“I have a pretty clear picture, actually,” Evereon snapped. Rosaline tugged on his arm and whispered at him to stop, but he shrugged her off. “All I’ve heard since arriving in this cursed city is how the new Duke will never sire an heir because he can’t keep his hands off his mistress for even a moment.”
My mouth went dry, but flames raged in my stomach and behind my eyes. “How dare you think you know anything—?”
“You got lost.” Evereon dropped his voice and squared his shoulders. “I warned you, but you still got lost.”
He glanced toward the white box with pink ribbon I just noticed was in Rosaline’s hands. “No point in any of this now, Rosaline. Not when she already has everything she ever wanted.”
His crimson cape swished behind him as walked down the hall.
Did he think I wanted to be owned? Trapped under watching eyes? Working to the point of exhaustion?
Did he really think that having the Duke under my control was what I had always wanted?
I opened my mouth to tell Evereon he was wrong, but no words left my lips.
My heart dropped to my stomach. I tried again, but I produced nothing but silence. My hands slowly wrapped around my throat as I braced myself to accept the cold truth that coursed through my veins.
I could not tell Evereon he was wrong because I could not lie.
No…I could not have gotten lost. I only had three days left to save Riyan. I just had to work harder, I just had to…
I turned to Rosaline, who looked at me with wide eyes as she clutched the gift in her hands.
“Tell me why you came to Hyton Palace,” I ordered.
Rosaline shook her head and tried to back out of the alcove. “The timing isn’t right. I was under strict orders to—”
“Fuck what Fraleigh told you.” I raised my hand as my throat tightened. “Fuck whatever Daigen’s plan was. I will get an answer even if I have to rip it out of you.”
Magic trembled in the air, but Rosaline did not cower. She gripped the sides of the gift box and her voice was soft as the beginning of an avalanche.
“Fine, Serafina. I just hope you are ready for what I have to show you.”
Rosaline sat beside me on a couch in a room far away from any listening ears.
I looked at my Hyton Blue skirt pooled around my feet.Thatwas all I had ever wanted—to be a Hyton, to have Derrick’s heart and mind in my hands, and to have real power.
Riyan gavehis lifefor me and how had I repaid him? By getting lost in my own desires!
Rosaline wrung her hands. “Daigen was very specific about timing. If you didn’t get this gift at the right time, everything could go wrong.”
I glanced at the box with the pink ribbon in Rosaline’s lap. “Is that the gift?”
She shook her head. “Captain Mydina said this arrived at the Fortress a few days after you left. He brought it because he never got a response to his message and was worried.”
“Because that was the message that got Brandt killed.” I dug my nails into the couch cushion and bit down on my shame. “I am a failure. And a disappointment.”
Rosaline let out a quiet breath. “He used to say that too.”
I looked up at her. I had forgotten that Rosaline was Riyan’s childhood friend. She knew him.
Her full lips turned up in a smile and suddenly a white light appeared between her eyes. The sound of a gentle wind through flower stems traced my ears.
She held out her hand. “Thisis the gift.”
I stared at her palm and my stomach twisted. Was I really ready for what I was going to face?
But Riyan once said I was the bravest person in the Dukedom. I had failed so many times over the past three weeks, but I could at least try to prove him right.
