There was nothing she could do to help him now. Whatever the outcome of the Game of Three Questions, her part in this was over. She squeezed her eyes shut against the sense of loss. When she opened them, she found Lightborn looking at her, his blue eyes like pale sapphires in the morning light. “I did not think to see you so detached,” he said, a wrinkle forming between his platinum brows. Cassandra blinked, surprised; detached was the very last thing she felt. But then, nothing was easier than the appearance of calm. You only had to be very, very still. And of course she would seem detached; that was what stillness looked like. “It’s a human thing,” she said. “They learn how to stand apart, watch, and wait.” Riders rarely stood apart, literally or figuratively, though she hadn’t noticed this until she was in the Shadowlands, among humans. As Travelers—what humans used to call Trouping Faerie, Riders were usually with their fara’ip. The custom of the troop, the fara’ip, had grown so strong that for many among the Riders it had gained the force of instinct. It was not the practice among Riders to seek solitude, she knew, quite the contrary.
