Xander

I pry open the shutters on my room with my fingernails, wood splintering. My neck burns, as it has since I left Finn standing in the tent.

Why did it have to be Finn? Why couldn’t it be some boy from this tiny waystation I would never see again, or some lesser noble I could intimidate into silence? Something sparked in his eyes when he saw it was me—confusion, shock, the blatant attempt to hide from himself what had occurred by accusing me of making fun of ...