There’s a sigh that sounds an awful lot like Heron’s, and sure enough, he steps in front of me, filling my entire frame of vision. He looks torn and for a second I worry he’s actually going to follow Artemisia’s advice.

“No,” Blaise says, looking toward him in alarm. “Heron, don’t you dare—”

“She’s going to hurt herself worse if you don’t,” Artemisia says. “Do it now.”

Heron looks between them, eyes wide, before finally looking to me. He steels himself before taking a step toward me. Blaise moves to stand between us, but Artemisia takes him by surprise, tackling him to the ground.

Then Heron gently touches my hand and everything goes black.

* * *

—

I wake up in my bed, swaddled underneath the covers, and for a blissful moment I forget what happened before. For a moment, Hoa is still alive. But then that moment ends and I want to burrow farther under the covers and sink into a deep, forgetting sleep once more.

“Are you all right?” Blaise’s voice interrupts my thoughts, quiet and wary. I look around the moonlit room to find him watching me from the sofa. Heron is fast asleep on the floor and Artemisia is on the other side of the bed, her back to me.

I force myself to sit up. It feels like someone knocked me over the head with a boulder, and my whole body is throbbing. My mouth feels like I swallowed cotton.

“You shouldn’t be here,” I say, ignoring his question. It’s a stupid one anyway—how can I possibly be all right?

He shakes his head, getting up from the sofa and coming to my side of the bed, crouching down beside me and speaking low. “I gave Art my gems for safekeeping. Just until I leave again tomorrow,” he says. “I was getting food in town when I heard the news. I thought…I don’t know what I thought.”

“You thought I’d need you,” I say quietly, my heart aching. “I’m glad you were here.” The confession takes everything I have. He left me, I remind myself, but suddenly that doesn’t matter anymore, because when I needed him, he chose me over his power. Right now, that is all that matters.

Blaise takes my hand in his and squeezes it tightly, his skin burning hot against mine. “Even without the gems, there’s still a chance I could lose control. If I start to, even a bit, Artemisia agreed to kill me before I could hurt anyone,” he says.

“That was kind of her,” I say, looking to where our hands are joined, fingers entwined. The pads of his fingers are rough and callused, but they are a comfort all the same. I never want to let him go.

He takes a deep breath and I worry he’s going to talk about Hoa. I don’t want him to. I can’t talk about her yet or I know I’ll fall to pieces. As always, though, Blaise seems to know my mind as well as I do.

“Dragonsbane tried to come earlier; she said she wanted to ensure your safety, but I told her you were safe with us,” he says.

I let out a mirthless laugh. “I’m sure she took that well,” I say. “She had a deal with Etristo, you know. It’s why he’s helping us—in exchange for Water Gems.”

He doesn’t say anything for a moment, then lets out a long exhale. “I wish I could pretend I were more surprised.”

“I thought her capable of an awful lot before,” I say. “But this is somehow worse. Ampelio was right—her help comes at too high a cost, Blaise. I don’t want it anymore.”

I expect him to argue with me, to remind me that we need her and her fleet, that we wouldn’t have gotten this far without her help, no matter how many strings were attached. Instead, he surprises me by nodding.

“Then cut ties,” he says. “You have the Gorakians and the Vecturians and the refugees. Dragonsbane’s help isn’t enough to tip the scales one way or another. This plan will live or die on its own either way.”

I swallow. “We’ll talk about it with the others tomorrow. We shouldn’t make plans without them. It’s Art’s mother, after all,” I say before taking a deep breath and asking the questions I’ve been dreading learning the answer to. “What happened? How did Hoa…” But I can’t finish. My voice breaks over her name.

Blaise looks away, understanding well enough. “As far as we’ve been able to surmise, the grapes were meant for Erik, but after he left, Hoa moved into his rooms and…” He trails off, and I’m glad he doesn’t finish the sentence.

“The Kaiser is killing suitors,” I say. “I was never the target.”

“Why, though?” he asks, frowning. “That doesn’t make any sense. The Kalovaxian sailors were very clear—the Kaiser wanted you dead or alive. He has nothing to gain from attacking them instead.”

