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Abby peered through the open door, at the inky darkness staring at her beyond the room. She could feel everyone's eyes on her, especially Kit's, as he anticipated her next move.

Abby too, was waiting for her next move. For her feet to listen to her brain signaling for something to happen. For one foot to kick out in front of the other and carry her towards Sebbi.

Hadn't that been how it always was? Running toward something? If that was the case, why were her legs rebelling? Why, when she had something so important waiting for her, couldn't she summon the strength to move? Why was she hesitating, fear melding her to the spot?

Something warm slid into her palm. Abby blinked. Lucy stood next to her, his hand in her own. "Take a breath."

After a beat, when Abby didn't respond, Lucy huffed. "Just do it." He pinched her knuckle, which cleared away some of Abby's funk. She exhaled.

A half-smile floated its way onto Lucy's face. "It'll be okay, alright?" He raised their intertwined hands.

Abby nodded slowly. "Yeah." It'd be alright. She needed to believe it would be.

Kit's gaze darted from Abby to Lucy. "If you are ready, Your Highness, Miss Abby, please allow me the privilege of escorting you." As he stepped through the arched doorway, he turned toward Crum. "You too, whiny one," Crum winced when Kit lanced the air with his giant claw, "come along, or you'll wind up crying and alone."

Crum did a great impression of a spider crab as he scuttled across the floor, sidling up so close to Abby their shoulders touched. Though Lucy gave the whole arrangement a raised eyebrow, he didn't speak on their proximity, or bother to wrench Abby from Crum's reach.

With both of them at her side, Abby felt herself relax into her steps, even as the eerily gold crescent moon outside continued to shine.

Their walk lasted minutes. Kit navigated down narrow corridors — abandoned and covered in dust — through huge ones lines with ornate tapestries and cascading water fountains. Tree branches and ivy from the gardens beyond the balconies wound themselves around columns and pushed through the cracks in the stone, becoming as much a part of Darkmoore's architecture as its vaulted ceilings and smooth stone walls.

Everything was as Abby remembered- cavernous, mysterious, empty. An entire town could live inside and still feel alone. She couldn't imagine what Sebbi had felt like living here. Even with the servants, the guards. His advisors. He still retired every night to this part of the castle where he more than likely roamed its halls alone.

Finally, Kit stopped in front of an enormous wood door. Abby breathed out. He nodded. "My ben'essren does not know Reven has sent me to fetch you." Abby's hold tightened around Lucy's hand. "I'll warn you, the smell is strong. Especially those with," he glanced at Abby, then Crum, "delicate senses."

Lucy pushed forward and fearlessly grabbed the doorknob. "I think we'll manage," he said, opening the door.

The room was massive. Furniture twice the size of Abby hugged the walls. A desk with a mountain of scrolls sat in the corner. A balcony at the opposite end let moonlight spill into the room, illuminating a massive bed raised at the room's center. Hanging from the bed were strange bundles of plants.

Were those what she was smelling?

A fire crackled in the hearth. In the bed, the bedsheets rose and fell. Kit pointed. "He sleeps now."

Abby nodded. She took a step deeper into the room, her slippers muffling her footfalls. She breathed deep, the air scented with smoke and some acrid, almost medicinal scent she couldn't place. Her heart clawed away at her insides, her unease refusing to settle.

Another step. Another. Noting Lucy's absence, she turned and spied him lingering in the doorway.

"Lucy?" she whispered.

He looked up at her. The smile he wore to conceal his true feelings plastered to his face. "You go first, love," he swung an arm over Crum, much to the other boy's surprise, "I'll take this one to another room," he leaned close, "I need more time."

Of course he did. If this was hard for Abby, it had to be unimaginable for Lucy. He had the same look of pleading in his eyes as he had on the porch before they left. She nodded. "Understood."

With that, Lucy, dragging Crum, softly closed the door.

Now, it was just Abby and Sebbi in a room together. So much was going on inside her mind, she had no idea what she should say first. Should she start with hello? Or should she ask if he was okay? Should she berate him for not telling her about Aelurian affairs?

