The room breathed cold stone and unturned pages. Amerei felt Xavien stiffen beside her. His words left him like the last light before dusk.
“There was an attempt on my life.”
Ulyria did not startle. Queens do not.
She let the words settle.
“Where,” she asked, “and by whose hand?”
“In my own chambers,” Xavien said. “A court scholar—Deglan of the Archives.”
Her brow rose. Her voice dropped.
“Why was your back to him?”
Amerei felt her stare crawl over her—the torn seam, the crude knot, the violet silk beneath the plain robe.
Xavien’s hand flexed.
His jaw shifted, lips parting to confess.
Shame hovered like a blade about to fall.
She cut first.
“We were making love.”
The words scorched her tongue the moment they left.
Terror coiled through her, and she stood frozen, hardly daring to breathe beneath the queen’s gaze.
Xavien’s eyes flew wide.
Ulyria did not blink.
“A bold thing,” the queen said, “to love a man not free.”
She let the blade hang—and then sheathed it herself.
“Yet I am not a stranger to the heart’s rebellions.”
Her voice softened a fraction.
“Two of my children do not belong to my king.”
Xavien’s head snapped up.
“Not you,” she added, almost bored. “Do stop looking so stricken.”
She rose a finger’s width from her chair, and Xavien straightened.
“Tell me,” she said, gaze fixed on Amerei, “how you love my son.”
Amerei’s breath faltered.
In a blink she was not here but in Fyreglade—in Viktor’s chamber.
Their wedding night.
