I’m no fool. I won’t ogle a temptress like some sort of idiot.
Show me how you’re traveling the realms, I practically beg. So I never have to step foot in this wretched land again. So I don’t have to sit here every night, and watch you sleep.
But the witch only buries herself beneath her blankets, cowering like a fool instead of a hearteating, chest-stabbing ruler. She looks so fragile. So naive.
Sheisyoung, compared to the rest of us ... She’s lived just over twenty years, according to records.
I shake my head, make a fist.
This relativelyyoungruler managed to break through all the protections I’ve formed around my realm and stab me through the chest.
I straighten at my post, swathed in my shadows. And go back to imagining my hands around her throat.
HEARTS AND BLOOD
“They’re waiting for you.”
I tense at my general Astria’s voice. I didn’t even hear her enter the war room.
Ever since I started watching the witch sleep, I’ve gotten very little rest of my own. And I’m starting to feel it.
Astria’s gaze doesn’t miss anything. Usually, it’s an advantage, as a general. But as she studiesme, that trait becomes fucking annoying.
I know why she’s here. It’s been a week since the last line of Covets. The time has come again. I grip the edge of the war room table, eyes on the depiction of my realm. The scar is a long, ragged mark across it. The biggest threat to my people, other than me and my own insistence on not visiting the consorts again. “Tell them to leave.”
Even the idea of the line of women has me seeing red,literally, as I remember the wretched Wildling hidden within their ranks.Waitingfor me to choose her, which I did, predicably, like a fool.
The idea that she knew I would choose her, that I strode right into her assassination plan, makes it all even worse.
When Astria still hasn’t left, I sigh. “I told you to cancel the Covets until further notice.” The dreks are not the only threats to my realm.
Sheis a threat. Her and her stolen portaling relic.
“We did thorough research into each consort. All of them are verifiably Nightshade. They have no ties to any rebel groups. They—”
“She almost killed me,” I say, my voice coming out louder than I meant it to, each word sharpened into cold rage. My grip on the edge of the table is so tight, the wood groans.
Astria bows her head. As my general, she feels responsible. I don’t blame her. The wretched hearteater certainly looked the part of a consort. Our harbors and the perimeter of the castle are tightly monitored. There is only one way she could possibly reach me undetected, and that is portaling.
My own power. She usedmy powerto get here.
The wood cracks beneath my hands, splintering everywhere, and Astria just stares at me. “I will tell them to go,” she says, bowing, before leaving the room.
In a fit of rage, I throw the table on its side. Shadows flare out of me, scratching the walls.
Red seeps into my shirt as my wound tears open again.
Enough.
I’m the ruler of Nightshade. I am done hiding in the shadows of her room. If she won’t show me where she keeps her device, I willmake her.
I’m waiting in the chair in front of her bed, made invisible, when she arrives from training that night.
Oblivious to me, she stumbles into her room, surrounded by a cloud of boredom. I would have thought she was drunk, if the smell of alcohol weren’t completely absent.
Then I realize the stumbling is due to the shoes she’s wearing. Their heels are perilously high. Sometimes her training, I’ve learned, involves them. She kicks them off with relish, then sighs, curling and uncurling her toes, pain scrunching her face. Pain fromshoes.
Disdain narrows my eyes. So weak. So ridiculous. How could someone so pathetic have tricked me?
