The Houses Begin to Move

Sophia's POV

The noble houses were restless.

I felt it the way you feel weather before it arrives — a shift in pressure, a change in the quality of the air, the particular unease of people who have been watching two forces build toward each other and are beginning to calculate which side of the coming collision they want to be on.

Alaric's letters had not stayed contained. Caspian had intercepted three of them, but the fourth — sent through a channel none of us had ...