The guards dismount in what looks like a single choreographed motion, one stepping up to the carriage to open the door.

Cress emerges slowly, each move a deliberate show of power from the instant her heavily jeweled hand extends from the carriage, glinting in the late afternoon light. When she does finally step out, her silver silk gown pools out around her in a glittering puddle that makes her look ephemeral. She made no effort to cover the charred skin of her throat with cosmetics or cloth, instead bearing the wound with pride.

Her cold gray eyes take Heron and me in, raking over us from our heads to our feet before her mouth curves into a tight-lipped smile.

“Prince Avaric,” she says, her voice melodic but loud enough to carry over the distance that separates us. “Princess Amiza. I’m so glad that you could make the trip yourselves. How were your travels?”

She lifts her skirt and steps toward us, her two strongest guards not even a half step behind her.

I wait for Heron to speak first, but when he says nothing, I step forward and smile, holding my hand out.

“The seas are lovely this time of year,” I say, pitching my voice a few notes lower so that she doesn’t recognize it. “It was a fine voyage and quite worth it for the splendor of the Water Mine.”

Cress’s pale eyebrows arch high. “Have you already seen it, then?” she asks, looking put out. “I had hoped to show it to you myself.”

“We arrived earlier than expected,” Heron says, finding his voice. “Your men were quite hospitable. The mine is everything we hoped for and more.”

“I’m glad,” Cress says. “And as to your own part of our bargain…Are my ships waiting?”

Heron nods once. “Just off the coast. Send your men to see for themselves, if you like.”

Cress turns over her shoulder and nods at a couple of her soldiers, who quickly mount their horses once more and take off toward the coast, where they will hopefully find a fleet of ships, or rather, the illusion of one. Several of the Water Guardians we found will be on the shore to hold the illusion in place and disguise the wreckage from the real ships.

“And it will be enough to eradicate the rebels at the Fire Mine?” she asks, turning back to Heron.

Heron’s nod is jerky. “As soon as we’re done here,” he continues, saying the line we practiced. “I’ll give the order to bring them there. Between your troops and mine, I’m sure we can wipe out this infestation of rebellion once and for all.”

“I certainly hope so,” Cress says with a brittle smile. “But I’m afraid I’m finding rebellions to be like cockroaches—there are always a few survivors. Speaking of which, where are the cockroaches you brought me?”

It takes me a second to understand what—or rather, who—she’s talking about. “Ah,” I say, snapping my fingers and gesturing to the Guardians behind me.

A disguised Artemisia brings Brigitta and Laius forward, bound and gagged. Laius stumbles a bit, and I have to stop myself from cringing. Even though he wears Jian’s face now, I can almost see beneath the illusion to the boy he is, a boy making his way toward certain death. But his gaze doesn’t waver. His shoulders are square, his head held high. Still, I want to stop it, to pull him back, to call off the plan. But it is too late now. I can’t stop his sacrifice, but I can make certain it isn’t in vain.

Beside him, Brigitta eyes her daughter like she is seeing a ghost—and I suppose she is. The ghost of the child she left, the monster that girl became. Does Brigitta feel regret now, or is there only fear left?

Cress barely glances at Jian, her eyes lingering on her mother. Her smile widens and her eyes glint with cold joy as she steps toward the woman. Cress is taller than her mother by a couple of inches, and I wonder what Brigitta thinks about that, about the woman standing before her and how different she is from the small girl Brigitta left behind.

“Mother,” Cress says, reaching out to touch her mother’s cheek. Brigitta flinches from the touch, from the burning fingers that leave delicate trails of red behind on her skin. “We have so much to catch up on.”

Cress jerks her head toward the guards, and two of them step forward to pull Brigitta and Jian toward them. The guards replace the prisoners’ binds with heavy iron chains, though they keep the gags on.

“What will you do with them?” I ask her, letting my voice waver, as Amiza’s surely would.

