I pull the thing off and stare at it.

“It’s not going to bite you.”

I don’t turn around when I hear Montes’s voice. He’ll demand attention soon enough—he always does—but I won’t give him any immediate gratification. I’ve been whittled down to petty acts of rebellion.

“How long have you been planning that?” I ask.

“The coronation? Since we returned,” he answers.

“I’m actually impressed,” I say, running my thumb over the spires of my crown. “You coordinated an entire ceremony, a feat you managed to keep me in the dark about, and you executed it all without making me look like a fool.”

I think he recognizes what I’m not saying.

You deceived me.

You made me vulnerable in a room full of wolves.

You forced my hand.

“Our enemies already recognize your position as my wife; it’s time the people recognize it as well.”

I rotate to face him. His eyes glint as he watches me. He wears a crown of his own, and the sight of it brings back all those months and years when he was just an evil so unnatural that he defied the very laws of nature. He seems just as inhuman now—just as dark, just as beautiful, just as untouchable.

I should renew that old vow and kill the king where he stands. My gun is holstered against my inner thigh. It would take seconds to pull it out, aim, and fire a lethal shot. Hit that terrible mind of his and destroy all chances of him ever being revived.

I won’t act on the fantasy. This evil man has awoken my heart. I don’t understand why or how, but he has, and even my ironclad will doesn’t stand a chance against it.

Montes strides across the room and takes the crown out of my hand. He studies it.

“Whether you like it or not,” he says, “you were always a queen. You were this morning before you woke up, you were the day I slid my ring onto your finger. You were the first time I laid eyes on you. You were queen the first time you drew blood, and the first moment you drew breath.” Very deliberately, he places the crown on my head. “The coronation makes no difference because here,” he touches my temple, “and here,” he touches my heart, “you’ve always been this way.”

He has no idea that while he waxes on about queenship, I’ve been debating whether or not I could kill him.

“I’m calling bullshit,” I say.

He laughs and extends his arm. “Come, Queen Regent, you have a coronation banquet to attend, and our child needs to eat.”

And there it is, the final nail in the coffin: he has compassion, and now we share more than just bloody, deadly love between us. We share life.

WE HEAD DOWN the hall, towards the ballroom where I first met the king. The doors leading to it are closed, but muffled conversation and laughter still filter out. I’m hit with a powerful wave of déjà vu. Not so long ago I walked down this hall with my hand tucked into the crook of another man’s arm and together we faced the same pair of closed doors. But then it was my father, and the dreaded meeting was with the king.

Now the very monster I feared is the one lending support at my side. I breathe in deeply.

“All you have to do is eat a little and nod to people you don’t know,” Montes says, misreading me. “Oh, and don’t stab anyone in the eye with the utensils.”

“Montes, I’m not going to stab anyone with anything.” That’s what my gun’s for.

We stop at the doors and wait for the guards to open them. “It’ll take an hour,” he says, “and then we’ll leave.”

The doors swing open. The moment the room comes into view, the guests fall silent even as they rise to their feet. I wonder what they see when they look at me and the king. Their nightmares swathed in silk and crowned in gold? Or are we more benign in their eyes than that? I know what I see. This place is the bastion of extravagance and corruption.

“May I now present you with Your Majesties the King and Queen Montes Lazuli, Sovereigns of the East and the West.”

Applause erupts and amidst the noise I hear shouts of “Long live the king! Long live the queen!”

Montes leads me down the stairs. As I pass by our guests, they bow.

The whole thing is more than a little unnerving.

The ballroom is now an expansive dining room. Everything that’s not gilded at least gleams. The clothing, the jewels, the candlelight, even the guests’ eyes and smiles.

There’s a table at the far end of the room and at its center are two empty seats. I just need to make it there and then converse with people I despise.

It’s times like these that I’m almost positive I somehow already died and this is my hell.

When we get to our designated table, the king pulls out my seat, just as he always insists on doing. I sit—and just about scream when I realize who is across from me.

I have died. This is hell.

“Congratulations, Your Majesty,” the Beast of the East says.

I don’t see him; I see a string of broken women.

This monster is going to die before the dinner is over.

I glare at the Beast—Alexei is far too innocent a name for this thing—until he looks away. Even that’s not good enough. I begin tracing the serrated edge of my steak knife with my finger.

I don’t care at this point that nearly a dozen cameras are capturing every second of this dinner. I’ll kill this monster where he sits, and then I will stand on his corpse and laugh.

Not five minutes after we’ve taken our seats, the waiters begin bringing out dinner. The sight and smell of all that red meat …