No, she shook her head. She wasn't Aelurian. Sebbi didn't need to tell her anything. Still, he could have confided in her. Did he think she wouldn't be able to keep his secrets? Why, even now, was Sebbi always out of reach?

"Ugh." The bed creaked as Sebbi's mass turned over. Abby stopped dead in her track when she spied a pair of eyes staring directly at her. She gulped and lowered her hood.

Sebbi's whiskers twitched before the corner of his lip upturned. "Still," he said, breath haggard. A cloth hung across his forehead, a bowl of some darkened liquid set on a nightstand. Aelurian medicine. Sebbi's fur had become so soaked through, it clung to his skin underneath, making him less the hulking Aelurian from Abby's memory. "Hallucinating, aren't I?"

Abby jerked her head around, wondering if someone else had slunk into the room behind her. Sebbi didn't seem to direct his words at anyone. She wasn't even sure if he was registering her presence.

Then, in a moment of pure idiocy, one Poppy would have surely chided her for if she had been here, Abby pointed at herself. As if Sebbi would respond to that. As if that would somehow snap him back to his senses and make him realize she wasn't a fabrication of his mind. That she was here. That she was real.

"Sebbi," she said meekly, continuing toward him. "Sebbi, it's me."

The cat-man didn't take his eyes off her as she made her way to the side of the bed, the smell growing stronger, making her feel sure in her assessment—the smell came from the bundles of dried Aelurian herbs hung over Sebbi's bed.

Sebbi blinked, his long, Aelurian lashes taking Abby by surprise. Even her first time here, she'd never gotten up this close to Sebbi's Aelurian form. "Heh." She took a hand and brushed aside a piece of fur that had fallen over his eye. "You must really be sick, if you're letting me get this close to you."

At this, Sebbi's eyes widened. With a grunt, he forced himself into a seated position. Blankets fell from his shoulders, exposing his broad Aelurian chest. He breathed fast. Ears twitching.

He'd moved so fast to get away from her, Abby hadn't had a chance to lower her hand before he was well out of reach. Her arm occupied the same space that it had when she'd brushed aside Sebbi's fur.

"How?"

The one word snapped Abby back to the present. Throwing her arm back to her side, she took a deep, long look at Sebbi. Sure, he was sweaty, but his eyes had lost their cloudiness. He gazed at her with sharp eyes, fully aware of who she was and all he could ask was "how?" Not even Crum would gloss over a proper greeting.

And Sebbi hadn't told her anything. Not about Aelurus. Not about if he'd be going to the memorial. Of all things he could say, he chose "how?"

Abby scowled, no longer intimidated by his Aelurian form. Deep down inside it, he was still the same cat who squashed beetles and hissed with no real threat behind it. Who swatted at her, always with his claws retracted. Who had done something he hated just for her—wearing a ribbon for her birthday.

"That's all you have to say?"

Sebbi blinked.

Abby pointed to the bowl on his beside, the herbs overhead, the cloth on his forehead leaking water over his cheeks. "You haven't told me anything! Why do you always keep me at a distance?" She didn't mean for her voice to be as loud as it was, but she couldn't help the emotions she felt leaving her.

As Sebbi's mouth opened, she took a step toward him and covered it with her hand. The cat-man immediately bristled, but she kept her hand locked around that mouth of his, his wet nose tickling her skin.

"It's my turn to talk, Sebastian Dinn' Aelurus. When you didn't show up in Laos, I was disappointed. Lucy was too. We concocted a brilliant plan to get back at you. By the way, I won't tell you what it is because I'm still mad at you and might end up doing it still." Sebbi's eyes widened as her threats hit home. "And then I come home thinking you're mad at us or that you want to distance yourself further because you think something stupid like how Aelurians and humans are different and the two can't occupy the same space."

Tears pricked the corners of her eyes. "You're always, always pulling away from me. And just as I'm thinking about that, Kit comes along and tells me you've been poisoned." Her hand fell from Sebbi's hand and she slunk to his bed. Staring at her hands, she continued, "You know how worried I was?" She cast him a sideway glance. "How my heart stopped, thinking I might lose you? That on the anniversary," her vision grew blurry, "of a day when I'd already lost so much, I'd have to add your name to the list. I'd have to look up at the sky and wonder which star you were?" She hugged herself in an attempt to keep steady as anger and sadness rocked her shoulders. "It was awful."

Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a shadow moving toward her. But as quickly as it'd come, it'd disappeared, the sheets around Sebbi suddenly shifting. Had that shadow been him? His hand? If so, why had he retracted it? Why was he so infuriatingly stubborn?

"I planned on going," he said as he looked at his blankets, "but the potion was poisoned."

Abby huffed. "You've been in this kind of danger and you never bothered to tell us." She pulled her hands onto her lap and pressed them into her thighs. "You're a jerk."

"I kno--"

"No." She whirled on him with the fierceness of a storm, finger leveled at his face. "You don't get to apologize as though that will make this better. You lied to me. To Lucy. We worry about you. Lying didn't make us worry any less, it only made us angrier when the truth was revealed."

He stared at her, wide-eyed - a little terrified, a little in awe. 

Abby's breaths came in huffs. Her heart hammered in her chest. She focused on her finger and felt her former anger melting. "And now, I'm lecturing you like Mimi." Her arm fell back to her side.

Sebbi ran his claws down the blanket. "You're doing a good job. Just as scary as she was, minus the broom she used to shoo me from the kitchen."

Tears fell from Abby's eyes as she chuckled. She couldn't tell if she was happy or sad. Both, probably. "You kept knocking over the pots and licking the ham." She glanced at her shoes. "And she kept yelling at me for sneaking biscuits prior to evening tea."

"We cause a lot of trouble for the people around us."

At this, Abby turned to face Sebbi. "We trouble them, because they love us."

"Yeah," Sebbi said gruffly, his whiskers suddenly drooping. "Sur-sur—"

He rocked forward, a coughing fit overtaking him.

"Sebbi?"

"I'm—" He continued to wheeze, his chest heaving at each dry expel. Blood dribbled down his lips. "I'm fine."

Abby glanced at his fur, where bright red now dotted his chest and hands. "You're not fine at all." Sliding across the bed, she pressed her hands into Sebbi's chest and eased him against the headboard. "Here, relax."

As she moved her hands away, Sebbi caught her by the wrist. He stared into her eyes as though she would the only thing in the world that mattered. Abby's heart hammered in her chest. Heat roared up and erupted across her face. "Se-sebbi?"

His eyes scanned her for a moment, before landing on the ribbon still in her hair, though the trip through the portal had caused the rest of her hair not tied down to look like it'd been styled in a tornado. With his other hand, he leaned up, his chest so near to Abby she could smell his dander, the intimacy deepening her blush.

The ribbon slipped between his fingertips. "You still wear it." 

His words weren't directed at her, but she responded as if they had been. "Of course I do. It's my favorite."

Sebbi broke out into another coughing fit and leaned himself against the headboard. More spittle tainted red dripped down his fur and between his fingertips. Abby chewed her lower lip. He had been poisoned. Someone in Aelurus had wanted him dead, and if it hadn't been for Reven, she might have never known. Her fists began to shook. Sebbi might have died and she wouldn't have known.

"Over there—" Sebbi pointed to a dresser at the far end of the room.

Abby shot to her feet, thinking it'd be something he would need, but as she came closer, she found a small box wrapped in paper. The Aelurians had an odd way of delivering their potions.

"Open it," Sebbi said, as he ran across a hand over his face. "It's yours."

She eyed it suspiciously.

"Go on."

Abby took the package in her hands, and carefully, as if still suspicious of its contents, tore into the paper. With bated breath, she lifted the lid. A crimson ribbon sat on top of starsilk. She took it between her fingers, the texture like running water. "What are the markings?" She ran her thumb over one of the thick lines.

"Protections. I had Menna do it. It'll keep you safe."

She clutched it to her chest. "And why did you get me this?" Try as she might, she couldn't keep her smile suppressed.

Sebbi, giving his best Aelurian grin, which involved a lot more teeth and menace, leaned forward, the firelight haloing his fur, his golden eyes brighter than she'd ever seen them. "Happy birthday."