“Some wounds are deeper than others,” Cress says, glancing at her mother one last time before looking back to us, her gaze lingering on me. “Some wounds demand to be repaid without delay, by your own hand. Surely you have some idea what I speak of.”

I do. I understand her need for vengeance so much that it frightens me, but Amiza doesn’t. Amiza doesn’t hold those sorts of grudges; she doesn’t have those sorts of wounds. Cress must realize this, because she shakes her head.

“You must think vengeance is ugly,” she says with a small smile. “I envy you that. I did, too, once. Shall I bring out the other part of our bargain?”

I struggle to hide my excitement. The other part of our bargain. I was right. There was something more to the arrangement, something worth Prince Avaric’s coming all this way personally.

Gold is of little value to the Sta’Criverans, but the Theyn had an extensive collection of art and relics that they might find valuable. Perhaps that’s it.

Cress snaps her fingers, and one of her guards opens her carriage door once more. At first nothing happens, but then the guard reaches in and roughly drags out a figure wrapped in so many chains that he can’t move so much as a finger. His hair is so matted in blood and dirt that it’s difficult to tell the color, and his face is a mottled mess of bruises and broken bones, but I still know him as surely as I know my own name.

S?ren.

The guard throws him roughly to the ground before reaching into the carriage again and pulling out another chained figure, this one slightly less roughed up, though his face is still marred by cuts and bruises, with a thick strip of white cloth tied to cover his eyes. Still, I know him right away, and with a sinking stomach, I realize why Erik hasn’t sent us a message. Suddenly it seems foolish to have expected anything else.

I told Heron that Erik was fine, that he was likely just too busy saving S?ren to write. But I must have known deep down that wasn’t the case. Seeing him now, like this, feels like a punch to my gut.

I push past the emotions, focusing on the reason. Why would Etristo want S?ren and Erik, and why would Cress be willing to give them up? The first answer comes quicker—S?ren was arrested in Sta’Crivero for murdering the Archduke. It didn’t matter that he was innocent. King Etristo believed him guilty, and that was enough to doom him to execution. The Sta’Criverans give no leeway with crimes of any kind. Etristo must have been furious when S?ren escaped. And Erik…well, maybe Etristo thinks that Erik broke S?ren out. Or maybe Erik is wanted merely because he’s Gorakian—that seemed to be crime enough in Sta’Crivero.

“Wonderful,” I manage to say, my voice coming out level. “King Etristo will be very pleased to have these criminals back in his dungeons.”

Cress’s eyes are dispassionate on S?ren and Erik before she looks back at me. “I suppose,” she says. “Though keeping them alive seems to be a waste of resources that Sta’Crivero can’t spare, if you ask me. Better to kill them now, save yourselves the trouble of carting them back. They are horribly misbehaved prisoners, in my experience. The Emperor made a deal to align Goraki with me but had the gall to try to steal Prinz S?ren the night he set foot in my palace.” She pauses, tilting her head to one side thoughtfully. “Of course, I was already planning to give him to King Etristo as a peace offering, but still, it was terribly rude.”

“I wish we didn’t have to bring them back alive,” Heron says, shaking his head. “But my father was quite insistent about it.”

Cress lets out a dramatic sigh. “I suppose I understand,” she says. “I’m sure your father is looking forward to seeing their deaths firsthand, or else he would have asked for their return to him dead or alive.”

“It is the way of Sta’Criveran justice,” I say, remembering what I was told upon first entering the city. It’s a struggle to tear my gaze away from S?ren’s and Erik’s battered forms, but I force myself to meet Cress’s cold gray gaze. “The public deaths of criminals serve as deterrents to others who think about breaking our laws.”

Cress purses her lips. “Well, then I’m sure the public deaths of a prinz and an emperor will be deterrents indeed.” She pauses a second before continuing. “There are those in my court who would still rather have a traitor prinz on their throne than a woman, those who were planning a coup to free him. I’d hoped that the Prinz and I could form an alliance, but he’s been quite stubborn about it, and if he’s not by my side, he’s a threat. I trust you will not show him any kind of mercy.”