I close my bloody fingers in the crush of leather and suede, hoping to brush against hers, but she’s already let go.

Nolla Verin is watching me very carefully.

I force myself to keep my eyes on my people, still blocked by the guards. The brief kiss I shared with Lia Mara seems to have happened days ago. Months ago. A lifetime ago. Now I’m covered in gore, a pure spectacle in front of strangers.

“Let my people go,” I say, and somehow my voice is level. “We will return to our rooms.”

Karis Luran nods, and the guards part. Tycho rushes to my side. Noah moves to Jake’s.

I don’t want to drag Iisak by the chain, but he hasn’t moved from the shadows. I can no longer read his expression, and at this point, my nerves are too edged to care. I wrap the chain around my hand, offer a bow to Karis Luran, and start walking.

He follows willingly. I want nothing more than to drop this chain, but I’m worried someone else will pick it up.

As we leave the room, Karis Luran is speaking to her guards. “Take Parrish to the dungeon. Take his eye for good this time.”

Lia Mara screams. “No! Mother—no!”

My steps freeze.

“No.” Jake’s hand finds my shoulder, and he gives me a good shove. “Keep walking.”

I don’t move. My jaw is clenched tight. I try to turn.

Jake gives me another shove. His voice sounds like I feel, quick and rushed and panicked—but he’s steadfast. “He’s alive. You saved his life. You gained ground today. You can’t lose it now. Walk, Grey. Walk.”

My feet refuse to move. We’re still visible from the doorway. I have no doubt Karis Luran gave her order just now to undermine me, to send some kind of message to her daughter.

Inside the room, the man screams. I wonder if they are doing it right there.

My chest is tight, and I know they’re doing it right there.

I try to shove past Jake. “I didn’t save him for her to torture him.”

Iisak hisses. “She will demand my return. She will likely have me do worse.”

That makes me stop. I run a hand across my jaw. Lia Mara’s screaming is etched in my brain now. So is the man’s.

“It’s just an eye,” says Jake.

“I hate this,” Noah mutters.

Me too.

Tycho takes hold of the chain. He’s possibly the only person I would allow to take it from my hand, so I release it. His eyes are dark and troubled again.

“Iisak is my friend,” he says. He wets his trembling lips and glances at Jake. “And it is just an eye.”

This is no choice at all.

Silver hell. I set my jaw and start walking.

The screaming echoes behind us long after we reach our chambers and lock the doors.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

LIA MARA

Mother strides into my room hours later. It’s late enough that I should be asleep, but I knew she would be coming, so I haven’t even dressed for bed. Her personal guard is with her, looking so fierce and punishing that I wonder if she’s going to have me killed right here in my chambers. I leap to my feet and back away before I realize what I’m doing.

“Mother,” I whisper.

Parrish’s blood stains her robes, and there’s a streak of it on her face, with more on her hands.

I have no doubt she’s aware of every stain, and she wore them here just for me.

“Do you seek to undermine me?” she demands. “Or is this simple envy for your sister?”

“It’s not—I’m not—Nolla Verin—”

“Do you have any idea what is at stake, Lia Mara?” she says. “Have you no consideration for how important this alliance is?”

“Yes.” I swallow. “I do.”

“Then explain to me why you would be wearing his clothing in front of every Royal House in the palace?”

“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I’m sorry.”

She steps close to me. “You will make no further apologies. You will make no further mistakes. We have the heir, and the Royal Houses have pledged their funds. Tomorrow, I will seal an alliance with this man, and he will lead our people to claim his throne in Emberfall. You will remain here until then.”

She turns to leave, her robes swirling in her wake.

I rush to follow her, but her guards step in front of me, and I’m drawn up short. My heart pounds in my chest. Mother has never turned her guards against me.

Once they’re through the door, I cannot breathe. It latches heavily behind them.

My sister. I must speak with my sister.

I count to ten. To twenty. To one hundred. I count until my mother and her guards will be gone.

I fly to the door and throw it open. A guard swivels to block me. Instead of Bea and Conys, I find myself face-to-face with Parrish. His missing eye has been stitched closed. He’s pale but steady, a staff in his hand to bar my way.

I gasp and stumble back. “Parrish—Parrish, please. I have wanted to talk to you so badly—”

His voice is cold, not revealing even a glimpse of the guard who once shared a shred of humor with me. “The queen has ordered that you will not leave this room.”

This is the final blow. My mother has put him here as a reminder for me that my actions have consequences. That my actions have caused nothing but harm.

I’m staring the result right in the face. Parrish’s other eye is clouded with pain and anger and regret.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper.

He says nothing.

I have nothing to offer.

I reach out and close the door. I got just what I wanted: I’m alone in my room.

CHAPTER FORTY

GREY

Iisak refuses to allow me to remove the chain. I refuse to send him back to the dungeon, and I refuse to tether him in my chambers. He dragged the rattling links around the stone floor for hours until I threatened to hang him with it if he didn’t stop pacing. My mood is bitter and recalcitrant, and I want nothing more than to sit in front of the fire to reevaluate every choice I’ve made since the moment Dustan appeared in the arena at Worwick’s.

Instead, I’m staring at the fire, thinking of Lia Mara. I wish I hadn’t given her my jacket. I wish I hadn’t endangered her. I wish I hadn’t—

“You seem unsettled, Your Highness.”

I glance at Iisak. He’s crouched in the darkest corner of the room, as far from the fire as possible, his eyes glittering black.

“Stop calling me that,” I snap.

“I believe you should get used to it.”

Silver hell. I run my hands back through my hair.

“What bothers you more?” says Iisak. “The man who lost an eye or our troubled princess?”

“Can they not both bother me?”

“For certain.”

I ordered him to stop pacing, but now he’s too still. Too calm. “What if she had told you to harm me instead of that man? Would you so quickly have bared your claws?”

“Yes.”

He answers so swiftly that it broadens my fury. I clench my teeth and wish I had asked for anything other than his freedom.

“I have already bared my claws to you,” he says. “You healed the damage within seconds. Why would I risk her wrath and refuse her order?”