what they'd told me, or at least, more than I believed my own family.
"It's not necessary," I called to the handler over my shoulder.
I arranged my plentiful skirts around my legs and squeezed gently, coaxing the gelding into a trot. Thao joined us, loping along before rising back up into the mountainside. Wendell's smile was tilted up as I passed the carriage and driver, taking in deep lungfuls of fresh air. I'd seen paintings of the northern terrain of Kimmery around the castle, including depictions of the Winter Palace, but my mother had never wanted to leave the south. I wondered now if that neglect on visiting the north was intentional.
The rocky hills rising up around us were lush with greenery, still ripe with Kimmery's long summers. I'd known rich, manicured gardens my entire life, and a little of forests when Mother wanted a royal hunt or picnic, but I'd never been anywhere so wild or with such a sense of the unknown. In the south, I could see for miles out my window, into the sea on one side over the castle, or over the villages and into the woods from the other. Here the hills hid what was over the next bend, like tempting secrets to tease me.
"I never realized what a long journey it was," I said, urging my horse up to ride alongside Aric.
He startled in his seat, and I smothered my laugh as I realized I'd caught him sleeping in his saddle.
"How long did you think three hundred miles would take?" Aric grunted.
My teeth clenched, and I fixed my eyes to the curling road ahead of us, two royal guards at the lead.
"I think we both know by now that my education has lacked a great deal of value," I said.
Aric groaned and stretched in the saddle, back cracking as he twisted. My own bottom was already sore from the carriage ride, and I couldn't imagine how his felt from riding for over a day. If I wasn't perfectly aware of how it would slow us down, I might've asked to walk on my own for a few miles, but I didn't want to be more of an inconvenience to the small collection of guards and staff or my Chosen than I already was.
"You have the ambition to learn, at least," Aric said, grudgingly and quiet. "And you appear to see things for what they are."
"Be careful, you're getting complimentary," I said, delighted to see his lips twitch.
"Princess, I promise to never compliment you where you don't deserve it," Aric said with a mocking kind of regality. "And to always tell you when I think you're doing a piss poor job."
We rode alongside one another, and it was the most companionable time I'd spent with Aric since he'd held me while I'd broken down on the night of my choosing.
He'd smelled like pipe smoke and plums that night, and no one had ever held me in such a way before. Not since I was a little girl at least. There was a complicated push and pull between us. I desperately wanted to prove myself to him, which I found equally and deeply irritating. And at the same time, I craved that brief softness he'd shown me. How could I show him my own strength when I wanted just as badly to have him scoop me up against his chest again?
"If you lack the Hunger, you may be the best ruler this country could see," Aric said. "You'd actually be focused on your people instead of your—" And then he stopped himself abruptly and cleared his throat.
I glanced at him, eyeing the flush spreading over his cheeks that he steadfastly ignored. A sharp pang struck me low in the belly, and I nearly swayed on my horse before whipping my stare away.
I did lack the Hunger…didn't I?
We reached the edges of the northern city Rumsbrooke at nightfall. I'd napped in the carriage while the others rode the horses during the afternoon, and then returned to my gray gelding as the sun set.
If I'd hoped to see Rumsbrooke as an improvement on the crumbling towns between here and the sea, I was disappointed. The city was large and contained in an old stone wall that was giving away beneath dense vines. Even from outside, the scent of decay was on the air.
"I leave you here. You're only an hour's ride from the Winter Palace," Aric said, turning his horse away from our caravan. "If you make it