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After years of service to both Erida and her own father, Lord Thornwall was not the kind to speak out of turn. Or speak when there was simply nothing to say. Erida knew that much of him. She saw his confusion too, written in the lines of his furrowed brow.

He does not understand, she thought.But how could he know that Corayne is the key to this realm? He does not see what we see, not truly.

Lord Thornwall kept his distance from Taristan’s corpse army. Terrifying as it was to her nobles, the army had proved its worth more than once. Thornwall’s own command was of living soldiers, and he knew nothing of Spindles torn. Only that Erida and Taristan were the glory of Old Cor reborn, their destiny written in blood.

He does not need to understand, Erida knew.He only needs to follow orders.

Finally, she gestured for the old man to stand.

Thornwall gave a grateful gasp as he rose, his leg still shaking.

“You Majesty,” he muttered.

Her scowl remained.

“Bring me a head, Lord Thornwall,” she commanded. “You choose which.”

Theirs, or your own.

Thornwall heard the threat clear as a bell, his red face going white. His eyes searched her, looking for any softness, any indication of Erida’s own loyalty to her great commander. The Queen remained as stone beneath his scrutiny, daring him to find a chink in her armor.

There was none.

“Yes, Your Majesty,” he whispered, bowing away from the simple chair that was her throne.

She watched him go, his lieutenants scurrying after him like hounds behind a hunter. They would not say a word until they were well out of the cathedral, returned to the legion’s makeshift camp in the cathedral square.

The doors shut behind them, the slam a dull echo up the cathedral tower. Erida loosened a little. Her shoulders dropped an inch, the hard set of her jaw relaxing. Around the central chamber, her Lionguard remained, golden statues set at intervals. Already Thornwall and Lady Harrsing had replaced her fallen knights, bolstering their ranks.

That nonsense is at least taken care of, Erida thought, grateful to be rid of one more task.

Before Harrsing and the ladies could flock back, Erida took another step from her chair. Taristan moved with her, offering his arm in a courtly gesture.

Erida twisted a smirk at him, rankled as she was by the circumstance.

“Now you decide to have some manners,” she muttered, letting him lead her away to their bedchamber.

She spent her rage on his body.

As her enemies had ravaged her city, so did Erida ravage Taristan. He was happy to oblige, his own muscles corded tight with anger, the white veins bursting under his skin. New wounds trailed beneath her fingertips, each one hot as the wick of a candle. She mourned every scratch and scar. They were a terrible, indisputable testament of Taristan’s weakness. He hated them too, as much as he pretended not to care. She felt it in the way he held her wrist.

As the minutes stretched, Erida let herself be lost, until her own anger and his frustration fell away. She forgot most things, even the pain in her wounded hand. Their oblivion consumed, until even the warrior prince lay still but for the rise and fall of his bare chest.

For the first time, Erida left marks on him.

She would not trace them, and subject Taristan to yet another reminder.

Their bedchamber in the Konrada once belonged to the high priest of the Godly Pantheon, and his things reflected the life of a mortal approaching death. Fat, waxy candles covered every surface, to provide enough light for aging eyes to read by. His bed was small and too hard, the mattress overstuffed, the pillows little more than two feathers put together. A single glass eye of a window peered out on the plaza, offering a clear view over the smoldering remains of the New Palace.

Erida would not look at it, not yet. She’d heard enough reports of the damage to know the blow struck was astronomical. But she could not force herself to see it, and accept the destruction the Amhara wrought. On Erida, on her authority. And on the palace her forefathers built, king after king.

All lost by a queen.

Erida bit the inside of her cheek, tasting blood. She winced and leapt from the priest’s bed, crossing to a washbasin set on the sideboard. After gulping water from a cup, she spit pink into the hammered copper bowl.

A warped shadow of her own face stared back at her, distorted by the metal. Blood and water swirled over it.

“What do we do, Taristan?” she murmured to the shadows. “I’ve raised bounties, hired assassins. I have the largest army this side of the mountains looking for her.”