Her voice cut through the haze in my mind. “I have a new idea. Unlock Bylur’s door. Let’s see what happens.”
Moments later, Bylur was kneeling at my side, his chains bumping my chest as he cradled my head. “Auria, please stop antagonizing her. I can’t watch you get hurt any more.”
I opened my eyes and smiled at him. “I’d rather this than stay home and pretend I didn’t know that you were dying.”
He ran a thumb over my lips and whispered in a breath so light I barely heard him. “Please. Go home. Think of our room and run into the shadows.” He didn’t realize I couldn’t jump through shadows so far away like that. I didn’t even understand how to call shadows to me.
I gripped his hand, and the queen’s voice interrupted. “New plan. This girl will provide us with some evening entertainment. Guards!” Metal boots echoed around us. “Chain Bylur to the post, and bring the girl to me.”
Rough hands dragged me up to standing and forced me to walk behind the queen. We marched down two corridors, past rows of metal and wooden weapons, and turned into a wide empty room, except for a postin the middle of the space. Two soldiers chained Bylur to the post by securing the chains around his wrist to another chain at the top of the post in the middle of the room. He grunted as they wrenched on the chain, forcing his hands above his head.
I clenched my hands into fists. This was the worst version of my worst nightmare. Was I supposed to watch him get beaten? I wanted to run to him, but two soldiers each gripped my arms, holding me just inside the room’s entrance.
The queen turned to me. “Now then, what was your name?”
Before I could answer, Bylur yelled from the middle of the room. “No! Don’t tell her your name. She doesn’t need any more power—”
The queen flicked her fingers toward him, and an ice ball flew across the room and pelted his gut so hard that it forced the air out of his lungs and left him gasping for breath. She turned back to me. “You were saying?”
I clenched my teeth together. I wasn’t about to say anything, not after she hit Bylur like that.
“No? Well then.” Her voice rose to a false crooning. “I’ve thought of a game we can play.” She straightened and called out, “Maid!”
Daneira’s daughter emerged from somewhere behind me. Everyone turned their faces down.
“Make a path,” the queen instructed, “of fire, from one prisoner to the other.” She waved her hands at the space from Bylur in the middle of the room to me.
The princess maid snapped, and the ground between Bylur and me erupted in knee-high flames. I tried stepping back from them, but the two soldiers held me still, despite flames licking their boots as well.
“Now,” the queen called, “I want guards lining this path!” Twenty guards slid out from the corridors behind us into the stone room. They lined up along the fiery path, ten on each side. My gut twisted. I wasn’t here to watch Bylur get tortured. I was here to die.
My death would be his torture.
Blood rushed away from my head as I realized what was happening. I would have lost my balance if the two soldiers next to me didn’t have such a tight grip on my arms.
The queen clicked her tongue. “I think we’re still missing someone.” She lifted her head and called louder. “Slave!”
A blue-haired fae with his face toward the ground rushed around us and knelt in front of the queen. My jaw fell, and a new rush of anger woke up all my limp limbs. I lifted my chin up and turned to the queen. “What did you do to him?!”
“Oh? You know this one?” Her smile turned sickly sweet again, and my stomach twisted. Something was wrong here. “You think I captured him, don’t you? Forced him into slavery?”
I didn’t answer out loud, but I glared at her.
She laughed. “Ephaltes, stand up and tell this human why you are my slave.”
He bowed to her and faced me. “I failed to sabotage Bylur’s efforts at making a council. She wanted him to not have any support from the nobles so he would appreciate her more, and I… failed.”
“Tell her,” the queen simpered, “why you agreed to help me.”
He focused his gaze over my shoulder, deliberately avoiding my eyes. “When she conquered Kalshana, she was going to give me a position of more power than the one I had as Lord of House Fundan.”
I was shocked. We hadn’t been friends exactly, but he’d helped me once or twice, and I never would have imagined he would have tried to hurt Bylur and me. “Eris?”
“I coerced her. And sentenced her.” His dark eyes looked sad, but his voice did not sound remorseful at all.
I couldn’t say anything else to him. The betrayal cut too deep.
“Well, I’m glad you two worked that out.” The queen waved at someone behind us, and they passed a long club to Ephaltes. “You’ll be first in line.” Her eyes glittered. “And if you don’t get a hit on her, you will die next.”
