Sharing a bed was not in the cards for Sam and Braeden, not this night. The forgotten kiss that could not be forgotten stood between them like an invisible elephant, and the pallet was scarcely large enough to fit one body, let alone three. After a brief argument, Sam took the floor, and Braeden the bed. He was the wounded one, after all, and needed rest far more than she. She wouldn’t take no for an answer.

The floor was hard and cold beneath her, and every time she shifted, a new piece of straw tickled her nose or feet or back. She wrapped a thin sheet around her, but it provided little comfort. It shouldn’t have mattered--with the marathon of events they’d had over the past few days, she should have been able to sleep standing up.

But she was too rattled to sleep. Ever since Braeden discovered who she was, she’d been off balance, unsure of how to act now that her two worlds had collided. She didn’t know how to be Paladin trainee Sam and Lady Samantha simultaneously. Sam had thought she’d left Lady Samantha behind for good when she joined the Paladins. She didn’t want to be a lady, she wanted to be a Paladin. And Paladins had no business going around kissing other Paladins. Not for any reason.

Braeden’s voice echoed inside her head. Why? Why did she kiss him? Even when Lady Samantha was her only identity, she hadn’t been much of a romantic. She’d harbored a tendre or two over the years, but never had she acted on it. She hadn’t been the sort to pine over men or flirt or gossip with her friends about the fine turn of a man’s calves. Then again, she hadn’t had many friends to gossip with had she wanted to. From the cradle she’d been taught not to befriend the people of Haywood but to rule them. She was close with no one but her servants, and they were paid to like her.

Until Braeden.

At the thought of his name, a fresh pang shot through her chest. When she’d touched her lips to his, she’d crossed some murky line, trespassing into new territory that she wasn’t ready for, now or maybe ever. Their kiss had been wonderful and frightening and seductive, but it changed things between them irrevocably. Could a friendship survive such a kiss? They couldn’t do it again, that much was certain. For the sake of their friendship and Sam’s future with the Paladins. She’d made a choice when she’d discarded her life at Haywood for the Paladins. Lady Samantha might have loved a man, but Paladin Sam never could.

Sleep did come eventually, or it must have, for she closed her eyes in darkness and opened them again in candlelight. She blinked, pupils adjusting. Tristan’s face blurred above hers and then sharpened. “Morning,” he said.

“Urgh,” she grunted, not yet able to form coherent words. She arched her back against the hard floor, stretching, and then forced herself upright. Her eyes shifted right, to Braeden’s empty pallet. “Where is Braeden?”

“With Asa, in surgery, I suspect.”

Sam bolted to her feet. “Why didn’t anyone wake me?” She moved for the door.

Tristan grabbed her arm, halting her in her tracks. “Braeden wanted to let you sleep. He said this was something he needed to do on his own.”

“Oh,” she said. She was strangely hurt by that. It felt like a personal blow, especially after last night, like Braeden was excluding her from his life.

“He’ll be fine,” said Tristan, mistaking her somber expression for worry over Braeden’s wellbeing. She should be worried--and she was, a good deal--not fretting over some perceived slight. “It’s a quick, easy surgery. Asa said Braeden would be patched up in time for breakfast.”

“Good,” Sam said absently, surveying the destruction they had wrought to the small room. She couldn’t wait to get out of there, to put the evening behind her.

“Impressive, isn’t it?” Tristan said dryly. “I’ve already remunerated Master Byrd for the damages. Cost me a pretty penny.”

Sam reddened. “Last night was…not intentional.”

Tristan’s face softened. “I know.” Then he grinned. “To be honest, I was far more reckless when I was a trainee, and for less reason. Most of the time there wasn’t a reason, other than my own amusement.”

“I’m not much for rule-breaking,” Sam said. It was true, if you didn’t count pretending to be a man.

Tristan snorted. “I’d hardly call you obedient. Have you ever accepted an order without protest?”

Sam sniffed. “I don’t disobey your orders. I just vocalize my grievances.”

Tristan’s rejoinder to that was simply to laugh. “Come on, let’s head to breakfast. Surely you can find no grievance with that.”

“Only that I have to share it with you,” Sam said with syrupy sweetness.

Breakfast was an elaborate affair: the usual bread and cheese accompanied by a rich, creamy butter, salted fish and a chine of beef. It was a meal Sam would expect to see on her father’s dining table, not in some backwater inn. She bit into a piece of heavily buttered bread, her eyes fluttering closed as the golden, flaky crust melted in her mouth. Pure heaven.

Tristan was staring at her. “What?” she asked.

“Your expression…” he said, pink tingeing his cheeks. “Never mind. Ah, here’s Braeden.”

Braeden stood at the entrance to the tavern, light and shadow playing across his face, accenting the sharp angles. He searched the room, his eyes landing on Sam’s. After a tension-filled moment, Sam looked away, her gaze falling to his shoulders. His left hand was wrapped around his upper right arm, holding it gingerly. So he had done it, then.

Tristan waved Braeden over. “How did it go?” he asked as Braeden pulled out a chair from their table.

“Fine,” said Braeden. “The surgeon said that with the way my body heals, my arm should be fully mobile by tomorrow.”

Tristan whistled. “Gods, that’s incredible. You’re a lucky man, Braeden.” Braeden gave him a flat look, and Tristan coughed awkwardly. “Well, I do envy your healing ability. The last time I was seriously injured, I was bedridden for a fortnight.”

“What about your tattoo?” Sam asked, her voice rusty.

“Damaged beyond repair,” Braeden said, pushing back his right sleeve to reveal thick white bandages. His eyes met hers again, drinking her in. “I’ll learn to live without it.”

Sam wasn’t sure if he was talking about his tattoo or something else, but she nodded anyway. “That’s good.”

