I wrench my arm out of Dragonsbane’s grip and move toward him, horror coursing through me as the Archduke’s skin takes on a purple tint. I feel like I’m walking through a dream, my mind unable to comprehend what is happening right before my eyes.

“Theo,” a voice says, cutting through the fog. Erik steps in front of me, blocking the Archduke from my sight. He grips my shoulders, giving me a gentle shake, but I barely feel it. I barely feel anything at all. “Theo, you need to leave. It’s poison and there may be more. The wine—did you drink it?

I find my voice. “No,” I say, though I don’t sound like myself. “I didn’t have any.”

Erik nods, looking relieved. “We need to get you out of here until it’s safe.”

I finally drag my eyes to his and realize what he is and isn’t saying. Poison, but maybe not intended for the Archduke at all. He isn’t the one with a million gold pieces on his head. He isn’t the one the Kaiser wants dead or alive. Erik swallows, his eyes wide. We both know too well that the Kaiser always gets what he wants, sooner or later, and that no decree from King Etristo can stop him.

Without waiting for a response, Erik leads me out of the room and down the hall, leaving the panicked clamor behind us.

THE TRIP BACK TO MY room passes in a blur of shock. I don’t even remember the ride in the riser. All I’m aware of is my erratic heartbeat thundering in my ears. By the time we reach my room, my mind is slowly coming back to me, like fingers of sunlight through a dense forest.

“He’s dead, isn’t he?” I ask Erik, though my voice sounds far away.

He lingers uncertainly in the doorway. “Maybe the Chancellor’s sister saved him,” he says, but I don’t think either of us believes that. We both saw the Archduke’s face turn purple, and Coltania said he wasn’t breathing. When I saw the Kaiserin fall from the window after the Maskentanz, there was a stupid, hopeful part of me that believed she’d survived, up until I saw her face. But like trust, stupid hope is something I can’t afford anymore.

It’s only then that I realize how shaken Erik is as well. He’s good at hiding it—I suppose he’s seen death often enough on the battlefield. But this is different; the palace is supposed to be safe. If the Kaiser can get to me here, is there any place that is truly safe as long as he draws breath?

It might not be the Kaiser, though. The room was full of royals, each with their own conflicts and enemies. The poison wasn’t necessarily for me. But even as I think that, the Kaiser’s face looms large in my mind and I feel his hot, drunken breath on my skin. Five million gold pieces for me alive, but one million dead. One million is still plenty.

“I should stay a while, until we know the threat is contained,” Erik says. I wonder suddenly if he knows about the reward.

For a treacherous instant, I wonder if I can trust him, but I quickly banish the thought. If Erik was loyal to the Kaiser, he wouldn’t have brought me back to my room. He would have taken advantage of the chaos and taken me out of Sta’Crivero. He would have taken the five million gold pieces.

I sink down onto the sofa, the stiff material of my gown crunching underneath me. “I liked him,” I tell Erik. “At least, I liked him better than the others. He was…awkward, but he was kind. He didn’t look at me like I was a roast carved up on the table for him. And he just…he just offered me his army. No strings attached, no cut of the magic, no marriage, just a chess set of his the Theyn had.”

It’s only after I say the words that I realize I am already using the past tense.

Erik shakes his head, dropping his gaze away from me. “With the power of the Haptanian army, we could have wiped out the Kalovaxians in a month.”

A month. My heart lurches in my chest. In a month, I could have been back in Astrea, sitting on my mother’s throne. In a month, my country would have been liberated and I would have made the Kaiser pay for everything he’d done to us. Everything I’ve ever wanted was so close to being within my grasp, only to be yanked away.

I close my eyes, but there is no hiding the tears that come. I press the heels of my hands to my eyes and let the sobs rack through me.

You’re crying about your own loss while a man lies dead, I chide myself. You’re just as self-centered as the Kaiser. That only makes me cry harder.

Erik is at a loss—I imagine he hasn’t seen many crying women during his training—but after a moment, he reaches out to pat my back awkwardly. Still, I’m grateful for his attempt.

Outside the door, footsteps thunder by, followed by panicked shouts. The entire palace must be in an uproar.

