they don’t bother to look up.
When I get to the top, I balance on the lip of the roof, and a wave of vertigo hits me as I take in the scene. At first, the dark mass in front of the cathedral looks like a hive. There are so many of them that they can hardly move. Vendors put away their wares as people fill every single space of the market square. It’s as if they taste the blood in the air, the wrath that comes from a crowd this large.
From where we are, we can see everything. There’s a row of nooses that dangle in the breeze. But what my eye goes to is the thick wooden block at the center of it all, where a judge sharpens a blunt executioner’s sword.
The shock of it leaves me cold and struggling to breathe.
They’re going to behead him.
“We have to get closer!” My voice strains as I fight to be heard through the noise of the capital. I sprint and jump across the foot-long space between this roof and the next. My boots splash through murky puddles, stick to the grimy black surface. The blazing sun radiates against it, making steam rise. On the next roof, the surface is so slick, I can’t catch my footing. As I fumble, Sayida is suddenly there, holding my hand and pulling me forward. From here, we have a better view of the block.
“Wait,” Margo says, pointing to the wooden watchtower beside us. Guards have climbed it to survey the crowds. “We can’t go farther yet.”
A loud cheer goes up as the prince is announced by dozens of trumpeting horns. Common doves take flight from the streets and search for higher places to roost. It has been three days since I laid eyes on the Bloodied Prince. He’s not dressed in the sullied armor he wore in the forest.
The prince rides out on his horse. Brilliant rubies drip from his circlet and the sun catches his gold crown, creating a halo—an angel of death. He’s decked in deep red finery tailored to his large frame.
People make a path for him around the block. His steed trots back and forth, and then the Príncipe Dorado gives them a devastating smile. A smile that says he knows something the rest of us don’t. That he lied. He broke his word. What good is the word of a royal? When he rejects the executioner’s weapon for his own bejeweled broadsword, the crowd goes wild with adoration.
The disgust at the display makes my stomach roil. I taste the wretched market air and bile, but I can’t break apart yet.
“We have to go,” I say, my voice rising. I whirl on Margo. “Can you cloak me and create a diversion for us to make a run for it?”
Her eyes are glassy with tears, and a deep line cuts across her forehead. “Renata Convida, I am not that powerful.”
“You have to be,” I whimper.
There’s a loud ripple of voices down below, and automatically, we all look back to the crowd. The people below move back and forth like a tumultuous sea, churning and churning, until a hush falls over them as Dez is brought out.
Even from this distance, I can tell he’s hurt. He can barely stand on his own. Despite all of that, my body relaxes at the sight of him alive. While he’s alive, there’s still hope.
The guard who holds him is an ogre of a man, with a bald head and brown skin covered in scars and tattoos. He grips Dez around the neck with one beefy hand and parades him up and down the platform.
I want to look away. Dez would want me to look away. He wouldn’t want me seeing him like this, brought to his knees by the thing he hates the most. But I let the sight fuel my fury.
He’s pushed forward, and then the royal priest hobbles onto the platform. He holds a golden chalice and begins the blessing ceremony of the prince, his sword, and the hungry onlookers who gather at the platform edge like vultures.
I have as much time as I’ll ever get—but I have to do it. Now.
I break away from my unit, leaving them behind in a flurry of shouts. By the time I hop onto the next roof, their pleading is nothing but a distant echo. This is my mission, not theirs.
I run from one end of the roof and jump across to the next. The closer to