away from him.

At the bend, I glance back. White flowers are opening in Daurek’s footprints all the way along the path behind us. He looks down at them, then at me.

“Have those been following us?” I ask.

“Yes.”

“For how long?”

“Since the cultivation.”

“You might have told me.”

“I was hoping they would stop.”

I laugh. A bud opens against the bark below his throat while I’m watching.

Daurek leaves it there.

“Come on,” he says. “We’ll be late for dinner.”

This time, I stay beside him where the path allows it.

DAUREK

The guards set Surevai’s challenge stone on my table. Frost spreads beneath it, whitening the place where I usually rest my arm.

Vai has been here six mornings. I have spent part of each one keeping flowers out of the public passages, and Surevai has used the time to put his old demand in writing.

Reivaka unties the notice from the stone.

“The road?” I ask.

“And the tolls.” She passes it to me. “Karev wants to inspect the approaches in two days.”

Surevai has tried twice before to prove the Ilden cannot keep the road safe. This time he has Neimura’s marriage agreement as well as the delays. Both, he argues, show that promises made in my name cannot be trusted.

I read that sentence twice. I should have taken the seal back when Neimura first began pressing me to marry.

“How many drivers were delayed?”

“Two. Each district marked its own diversion, and both sent wagons to the same narrow approach.”

“Why wasn’t the second delay reported?”

“It was. The report is still beside your chair.”

Yesterday’s petitions lie beneath the cultivation records. I put them there before taking Vai to see the saplings. Reivaka watches while I draw the road report out.