The warning about blue flowers earned an immediate, solemn nod from Kiva, as though Raelan had just imparted some valuable piece of survival knowledge rather than confirmed something she had already decided for herself. “Oh, absolutely. I’ve developed a very strict policy regarding suspiciously pretty plants since we last met.” Her gaze swept briefly across the surrounding landscape, narrowing at the scattered red blooms as though they, too, had personally offended her. “Actually, I think I’m expanding it to flowers in general. Pretty ones, specifically. Ugly flowers are probably fine. They’ve got nothing to prove.”

His chuckle drew her attention back toward him, and something about hearing it made the smile already threatening at the corners of her mouth settle more comfortably into place. It suited him considerably better than the expression she remembered from the clearing, when grief had hollowed something out behind those pale eyes and made a stranger’s pain feel unpleasantly familiar. This version of him was different. Lighter, perhaps, although Kiva knew better than most that appearing lighter and actually being so were entirely separate things. Still, she preferred this. She was content to leave the distinction unexplored.

Then he accused her of following him. Kiva’s mouth fell open. The expression of offense that followed was immediate, dramatic, and undermined by the amusement already shining in her eyes. “Following you?” she repeated, one forepaw lifting toward her chest as though the accusation had struck somewhere particularly tender. “All the way from the north? That is an outrageous thing to accuse someone of when we’ve only met once.”

She deadpanned and her next words were delivered with such mock seriousness that she almost lost it. “Obviously I’m stalking you.”

Her paw returned to the earth as she gave him an exceedingly serious look, although the twitch at the corner of her mouth made maintaining it increasingly difficult. “Following makes it sound accidental. Stalking implies commitment, and I would like some recognition for the amount of effort I’ve apparently put into this.” Considering she had managed to encounter the same wolf twice despite possessing very little idea of where she was going on any given day, perhaps the accusation was not unreasonable. Mythris was enormous. Kiva had spent most of her time wandering through it with the confidence of someone who refused to acknowledge that having no destination and being lost were occasionally indistinguishable circumstances.

“Although if I were following you, I’d like it formally noted that you are extremely difficult to keep track of. First more north, now all the way down here. Very inconsiderate of you,” she snorted.

Then came his introduction. Kiva had expected a name. She hadn’t expected a title, or, rather, several of them.

Her brows climbed progressively higher as Raelan continued, and by the time he dipped his head in that quietly formal bow, she was staring at him with the particular expression of someone who had just realized she may have been cheerfully insulting someone considerably more important than anticipated.

“Oh. Oh, you’re fancy.” There was no reverence in the observation whatsoever, but neither was there mockery, not really. If anything, Kiva seemed delighted by the discovery, looking him over again as though perhaps Lord Commander ought to have been visibly written somewhere across all that dark fur and she simply hadn’t noticed it before.

“Ser Raelan Whitewood, Lord Commander of Eastrenhold,” she repeated carefully, testing the collection of words before giving a quick nod. “That is significantly more impressive than what I’ve got.”

She straightened. For one ridiculous moment, Kiva attempted to arrange herself into something vaguely dignified, shoulders squared and chin lifted in an imitation of the formality he had offered her. Unfortunately, dignity had never been particularly interested in cooperating with her.

“Kiva Gaudius. Former messenger and ambassador of Wind Haven. Occasional trespasser. Apparently a wedding crasher? Suspected stalker.”

The solemnity finally cracked, laughter slipping beneath the words as she once again shook herself off. “I feel like you won that introduction.”

Although Lord Commander caught somewhere in the back of her mind after the joke had passed. It was a title that suggested responsibility. Others depending upon him, perhaps, or at least a place where he belonged strongly enough that someone had decided to give him something important to do. Eastrenhold meant nothing to her yet, another unfamiliar name to add to the increasingly ridiculous collection she had accumulated since arriving in Mythris, but she filed it away automatically. Old habits and all that. Names, territories, positions, relationships between groups; once, those things had been the bones of her work. Once, knowing them had mattered. Perhaps they could again.

Her attention returned fully to him when he called her observant, and Kiva stared for half a heartbeat before suspicion slowly crept across her features. “Observant.” She repeated the word like she was examining it for structural weaknesses, drawing it out. “That was diplomatic. On brand for what I’ve noticed about you so far.”

Her eyes narrowed further, though amusement remained visible beneath the scrutiny. “You thought of something worse first, didn’t you?” She leaned forward a little, studying him as though the answer might be hiding somewhere on his face. “Blunt? Nosy? Deeply incapable of keeping thoughts inside her own head?”

That last one received a thoughtful tilt of her head. “Um. Actually, don’t answer that.” Probably safer.

The mention of the wedding rescued him from interrogation, at least temporarily, and Kiva glanced inland again. Now that she knew what all the movement was about, the overlapping scents she had noticed earlier made considerably more sense. Wolves traveling from different corners of Mythris toward the same place, enough of them that Raelan described it as practically the entire continent migrating south. Something curious flickered across her expression.

“So you’re actually going?” she asked, looking back toward him. “To the wedding, I mean. The one you apparently think accepts random women sitting beside cliffs as invited guests.” Her mouth curved. “Because I’m starting to think you might be onto something with this wedding-crasher idea.”

She had no invitation. She didn’t know who was getting married. She didn’t know where, precisely, the wedding was being held, what groups would be attending, whether strangers were welcome, or whether showing up unannounced would result in awkward introductions or being chased halfway back across the continent. Admittedly, none of those things had ever been especially effective deterrents for Kiva. And there was something else, too, something she was considerably less willing to examine: the idea of being surrounded by wolves again. Noise. Conversation. Too many scents layered over one another, strangers coming and going, someone laughing somewhere nearby, perhaps food being passed around and stories exchanged between wolves who would wake tomorrow and continue living their perfectly ordinary lives. The thought hurt. No, the thought sounded wonderful. Kiva’s ears tipped toward Raelan.

“How opposed are you to acquiring a wedding guest? And who’s even getting married? Someone important?”