Pain.
It spasmed through her hand. Just a slight tingling at first, but then it started to warm. Her skin felt tighter, scorched down to her bones, and soon the heat was so intense that she couldn’t catch her breath. The clouds cradling her becameflames—
Her eyes blinked open.
She immediately found the source of the burning: There was a strange ring around her finger.
And she couldn’t get it off.
She pulled and pulled, but it only held tighter. Burned hotter. It felt as if flames were siphoning from the ring’s sapphire center and into her skin, as if it might set her entire body ablaze if she didn’t get itoff. She kept pulling, wrestling and rolling about on the bed. Her legs tangled in the blankets, and then she pitched over the side of that bed and toppled to the floor.
Ow.
She must have cried out before waking, because as she pushed herself up off the floor, suddenly her room flooded with people—with guards and servants bursting through both doors, asking what was wrong.
And then the prince himself arrived.
Their eyes met.
The moment felt suspended and surreal; he looked half-asleep and more disheveled than she’d ever seen him, and something about that appearance—compared to his usual stiff, otherworldly perfection—was strange.
He looked almost…human.
But still better looking than any human she’d ever met. Her breath caught in her throat as he stepped toward her. How did he manage to still look so beautiful, even with messy hair and eyes heavy with sleep?
Then the ring pulsed with more of that borderline painful, burning energy, and fury overtook the fluttering in her heart.
He’s not beautiful.
He’s monstrous.
Because this ring was the same one she’d seen him wearing before, she was certain, and it was clearly another shackle like the bracelet she wore—except she hadn’t been awake to give consent for this particular shackle.
“I need to speak with you,” she told the prince, fighting to keep her voice level. “And I want everyone else toleave.”
The guards and servants all looked to the prince.
Prince Tarron breathed slowly in, exhaled even more slowly, and then gave a single, curt nod. “As she commands.”
After a moment of confused hesitation, the others obediently filed out.
Once they were alone, Prince Tarron wasted no time closing the distance between them. “What in the name of the three gods were youscreamingabout—”
“This!” She jabbed her finger—and the ring—accusingly in his direction, nearly poking him in the eye as she did. “It won’t come off!”
He took another deep breath. Reached for the ring. Tapped it. Whispered a single, strange word under his breath, and then slipped the ring off— with ease— and said, “It adjusts to fit the wearer securely. If you had simply relaxed, you could have pulled it off yourself.”
She stared at the unassuming piece of jewelry, still not quite believing how easily he’d taken it off. After swallowing to clear the dryness in her throat, she asked, “And why wasIwearing it? I didn’t go to sleep with it on.”
“I put it on you while you were sleeping.”
Her temper flared as hot as those clouds in her dream-turned-nightmare. “It’s magical, isn’t it? I could feel it starting to burn me. I could feel its power sinking into my skin, and if this is some sort of trick that—“
“I put it there as a ward against whatever nightmares you were having.”
“It—oh.”
He yawned. “Ohindeed.”