Abby's hand tightened around the ribbon as she felt all her anger from earlier disappear. "You," she wanted to say something, to continue to berate him—he'd kept so much from her, he hadn't been a no-show, he'd had her worried and nervous, thinking she'd done something wrong, and yet, the big stupid oaf had gotten her a birthday present. A shiny new ribbon, a deep red.

She could practically see Sebbi pacing back and forth as he mulled over which one would suit her best. And then, she could see him second and third guessing his choice, probably to the chagrin of those closest to him. "I can't believe—" Her shoulders slumped as she leaned against the wardrobe, defeated. "It's lovely."

Sebbi nodded. "Good." He shook his head. "I was hoping you'd like it."

Feeling the Aelurian humidity make quick work of her dry clothes, Abby took Sebbi's present and tied the rest of her hair back. She smiled as the air hit her bare neck and did a quick turn to show off the ribbon.

She had to strain to hear it, but she could swear he purred, low and soft.

Just then, the door was thrown open. Lucy, at his most Lucy, pranced into the room like he owned the place, a dazzling fixture outshining all the castle's other opulence. He stormed straight over to his brother, not bothering with Abby, Crum left abandoned in the doorway.

His face a mixture of tight lines and harsh angles, Lucy stopped in front of Sebbi and flicked his forehead, right where the crescent-shaped scar was.

Sebbi snarled. "What was that—"

"Don't," Lucy hissed. "Don't." Leaving it at that, Lucy whirled and faced Abby. "I talked things over with Kit to get a better handle on the situation since this moron," he motioned toward Sebbi who let out a low growl, "didn't bother to tell us how he was struggling to rule."

Sebbi, rubbing the spot Lucy had flicked, glanced at his bedsheets. "Don't worry about it. Ruling's just more complicated than I imagined."

"Wait," Crum interjected. "That's," he hefted a shaky finger toward Sebbi, "that's the other one? Sebbi?"

Lucy glared. "Now's not a good time." He motioned between himself and Abby. "The adults are talking now." He moved Crum toward a chair by the fire and pressed down on his shoulders. "Be a good lad. Sit over there and take a vow of silence." After watching Crum do as he was told, sitting on a low-to-the-ground Aelurian bench beside the fire, Lucy returned his attention to Abby.

"Some Moonborn houses want to ursurp brother dearest's throne here." He stalked over toward Abby, massaging his temple. "Three of them outwardly, but who knows how many support them in secret."

"Why would they oppose him?"

"Don't talk as though I'm not here." Sebbi harrumphed.

Lucy tossed a hand into the air without looking back. His anger crackling like the fire in the hearth. "I require silence from the likes of you. Besides," he shot Sebbi a sideways glower, "I suspect that'll be easy for you, since silence is how you communicate best. Keeping us in the dark," he snarled, "I've given you far too much credit. You're a greater idiot than I ever thought possible."

Abby wanted to reach out and try to calm Lucy, but she'd never seen him this furious. He could've burned her with his glower alone.

"There're issues with the Cloude and he's been ignoring the problem hoping it'll just go away. Well," he turned and locked eyes with Sebbi. Somehow, though Sebbi was the bigger, toothier creature, Lucy was the one that commanded all the power in the room, whose presence seemed to loom bigger and scarier than a full-grown Aelurian's, "how's that working for you? Got yourself poisoned and with a list of potential enemies."

A knock sounded on the other side of the door, accompanied by Kit's muffled voice. "If I may, your highnesses. I have information that might be of use."

Lucy sighed as he ran a hand through his hair. "If you've been eavesdropping the entire time, might as well come in."

The large Aelurian appeared apprehensive as he ambled into the room, tail tucked between his legs. He bowed. "We have the culprit under arrest."

The air leaked out of the room. Lucy and Abby exchanged glances. Sebbi frowned. And Crum shivered, despite being next to the fire.

"Who is it?"

Kit lowered his eyes. "His highness's friend. I believe you know her as well." Abby froze. "Margoliesse Fennick of the Cloude. They've detained her for the attempted assassination of Sebastian Dinn' Aelurus. She's to be executed tomorrow."