Sabine closed the case and locked it.
For a moment she stood with one soot-blackened hand resting on the lid.
The palace had built the vow to consume women in silence.
Sabine carried that silence now, folded against her skin.
And when the chamber opened for her, she intended to make it speak.
Twenty Two
The Trial of Flesh
The summons came before dawn.
Sabine woke before Lysa touched her shoulder.
For a moment she lay still in the dark, listening to the palace breathe around her. Pipes clicked behind the walls. A guard passed somewhere in the corridor beyond her door. The fire had sunk low, leaving the chamber half-lit by ash glow and the first gray suggestion of morning at the window.
The mark on her arm was warm.
Not pulsing.
Waiting.
Lysa stood beside the bed with a sealed temple notice in one hand and a face that had gone carefully blank.
Sabine sat up. “Which trial.”
Lysa did not answer at once.
That was enough.
Sabine took the notice and broke the black seal.
The words were written in temple hand, each line formal, graceful, and cold.
The remaining marked brides are called to the Vow Chamber antechamber for the Trial of Flesh. Attendance required at first bell. Ritual preparation mandatory.
Sabine read it twice.
“The seventh trial,” Lysa said quietly.
Sabine folded the notice. “Tell me what servants know.”
Lysa crossed to the wardrobe. Her movements were efficient, but Sabine knew her well enough now to see the tension in them. The too-careful way she opened the doors. The extra moment she spent sorting through gowns that had already been arranged.
“Publicly, compatibility,” Lysa said. “The prince’s blood and the bride’s blood are tested before sacred witness. The temple calls it harmony of flesh and bond.”
“And privately?”
“Escalation.” Lysa withdrew a gown of dark wine-colored silk so deep it looked almost black in the weak light. “The remaining brides are not all tested the same way. Some only undergo the physician’s sequence. Pulse, breath, mark inspection, response to ritual phrase. But the first chosen bride…” She stopped.
Sabine stood. “Say it.”
“The first chosen bride is brought before the prince.”
The chamber seemed to lose temperature.
