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“Trusting them is idiotic. Or have you forgotten—”

Cyara slapped him.

Ancestors below, but she was bold.

“Mind your tongue in the presence of the Queen,” Cyara warned, stepping back and out of easy range of Gawayn’s grasp.

The Captain of my Goldstone Guards stared at the handmaiden as if he’d like nothing more than to drag her over to my balcony and drop her off of it. As if my thoughts were carried on the wind, her delicate white feathered wings twitched. Little good it would do him.

He could have bested her in a second. But instead, he glanced my direction. I avoided his gaze in the reflection of my mirror.

“I seek to protect the Queen,” Gawayn said.

“As do we all,” Cyara said back instantly. The response had clearly been poised on the tip of her tongue.

Protect. So many people intent on protecting me.

Gawayn blamed himself for my brother’s death and had become insufferable in his duties since the moment he shoved me into that passageway to safety. Cyara refused to even let Arthur’s name be spoken within my earshot, she was so afraid it would unhinge me.

Maybe if they’d all protected Arthur so diligently he would still be alive.

They were as culpable as the rest of us.

I shook my head, ripping the tail of white hair out of Carly’s grip and ruining her last several minutes of work. The string of opals hit the tiled floor with a hideous clash.

“Go. All of you.”

Not a single one of them dared to look at me. They stared at the floors, the goldstone pillars, gems on swords and mounted on rings. But none of them could look at me. If the truth was told, I preferred it that way. If no one looked too close, no one would realize my plan.

“Out,” I rasped, nothing more than a hoarse whisper.

In the next breath, I was alone.

Just like always.

7

VEYKA

Out. Out. Out.

The word drummed an unbearable demand with every beat of my heart.

I had to get out.

To the balcony, where everyone could see but no one ever noticed. Through the secret panel.

Secret. Our secret. But not ours any longer. Not when there was only one alive to keep it.

My secret. But not my most dangerous one.

Down the staircase. Wait behind the door. Dash across the hall. Staircase. Staircase. Staircase. Down. Down. Down.

Into the bowels of the mountain. Into the depths whose secrets were now forgotten.

I could smell the freedom; taste the brightness of it on my tongue.

Five more steps. On my belly, cursing the layers of soft flesh slowing me down, slithering through the tunnel. Then air.