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Did I score a point? Or did I just make this situation more dangerous for myself?

“You’re so quick to defend her, Samara. It makes me wonder about that little note you wrote me.”

I swallowed, the sensation sharp and ugly. That was why he was here, after all. Of course he hadn’t given me a warning. He enjoyed my fear far too much.

Not for the first time since I’d left the note, a wave of doubt hit me. But it was too late to go back on the plan. If I confessed that for months I’d not only known the Storm-blooded King’s spymaster was in the kingdom but that I’d plotted against Raphael with him?

No matter what his affection, I’d be dead.

And when the memory of that girl came again, the doubt disappeared, replaced by that same, relentless anger that had been growing.

“She dressed you like his little meal.” His voice was closer now. I could smell the sweet almonds on his breath. “No different than putting a shiny red apple in a roast’s mouth.”

The slightest graze of the gossamer that wrapped my arms. I jerked my hand back.

“What do you want?” I demanded once more. “You may be invisible, but Raphael will be here soon, and he’ll hear you. Not being able to see you won’t stop him from following the sound of your heartbeat and ripping your head from your shoulders.”

A pause.

Gods, I wish he would leave. I was beside my bed now, my hand aching to reach for the dagger under the pillow.

Titus had risked a lot to enter my rooms, with all the guards posted in the halls. He wasn’t invincible, no matter how he acted. He wouldn’t have come just to lecture me.

“Are you committed to this cause or not?”

I hesitated. I’d seen the cruelty of vampires firsthand, at every turn in my life. Raphael had condoned their actions.

I owed him nothing.

But still, I hesitated.

A folded piece of parchment fluttered to the floor in front of me, the royal seal stamped on it. I picked it up and opened it. The sprawling script, the golden ink. Exactly as I’d seen it in childhood.

“A pardon, Samara. All your sins forgiven.”

A royal pardon. I could go home.

Wherever that is, part of me chastised.

But that louder part of me craved this. To finally be absolved of guilt and welcomed into the land of humans once more. Once I helped Titus, I would flee with the book and scour the Witch Kingdom without the threat of imprisonment.

The parchment disappeared again as Titus snatched it back. In its place, he set another item.

A card.

Not just any card. The purple edges said this was made by a toximancer, a witch specialized in poisons.

“What am I to do with this?” I made no move to pick it up.

Titus let out an aggrieved sigh, as though he could hardly believe he was still talking to me. “And here your one redeeming feature is you were thought to be clever. It’s a poison card.”

Obviously. “And what do you expect me to do? Use it on Raphael?”

“In a manner of speaking. Such a card would never work on a vampire. Their bodies are too strong. But if he were to ingest it directly, even the demon king himself couldn’t withstand the toxins.”

When he drinks from me.

This was why Titus had seen such an opportunity in me being the king’s Chosen. With me, Raphael was vulnerable in a way he was with no other.