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She flinched as six pairs of eyes suddenly swept towards her, her gruff voice little more than a whisper. ‘The … the bones?’

‘Yes. Did you see it?’

Her gaze darted towards Creon and back to me, sharp with all the suspicion of a girl born and raised at the Crimson Court – trained to distrust fae and their words before she’d learned to walk. She didn’t speak.

‘Finn?’ I said quietly.

Her nod was barely more than a single, involuntary twitch of the head. But itwasa nod, and Tared’s slow, meaningful hiss was proof enough I was not the only one who’d seen it.

‘Well, there you have it,’ Creon said, sending Agenor a mirthless smile as he leisurely began rolling up his left sleeve – revealing a muscular bronze forearm, marked by the map of inked scars I could have drawn blindly. Such a calm, unthreatening gesture, and yet it somehow brought to mind the sharpening of a blade. ‘My bet is she intends to stay for a while, in that case. Transporting the bloody thing isn’t that simple.’

A brief silence settled over the table as that point sank in.

I couldn’t help but imagine that stately white room with its statues and the lily banner that must have taken years to complete – imagined Ophion gloatingly smashing the marble consuls off their pedestals, imagined that monstrous pile of bones erected in the place where Rosalind had smacked Halbert in the face two mornings ago. From the feverish gleam in her eyes, my mother was seeing very similar visions play across her mind.

‘Why in the world would she stay?’ Lyn muttered, looking nauseous. ‘She has everything she’ll ever need at the court. Why would she go to these lengths to turn those poor people’s lives into a living hell?’

‘They would like the symbolism of it, I think,’ Agenor said, bleakly rubbing his temples. ‘The last place capable of resistingthem, finally made to serve them. It sounds like something they’d find amusing.’

‘Oh, yes,’ Creon muttered, and the bitterness in his voice made me wince. ‘Absolutely hilarious.’

The look of understanding that went back and forth between the two of them was a rare one – a glimpse of centuries of mutual history, of shared memories that not even the deepest grudges, disagreements, or dislike could ever erase. How many times had they sat with her in that hall of bones and heard her forge these same vindictive plans, hating every word from her lips yet unable to do anything to stop her?

‘Honestly,’ Creon added, averting his gaze to finish the work on his second moss-green sleeve, ‘if she brought her throne, I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s planning to turn the place into a fourth court. One for every point on the compass. The Marble Court, or …’

‘My bet is on Alabaster Court,’ Tared said, wry gallows humour lacing his voice. ‘Has a more dignified ring to it.’

Creon’s snort came suspiciously close to a laugh. ‘Ten silverlings.’

‘Boys,’Lyn hissed, glancing ruefully at Rosalind. ‘Please. It’s hardly relevant what she’s naming the place when we just need to get her out of it.’

‘Fifteen,’ Tared muttered under his breath at Creon, then barely dodged the small fireball Lyn flung at him. I would have laughed if not for Rosalind, whose tight lips and paling knuckles suggested she’d left just a few too many friends and acquaintances behind to appreciate any attempts at lightness right now.

The glance Agenor sent her didn’t escape me. Nor did the hand he lowered behind the table to squeeze hers, or the shivery breath that escaped her in response.

My heart constricted a little.

‘Court names aside,’ I said before anyone could break the silence with more sensible but unbearable arguments about delaying our attack, ‘wouldn’t it be more beneficial for us to strike as soon as possible if we know she’s likely staying there? At least the city is still mostly unfamiliar to her now, and our human army knows it very well. Might be a small advantage.’

Agenor hesitated. ‘Yes, but—’

‘She also will have left a considerable force behind at the Crimson Court,’ Creon smoothly interrupted, his wings unfurling a fraction as he sat straighter. ‘More of them might come this way in the coming days or weeks. I’d personally prefer to attack before they arrive – especially if we have little hope of growing our own army, as Rosalind argued.’

‘Before they arrive, perhaps,’ Agenor said sharply, ‘buttomorrow?’

Creon shrugged, a small smile tugging at those soft lips. ‘We might surprise herandourselves.’

‘Much more likely, they’ll obliterate us.’ A joyless laugh. ‘I don’t have to tellyouthis is a madman’s gamble, do I?’

‘Did that ever stop me before?’ Creon dryly said.

My father’s overly restrained inhalation gave the impression his self-control was hanging by a last fraying thread, and his sanity, too. ‘Must you?’

‘Someone has to do it.’ And in the blink of an eye, that nettling amusement had melted off his face – no more princely provocations, that flippant arrogance reminding every single soul around him that even the deadliest battles had rarely been more than a game to him. In its place a cold ruthlessness arose, the Silent Death calculating his path to victory. ‘The simple fact is she’s only growing stronger and we’re only growing weaker. So you can do what you always do and wait for certainties and guarantees until half of us are cold in the ground—’

‘Oh, see?’ Rosalind muttered, a pale smile flickering over her face. ‘Hearing it from someone else for once.’

Agenor fell back in his chair, cursing under his breath. ‘We may lose more people on the battlefield than we’ll save by acting quickly.’