“Do you have a weapon?” Erik asks me, his voice low. He doesn’t take his eyes off the door.

I nod, getting up and crossing to my bed. I’d wedged my dagger under the mattress, but now I draw it out, showing it to Erik, who eyes it appraisingly.

“Very pretty,” he says. “Do you know how to use it?”

I think about my lessons earlier with Artemisia, but suddenly all that feels very far away. That was a different size blade and it wasn’t even sharp. What little I did manage to learn in a single lesson suddenly seems useless—Erik is asking if I can defend myself if we’re attacked. That’s not sparring with dulled long blades, that’s life and death.

“You should take it,” I tell him, passing it to him and retaking my seat on the sofa.

He turns the blade over in his hands, his fingers running over the filigreed handle.

“It’s so delicate—I think I’m likely to snap it in half if I try to use it.”

My smile wobbles. “It’s stronger than it looks,” I say.

More footsteps echo in the hall outside but this time they don’t pass. Erik is on his feet between me and the door, blade poised; the instant the door swings open, though, he steps aside.

S?ren leads the charge into the room, with Blaise, Heron, and Artemisia at his heels. When they see me, they all let out a collective breath of relief.

“We heard someone was poisoned at dinner,” Blaise says, panting. “We thought…”

He doesn’t finish, but he doesn’t have to.

“It was Archduke Etmond,” I say, recounting everything that happened.

S?ren swallows, his eyes finding mine. “That doesn’t make sense,” he says quietly. “Haptania doesn’t have many enemies, and even if they did, murdering Etmond wouldn’t do anyone much good. And if anyone did want him dead, they would have had an easier time doing it in Haptania, even during the months he spends in the barracks. Sta’Crivero’s security is higher.”

“No one said anything about him being murdered,” Heron says, holding up his hands. “We shouldn’t jump to conclusions. It could have been from natural causes.”

“Or the poison was meant for Theo,” Artemisia says. “She is the one with a price on her head.”

Erik frowns, looking from them back to me. “Who are these people?” he asks me.

“Oh, right,” I say, realizing that Erik had never actually met Heron, Art, or Blaise, though they’ve seen him from afar. I make quick introductions and explain what Erik is doing in Sta’Crivero.

“Poison is new to me,” Erik tells Heron when I’m done. “But I know what I saw, and there was nothing natural about that death.”

Heron’s eyes widen but he gives a solemn nod.

“And I can’t imagine that it was intended for Etmond,” S?ren says, looking at me. “Artemisia is right. Of everyone in that room, you’re the most likely target.”

“Everyone in that room is important in their country,” I say, though my voice shakes.

“Important, yes,” Artemisia says. “But not in anyone’s way, not disliked. No one else had serious threats made against them, let alone a bounty on their head.”

“We might not know who delivered the poison, but we know who gave the order,” Blaise says quietly.

Though I didn’t eat anything at dinner, my stomach still flips and twists, my mind swimming in thoughts I won’t—can’t—entertain. I thought I was safe here, I thought I was finally beyond the Kaiser’s reach, I thought he would never be able to touch me again. It was a foolish hope and now a man is dead because of it. Because of me.

* * *

—

It isn’t until after midnight that a sharp, official knock sounds on the door. All of us have been too tense to talk, though Artemisia has insisted on making the most of this time and practicing some more. It’s been especially fun, what with everyone watching and adding their own critiques of my posture and technique, but at least it distracts from my nerves.

At the sound of the knock, everyone goes on alert, their weapons drawn. Artemisia switches out her practice sword for her real one.

“Back corner of the room,” Blaise says to me, and I hurry to oblige, my heart pounding in my chest even though I realize, logically, that an assassin wouldn’t bother knocking.

Sure enough, when Heron opens the door, it’s only one of the King’s guards. Even he looks on edge, though, eyes darting around the room as if expecting an attack to come at any moment.

“Queen Theodosia,” he says, looking at me. If he thinks it strange that I’m cowering in the corner, he doesn’t show it. “The threat has been secured. If you’ll join King Etristo in the throne room, you can see the fiend for yourself.”