But it came in silence.
It came in ink on parchment. Orders tucked inside a drawer. Words written so cleanly, so confidently, that they didn’t even feel like murder. They felt certain.
He was going to kill me. He was going to kill us.
And all this time, I thought I was navigating a court. I didn’t realize I’d stepped into a cage.
I keep wondering what I did wrong. What softness I showed, what questions I asked, what part of me cracked open enough for him to slip the blade in.
But maybe it’s not about weakness. It’s about threats.
Maybe he saw something in me that scared him. Something that still burns.
I haven’t told the others. Not Alaric. Not Jasira. Not Erindor.
What would I even say? Did I find proof that our peace is a lie? That I’m sleeping a stone’s throw away from the man who wants to kill me? No one can protect me from this. And if I speak too soon, I could ruin everything.
But the silence is rotting me from the inside. And I don’t know how long I can keep it. I want to scream. I want to run. I want to burn this whole place down and start again.
But I won’t. Not yet.
Instead, I’ll sleep with the truth pressed between my ribs. And in the morning, I’ll decide whether to stay quiet.-W
Chapter Thirty-Four
Wynessa
The walls were too white.
Not the soft, garden-bathed white of moonflower petals. No, these were bleached and unyielding. I’d stared at them all morning, pacing between them like some trapped creature circling its own enclosure.
The fire in the hearth snapped as if resenting the silence.
I’d tried to sit down three times. The edge of the bed, the window ledge, the little velvet chair by the writing desk. Each time my body refused to stay still, my bones too tightly coiled with dread.
The letters were still safely stashed in the hollow behind the hearth. That was the safest place for them. Who knows what I would do if they were in my hands?
I had gone for breakfast.
Sat next to Alaric at a long, polished table, gold-fringed and gleaming, while the Caerthaine nobles sipped chilled wine and commented on the mildness of the wind. I’d nodded when spoken to and smiled when required. But my food remained untouched, while my tea, once steaming, grew tepid and left a bitter taste on my tongue.
Erindor had been there too, posted by the pillar, as always. He hadn’t spoken, but I felt his eyes linger more than usual, as if he were memorizing my silence.
Lunch had been worse. The clang of cutlery was too loud; the candlelight too bright. I tried to say something to Jasira, anything, but my throat felt lined with smoke and ash.
She had leaned closer, brushing my hair from my shoulder.
“You’re too quiet,” she’d whispered. “That usually means your brain’s on fire.”
I hadn’t replied. I’d only taken her hand and squeezed it beneath the table.
Because how could I explain what I had found? How could I look my brother in the eye, or Erindor, and say, I know now? I know it was never a chance. The forest wanted me dead, and Kaelen held the leash.
The knowledge wasn’t just poison. It was weight. Thick, oozing weight that clung to my skin and pooled behind my ribs.
What do I do?
I had asked myself that question at least fifty times since sunrise.
