“Sir Daniel,” she blurted out.

“My princess,” he said, offering a quick, respectful bow. “Are you and this young lady walking alone to the South Wing at this hour? Allow me to accompany you.”

Slightly flustered, Kat thought about telling him that it was not at all necessary, when she remembered Sir Daniel was from the Westlands.

“Sir, it is well that I came upon you, because you may be able to tell us about someone,” she said.

“Anything, Your Highness.” Sir Daniel seemed pleasantly surprised; the princess had rarely exchanged a word with him before.

“You are from the Westlands, are you not, Sir Daniel?” She knew very well that he was. “Are you quite familiar with Glass-Blower’s Haven? An incident from those parts was presented at court today—”

“I know, Your Highness. I was there.”

She had known that too; Kat usually knew when Sir Daniel was around.

“Well, what do you think of the resolution of that incident?”

Sir Daniel looked genuinely confused. Kat understood his predicament—it was not the place of a knight to give the princess his opinion on the King’s decrees.

“It was very merciful of the King to pay the poor girl’s dowry,” he offered carefully.

“Well, do you know these people at all? They are from the Westlands. I know it is a vast region, but perhaps you understand their customs and can help us. I want to reach out to that poor girl and offer her another way, rather than forcing her to marry her tormentor,” Kat said quickly, hoping that Sir Daniel would not betray her confidence even if he disagreed.

“Offer her another way beyond what the court has judged?” Sir Daniel sounded skeptical. “How so, my princess?”

“This girl and her father must still be in the capital, or just about to leave. Would it be possible for you to arrange for someone to wait outside the city gates, or to search the cheapest inns in Elden’s Circle to find the pair? I can make it to the stables on the southern side if you can bring her by tonight.” Kat blurted out the plan that was forming in her head, hoping that Sir Daniel would either go along with her or burst out laughing, thinking it all a jape.

He seemed to consider the outlandish proposal for a moment, and then bowed. “I must do as the princess commands. I will go find them myself. How do I send a word to you if I succeed?”

“Light a torch at the South Stables and signal us. We will keep an eye out,” said Kat, unable to believe the knight required so little persuading.

As the knight took his leave, Kat turned to Celia. “Time to pay Chef Rosby a visit,” she said.

◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

Celia alerted Kat as soon as she caught the frantic, rhythmic sweep of a torch near the shadow of the South Stables. Kat stood ready. Dressed in the coarse wool of Celia’s garments, with heavy linen veils drawn tightly over their faces, the two women stepped into the dark.

Celia peered around every stone corner, scanning the moonlit courtyards before gesturing for Kat to follow. They moved like ghosts through the shadows, skirting the castle walls unchallenged. It was only when they finally picked their way across the cobblestones and into the damp warmth of the stables that the flickering glow of a single tallow candle offered them light.

Sir Daniel Norwood was waiting in the dim light, looking every bit the dutiful knight, though he regarded the princess with a sharp, searching intensity as she approached—as if quietly questioning the sheer madness of her scheme. Beside him stood the old tenant farmer and the little girl Kat had seen in court that morning.

“Sir Daniel, I thank you for this,” Kat said softly, her breath clouding in the cool air.

The knight nodded, his gaze still heavy with unvoiced questions. Kat chose to ignore his silent scrutiny, shifting her attention instead to the father and daughter. The girl and her father immediately dropped to their knees, bowing low into the straw, seemingly too terrified to utter a word.

Kat stepped forward and took the little girl’s hands. They were small, cold, and rough from fieldwork. “There is little time to waste, so heed my words closely,” Kat spoke in a fierce, breathless whisper. “I can offer you sanctuary within these walls as a scullery maid. I have already instructed Chef Rosby to take on a new hand upon my personal recommendation, and your wages shall be paid directly from my own purse. If you keep your head down for a few weeks and speak little of your past, no soul in this sprawling keep will recognize you. It is a path forward, should you wish to escape that brute. I shall do everything in my power to keep you safe.”

The girl remained frozen, her wide eyes fixed on the princess’s face, as if overawed by her touch. But her father found his tongue.

“Your Highness,” the old man rasped, "this misfortune has brought such great sorrow and shame upon our hearth. If Your Highness would shield my daughter under your care, it would lift a terrible burden from my back.”

“Father…” The girl’s voice finally broke, small and trembling in the darkness. “Will I never see you or mother again if I stay? What of my brothers?”

Kat’s heart wrenched. It was a cruel trap. Even if the girl accepted her sanctuary, the cost was total banishment from everything she knew, forced to live under a false name just to buy her freedom.

“Mili, you will fare better here than beneath the roof of that beast Corin,” her father urged gently, though heavy tears now rolled down his own weathered cheeks.

Kat suppressed a sigh, looking between them. “How much longer will you stay in the capital?”

“We depart at first light, Princess.”

“Should you find your resolve by dawn, my offer remains,” Kat said. She turned to Celia, knowing it would take only a single silver coin from her purse for the maid to secure the watchman’s silence. “You need only come to the castle gates and ask for Celia. Sir Daniel, if you would please escort them back to their hostelry…”

“As you command, Princess,” the knight replied coolly.

Kat bade a quiet farewell to the knight, the farmer, and little Mili before turning back toward the stone keep. She had assumed the girl would eagerly embrace the chance to flee her tormentor. But perhaps her father had voiced a truth Kat had overlooked in her righteous anger: she had not truly weighed the agony of a child losing her home, her mother, and the quiet comfort of well-trodden lands where she had always expected to live out her days.

Kat spent the following day in a state of restless agitation, a volume on parasites of the stomach sitting forgotten in her lap, until Celia finally slipped into her chambers with a breathless smile. Little Mili had indeed arrived at the gates. Perhaps her father’s practical wisdom had prevailed over her grief, or perhaps the sheer dread of Corin had spurred her steps; regardless, she was safe within the castle walls, prepared to take up her place in the kitchens.

Kat immediately issued strict directives to her maid regarding the child’s care, decreeing that she must be spared from labor for her first few weeks.

“She shall share your own quarters, Celia,” Kat instructed, “so that any courtier who might have marked her tearful face in the Great Hall has ample time to forget her features. See to it that she is well sheltered, and do what you can to lift her flagging spirits.”

To secure the girl’s long-term safety, a careful web of deception had to be spun. Through Sir Daniel, Kat dispatched swift instructions to Mili’s father. He was to journey back to the Westlands with all possible haste, taking care to remain unrecognized. On his road home, he was to pause at a crossroads parish between the capital and Glass-Blower’s Haven to report to the local wardens that his daughter had vanished along the highway. Upon returning to his village, he would maintain the grim fiction with his neighbors and family.

The greatest threat remained Corin, who would undoubtedly rage across the province in search of his missing bride and the fifteen silver pieces promised by the King. Yet, so long as Mili remained hidden deep within the shadow of the royal towers, the brute could do her no harm.

In orchestrating these clandestine arrangements, Kat found herself requiring several secret consultations with Sir Daniel Norwood.

What began as a practical necessity, however, quickly shifted into something far warmer. She felt her heart quickening at the prospect of these brief encounters in the quiet corridors, her thoughts frequently wandering to the earnestness with which he carried out her instructions.

And, from the way the knight observed her with complete attention, his face sometimes involuntarily curling into a smile—flashing that dimple—as she went into rather outlandish details of her elaborate scheme, she privately suspected that he looked forward to their meetings as well.