I shake my head, which screams in protest. “Because he may want me dead, but he wants me alive more. You remember the discrepancy in the rewards. He wants me suffering. He wants to be the person behind it, even if he isn’t holding the whip himself.”

Blaise nods slowly. “I’m sorry, Theo,” he says after a moment.

The words are a stab to my gut, and again I see Hoa in my mind as I last did, lifeless and empty.

“How am I supposed to tell Erik?” I ask after a moment, my voice cracking. “He’d just gotten her back and I…He told me to take care of her and I couldn’t even do it for a few hours.”

“He won’t blame you,” Blaise says. “There was nothing you could have done. It’s the Kaiser…it’s always the Kaiser.”

“He’s taken all of our mothers, hasn’t he?” I ask him quietly. “Yours, mine, Heron’s. Even S?ren’s. And now Erik’s. Artemisia is the only one of us left who has a mother still.”

“I think he took mine, too, in other ways,” Artemisia says suddenly. I wonder how long she’s been awake—if she heard us discussing her mother a moment ago—but before I can ask, she rolls over to look at me. I let go of Blaise’s hand so I can turn toward her as well, the two of us facing each other like some kind of bewitched mirror. We look nothing alike, but staring into her eyes in the moonlight, I think I see a ghost of a similarity there. We must both have our fathers’ eyes; it’s not a physical similarity but a reflection of something deeper. A fire that I think we must have inherited from our mothers.

“She was different before the siege. Softer, I suppose, though I don’t think she’s ever been soft. Happier. Less hungry all the time. Less angry at everyone who couldn’t satiate her. But then the Kalovaxians captured my brother and me, and I was the only one who managed to come back….I don’t think she ever forgave me for that.”

For a moment I don’t know what to say. Blaise is similarly struck by silence. He concentrates on the duvet beside me, picking at the stitching idly to keep from looking at her. I think he’s worried doing so will open something between them he’d rather keep closed.

“I don’t think she’s angry with you for surviving, Art,” I say. Hard and unyielding as Dragonsbane is, that seems cruel in a way I don’t think she’s capable of.

“No,” she admits. “But I was the one who got us caught—I was the one who was reckless and foolish and it was my fault we ended up in that mine. The least I could have done was get him out, but I didn’t.”

It’s such a rare moment of vulnerability from Artemisia that I don’t know quite how to reply. Even breathing too loudly feels like it will break the spell that’s fallen over us.

“I’m sorry,” I say finally.

She shrugs and rolls over again, turning her back to me.

“I don’t need your pity,” she says. “But the Kaiser ruined my family, too, even those of us who survived him. He ruins everything.”

Venom is not a new thing for Artemisia—it infuses all her words and it has as long as I’ve known her. It fills up her every glare and makes her every movement potentially lethal. Still, I don’t think I’ve ever heard her so full of hate before.

I inch closer to her and reach out to touch her shoulder gently. I expect her to shrug me off, but instead, after a moment, she softens and I wrap my arms around her. She turns toward me and buries her face in my shoulder. I don’t realize she’s crying until I feel her tears against my skin.

I MUST FALL BACK ASLEEP, BECAUSE the next thing I’m aware of is a light knocking at my door. I sit up, blinking the exhaustion from my eyes. Heron and Artemisia are still sleeping and oblivious to the visitor and there’s no sign of Blaise at all—he must have left again, I realize with a pang. The knocking starts anew and I climb out of bed, slipping my dressing gown over my nightgown and fitting the dagger beneath it so that it’s secure at my hip.

I tiptoe toward the door, careful not to wake the others. Even though I know that an assassin wouldn’t knock, I still hesitate before opening the door.

“Who is it?” I whisper.

“Coltania,” a voice whispers back.

I let out a sigh of relief even as irritation prickles at the back of my neck. I think I’ve had my fill of Coltania and her bribes and bargains. I’ve had enough of pretending I want anything to do with her smarmy brother.

Still, I might yet need her to get S?ren out of prison, so I open the door.

Coltania stands there in the same black, high-necked gown she wore earlier. In her hands she holds two mugs of tea.