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Erida flushed and she looked away, working her jaw. She felt her own thrumming pulse, born of frustration as much as Taristan’s attention.

“I want Konegin’s head,” she hissed.

“He’ll make another mistake soon enough,” Taristan said, oddly calming. “Or another noble will make it for him.”

“I’m already working on that. The Madrentine treasury is vast, and Robart’s wealth is already being divided up among my supporters.”

Taristan huffed out a scoff, his face falling. He eyed the Lionguard around them, silent and unyielding. “Pay the soldiers, not the preening nobles.”

“Many of my soldiers follow those preening nobles,” Erida answered coolly. “And coin makes for the strongest allegiances. Konegin cannot buy what is already mine.”

“Konegin isnothingin this world.” His low hiss filled the gardens. “One day you’ll see that.”

She could only sigh, rolling her shoulders. Her ceremonial armor was so heavy, and beginning to dig into her ribs. “One day you’ll be right. But for now he’s still a threat. Just like your niece.”

“Indeed she is.” His lip curled.

Exasperated as she was, Erida couldn’t help but find quiet amusement in her own circumstance—and Corayne’s.So much of the world rests on the shoulders of two young women, with men squawking at our edges.She tried to take heart in it and sink back into the woman she was an hour ago, a queen of all she surveyed.

Instead she felt small, dull as the shrinking palace, a pearl without light to make it shine.I am a conqueror today. Why don’t I feel it?

Taristan’s voice deepened, so low it reverberated through the air, finding home in her chest. “Is it everything you dreamed of?”

She clenched her teeth, fighting the sudden rush of sadness.Her eyes fell shut for a long second. The birdsong and the fountain washed over her, enveloping her in soft noise.

“I wish my father were here to see this,” she finally said, forcing her eyes open again. The fire Taristan spoke of licked up inside her, consuming her pain, turning it into something she could use instead. Anger. Fear. Anything but sorrow. “I wish Konegin were here to see it. Chained to the floor, gagged, forced to watch as I become everything he ever tried to take from me.”

Taristan laughed openly, his teeth flashing.

“You are ruthless, Erida,” he said, moving so his shadow fell over her. “It’s why you were chosen.”

Erida’s stomach twisted. Her breath caught in her throat. “Chosen by who?” she gasped out, knowing the answer already.

“What Waits, of course.”

The name of his demon god sent a jolt through Erida’s body. Both a bucket of cold water and a bolt of lightning. She tried not to think of Him, and most days it was easy. The campaign had many distractions.

“He saw a weapon in you as he saw it in me. Something to treasure, and reward.” Taristan took her in, his eyes still dark, still empty of all but the fathomless black. “Does that discomfort you?”

She chewed her answer. “I don’t know,” she finally said. It was the truth.

Taristan remained, unwilling to step back—or move closer. He looked down at her, and Erida felt like a corpse on the battlefield, dead eyes open, staring up at her ending. She could not begin to know how many had seen her husband this way, in their last moments, bleeding and broken. Again she knew how foolish itfelt to trust him, to follow him willingly down such a dark path. And yet it felt like the right choice still. The only one she could ever truly make.

“You chose me too,” he breathed. “You saw what I was, what I offered, and you said yes. Why?”

Erida took a steadying breath.

“Another man would have been my jailer, his leash woven through my crown,” she said, matter-of-fact. “I’ve known it all my life. But you are my equal, and you see me as your equal too. No other suitor upon the Ward can say the same.”

Her words stilled him somehow, his eyelids growing heavy. He seemed like a dragon entranced by a lullaby.

Then Erida shrugged.“No other suitor served an apocalyptic god of another realm either,” she said, half smirking. “But if this is the price for my own freedom, my own victory, I will continue to pay.”

His eyes remained black and staring.

Somewhere out at sea, thunder rolled in the clouds, and a single raindrop fell, shockingly cold on her face. But the air was hot between them. Suddenly she felt the heat of his cheek beneath her raised hand, smooth and warm, near to feverish, but without any sweat. Like a hot stone in the sun.

He didn’t flinch beneath her fingers. Again he would not blink, his wild eyes seeming to swallow the world around them.