“Can you ride?” asked Tristan. “I was hoping to leave Pirama today, but we can delay our departure until tomorrow if necessary.”

Braeden said, “I should be fine to ride, so long as I’m careful with my arm.”

“And if a demon attacks?” Sam asked sharply.

A dagger appeared in Braeden’s left hand, twirling around his fingertips. “I have another arm.”

Sam shook her head, but Tristan seemed pleased enough by his answer. “Let’s finish our meals and pack quickly, then,” he said. “I’m eager to put Pirama behind us. Too little sunlight.”

Indeed, the inn was buried so deep into the mountains that it was next to impossible to tell day from night. When they finally departed The Brass Monkey a short while later, the sun was almost too bright. Sam felt raw and exposed beneath the sun’s penetrating rays.

Tristan kicked his horse into a lope, and Sam and Braeden kept apace. Braeden guided his horse expertly with his thighs, his reins sitting unused in his lap. “Now he’s just showing off,” Sam whispered into her horse’s ear. The piebald whinnied in agreement.

Tristan pulled his mare to a stop at the bottom of the mountain pass where they had fought alongside the Uriel. He dismounted and retrieved a shortsword and scabbard from his pack. He handed it to Sam. “Just in case,” he said. “I’m not sure what sort of reception we’ll get in Luca.”

Sam looked up at the peaked massifs in the distance, their tops dusted with snow. “Luca is through here?” she asked.

“Aye,” Tristan said. “Where Pirama was built into the mountains, Luca was built atop them. Only the most stalwart of men travel to and from the city.”

“Why did the Uriel set up their base there, if traveling is so difficult?” Sam asked.

Braeden brought his horse beside hers. “It sends a message.”

“It sounds like cutting off the nose to spite the face to me,” Sam said, wrinkling her own nose. Those snowy peaks looked cold.

Tristan shrugged. “Who knows why the Uriel do anything? Perhaps a trip to Luca will enlighten us.”

“You decided to meet with Sander, then?” asked Sam.

“Still to be determined,” Tristan replied. “I sent off a letter to the High Commander last night. We’ll see what he says.”

“How will he reach us in Luca?”

Tristan frowned at her, as though it were obvious. “He’s the High Commander.”

As Tristan had warned, the road to Luca was not an easy one. The mountain was impossibly steep in parts, and their horses tired quickly, so they had to break at regular intervals to allow the animals to recover. The terrain varied greatly, too--a meadow of brilliantly colored wildflowers would be followed by a field of snow. The snow fields were dangerous, according to Tristan, because rivers flowed beneath them, and it was hard to tell whether the snow had solidified enough to support their weight. He made them cross by foot, afraid that the combined weight of horse and man would send them plunging into the icy waters below. Sam skidded and slid her way through the snow, falling more times than she cared to admit.

The undulating crests and dips of the mountain path made it difficult to gauge their progress. They’d climb uphill for what seemed like forever, only to descend the same distance after they reached the summit. The trail was narrow and slippery--from melted snow or rain, Sam didn’t know--and her heart stopped every time the horses’ hooves slipped in the loose gravel.

But it was beautiful in the mountains, too. There were delicate flowers so blue they seemed artificial, and the uninterrupted vistas of lofty, gray bluffs against sky must have been painted by the gods themselves. At one point, they paused just to watch an ice avalanche roll down the mountain slope. The avalanche was more than a mile away, but it was close enough that they could see and hear the ice separate from the glacier and fall in crystallized shards to the ground below. It was both awe-inspiring and terrifying.

When the sky turned orange as the sun ducked below the mountaintops, Sam resigned herself to a cold night beneath the stars. Tristan, however, had other ideas. “Just a little bit further,” he urged, stroking his horse’s mane.

He led them off trail through untamed brush and uneven earth, until at last an opening appeared in the narrowly packed trees. A small wood hut stood in the clearing, unsophisticated but well-kept. “We’ll stay here for the night,” Tristan said, leaping off his horse.

Braeden and Sam followed Tristan into the small hut. It was surprisingly spacious and warm, though Sam could hear the wind beating against the roof. “How did you know about this place?” she asked.

Tristan spread out a blanket onto the musty floor and lay on top of it. “I stayed here once before, many years ago. I wasn’t sure it would still be here.”

Sam pulled out another blanket and claimed the space at the back wall, as far from Tristan and Braeden as possible. “What were you doing in the Elurra mountains?”

Tristan took a long time to respond. “Running away,” he said, a muscle in his jaw ticking.

From what? was on the tip of her tongue to ask, but she sensed that Tristan didn’t want to be pushed, not about this. So she asked instead, “You’re from the West, aren’t you? Did you grow up near Luca?”

His jaw tightened. “Nay, further west. In Finchold.”

That took Sam by surprise. Finchold was almost as uninhabitable as the Diamond Coast. “That’s, uh…” she struggled to find adequate words. “How long did you live there?”

“Fifteen years,” Tristan gritted out, his face a dark cloud.

She opened her mouth to ask another question, but Braeden caught her eyes and shook his head slightly. “Sorry I asked,” she muttered.

Tristan sighed. “Don’t apologize. I’m sorry I snapped. I don’t like talking about Finchold, that’s all. We’ll pass through it eventually, anyway. We’ll have to in order to get to the Diamond Coast.”

Sam bit back her curiosity. Tristan was the one of them without secrets, the unflappable one, the one without a chink in his armor. What kind of sordid past could he possibly want to hide? She recalled the priest of Cissonius’ words: For all your bluster, Paladin, you suffer still. She had half-ignored the priest at the time, but now she wondered if he had truly known something.

The conversation turned to more innocuous topics for the remainder of the evening, and they went to bed as soon as the sky faded to black. “We’ll be in Luca tomorrow,” Tristan told them on a yawn. “Sleep well. You're going to need it.”