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Ash passed Zeke a bottle of water. “Ezra’s right. Cornaith would use it against him, especially since he’s supposed to take his place. We can’t risk your parents stepping down and Cornaith remaining with you two on the thrones. It’s possible he won’t let me take over where my parents served.”

Cyn pressed his fingers into his eyes.

Ezra turned his attention to me again. “Why did you intervene?”

“I couldn’t just let him hit Cyn.”

“You know he’ll heal.”

“That doesn’t matter. No one should be a punching bag for someone else.” I put my plate down and mumbled, “Cyn didn’t do anything wrong.”

Cyn lowered his hand and stared at me, but I didn’t meet his gaze.

“He protected us and kept us safe out in Feranzis. They both kept me safe. Zeke kept us all safe. But Cyn…” I took a breath. “Cyn fought the curse and didn’t hurt me when he could have. He could have hurt us both.”

Remembering Cyn’s near-feral state and how he fought to hold the curse back, demanding Zeke take me and abandon him all to protect us…

My chest tightened, and tears welled in my eyes.

Ash reached for my hand.

Zeke plucked at a loose string on the throw pillow to his right while Cyn continued staring at me with the same unreadable expression.

I pushed down the emotions and looked at Cyn, then at Ezra. “Why did you lie about not using my blood?”

Ezra set his bottle on the table. “I didn’t lie. I simply omitted the details.”

I gave him a flat look that made Ash chuckle.

“That said, if the council hears that your blood is capable of healing us or holding back the curse of Feranzis, Father won’t let it be.”

“What will he do?”

“Probably turn you into a glorified blood bag for the guard,” Cyn said, grabbing a glazed pastry.

Ash growled. “Over my dead body.”

“That’s a given,” Ezra said, surprising me. “But it doesn’t mean he won’t try.”

“Ranthus was in the room when you mentioned what happened to me,” Cyn said, licking icing off the pastry in a way that made my mind go blank. He ran his tongue over his lips, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye with a smirk as if he knew the effect he was having on me.

Ash cleared his throat and adjusted his position, tugging at the legs of his jeans.

“We don’t want Ranthus to tell Cornaith or the others,” Ezra said, steering everyone back on track. “Cyn was right to stop me from speaking. We don’t need to draw more unwanted attention to you.”

“But Amra and Rinlora already know.”

They all focused their attention on me.

Having all four of them so fixated on me made my heart race with something I couldn’t name. Nervousness? Anticipation? Not fear. I didn’t fear any of them.

They’d listened to me before, but never with such complete attention.

I squirmed in my seat and looked at the pastries on the table. “They think it’s the tether. That the reason I healed from my razor cut was because my blood absorbed some of Ash’s royal powers when we bonded. It makes sense. I wasn’t able to heal before that.”

“Except in Cholian,” Ash said.

“Yeah, they mentioned that. Thought it was something to do with our connection. Dismissed it, really.”