First her eyes, then her head, and then her shoulders, all dimmed. Trained into inferiority. “Does it matter?”
“Yes.” The word lashed out. “It fucking matters.”
I grasped her arm, gently, eyes scanning every inch of her skin, searching for marks, for fresh cruelties I couldn’t yet see.
She never understood that even if the bruises vanished, they stole something every time.
Her palm unfurled toward the ceiling releasing a sparkle of light, small and fleeting, gone before it could take shape.
“I have made my choice,” she said, and the shadow in her eyes darkened further. “For my kingdom.”
Her kingdom. As if this kingdom had ever given her anything in return.
Csolenia was once alive with brilliance, streets painted in saffron and song, halls gilded not just in gold but in welcome. Now the colors had been leached, leaving only corridors of elegant malice.
And Selvarra swore thatIwas the toxin.
Some nights I almost believed it. Some nights I thought,Let it collapse, all of it. The palace. The polished legacy.
But Elva still needed me.
I caught her hand and said, “It isn’t a choice if you only have one option.” A flare returned in her eyes, thin, but there. I leaned my forehead to hers, the canopy falling around us like a dome. “So let me offer you option two, hm?”
She didn’t speak or pull away; her flame hadn’t guttered out completely. It was there, only hidden, waiting.
And I would see to it that she set this kingdom ablaze again.
A few hours later, the mirror threw back someone I hardly recognized. Or maybe just a version of myself I hadn’t met yet.
Elva had worked her silver tongue on Obrann, convincing him to let me attend tonight’s royal celebration as her guest.
Guest,not her guard.
I’d resisted, of course, but she had insisted with that damn stubbornness she only reserved for me until I caved.
For once, try to enjoy yourself,she’d said,instead of hovering like a mother hen.
Not my choice of phrasing but, fine.
The gown was the final lie to keep me looking as though I belonged here. As though I hadn’t plotted a dozen ways to gut them all.
Tessi, Elva’s housemaid, had paraded gown after gown before me, each neckline plunging low enough to invite hel itself. I made a clumsy excuse about modesty, unwilling to show the scars etched across my chest.
She had only scoffed, then returned hours later with black silk, cut from the last bit of beauty left in the dark. The bodice clung close, wrapping my shoulders, collared high at the throat.
I hadn’t quite mastered glamouring the way Elva had, but it was enough to fade the Viper mark into not being noticeable where it still showed out of the neckline.
But the back, gods, the back. The fabric plunged low, from the nape of my neck to the tops of my hips, exposing me completely.
I twisted, cursing under my breath as the lace pressed sharp at my tailbone. She had really left little to the imagination.
It had been a decade since I last wore a piece of elegance. Back then, Callum and I had been allowed into a palace gala at Elva’s side—naïve, dazzled, too blind to see the poison laced into every word Obrann spoke.
Since then, our invitations had changed. No longer guests. Just guards, stationed where we blended.
Now, the reflection displayed something else entirely. Not a dreamer. Not a guard. A weapon woven into radiance.
A shriek split the room, and I reached for the dagger strapped to my thigh.
