The air was suddenly too cold, each breath piercing Ana’s lungs like broken glass.
Kerlan only kept him alive long enough for me to get there.
Ramson hadn’t been good—and perhaps some part of him had wanted to change that. In a world of grays, he had made a choice. And that choice had saved her life tonight.
She blinked back tears. She couldn’t afford to think of Ramson, or to try to piece together the full story of why he’d done the things he’d done, made the choices he’d made…not now, not when Luka would be forced to abdicate in five days leaving Morganya to begin her reign of bloodshed and terror.
Five days was barely enough time to make the journey but she had to get to Salskoff. She would return to the Palace, even without Tetsyev, and she would accuse Morganya of treason against the Empire.
She had proof already. The antidote was in the apothecary’s wing, along with the poison. And Luka—Luka would listen to her. He would believe her.
Suddenly, the night seemed a little less dark.
The girl was untying the horses from the carriage when Ana made her way over. “What’s your name?”
“Linnet,” the girl whispered, as though tasting a strange word on her tongue. “My name is Linnet.”
Ana drew a deep breath. Her next words were a gamble, but it was a gamble she had to take. She had nothing left to lose. “My name is Anastacya Kateryanna Mikhailov,” she said. “Crown Princess of Cyrilia. And…I need your help. Please.”
Linnet listed her face to the sky, closing her eyes briefly in the silver fluorescence of the moon. “My people believe in fate. That man freed me from my indenturement so that I could protect you; and you saved my life from that Affinite. The gods have joined our fates, and now I must complete the circle. I will be the blade in your hands and the wind at your back.” She paused, and resolve shaped her expression. “Call me Linn.”
There was a pale-eyed ghost in the darkness with him.
Ramson moaned. It was the only sound he could make.
The ghost peered at him, candlelight shifting on its face. Ramson had seen the face somewhere, but he could not remember where.
“Stop. I’ll tell you anything,” he slurred. And then a new thought occurred to him. “Am I dead?”
Slowly, feeling was coming back to his body. His limbs were on fire. His head felt as though it had been used as a battering ram. And his chest—Deities,his chest…
“Not yet, Ramson Quicktongue,” the ghost said. He was hooded, and he was prodding at Ramson in the most painful, irksome way.
“I suppose not,” Ramson mused. “Death would feel better, and I’d be in the company of some honey-eyed girl instead of an ugly old hagbag.”
The ghost gave him what resembled a sullen expression. He was starting to look extremely familiar, but Ramson could not think beyond the aching of his head as to who this was.
“Where am I?” he asked instead. It was too dim to see.
“The Kerlan Estate. In the dungeons.”
The Kerlan Estate.Ramson pushed at his muggy consciousness, wincing at the effort. The memories came back to him in a slow, painful trickle. He looked at the man-ghost, suddenly wary. “Who are you?”
The man looked up at him from beneath the hood. Bulbous eyes, thin nose, bald head.
And then the name clicked.
“Tetsyev,” Ramson croaked. “What do you want? What are you doing to me?”
“I am healing you,” Tetsyev said calmly. “Though if you insult me again, I might change my mind.”
Ramson then noticed the strange smell of herbs and chemicals, and the feeling of cold gel all over his body. He looked down at his chest and winced.
His skin resembled a bloody slab of meat, sliced in a dozen different directions. And on his chest, almost where his heart would be, was a shiny patch of flesh, seared over his old brand. The insignia of the Order of the Lily.
He remembered the iron, white-hot before his eyes. The insurmountable fear as it was pressed to his chest. The unspeakable pain, and the welcomed darkness that followed.
His resolve wavered, and the feeling of helplessness that washed over him was nearly enough to drown him. “Why are you healing me?” he asked, and despite all of his efforts, his voice trembled. “Preparing me for another torture session?”
