The Gilded Cage （The Prison Healer #2）
Lynette Noni
About the Book
“You need to choose, Kiva. It’s him or us. Them or us. You can’t have it both ways.”
Kiva Meridan is a survivor.
Not only did she survive Zalindov Prison, but also the deadly Trial by Ordeal. Now, Kiva’s purpose goes beyond survival to vengeance. For the past ten years, her only goal was to reunite with her family and destroy the people responsible for ruining their lives. But now that she has escaped Zalindov, her mission has become more complicated than ever.
As Kiva settles into her new life in the capital, she discovers she wasn’t the only one who suffered while she was in Zalindov — her siblings and their beliefs have changed, too. Soon it’s not just her enemies she’s keeping secrets from, but her own family as well.
Outside the city walls, tensions are brewing from the rebels, along with whispers of a growing threat from the northern kingdoms. Kiva’s allegiances are more important than ever, but she’s beginning to question where they truly lie. To survive this time, she’ll have to navigate a complicated web of lies before both sides of the battle turn against her and she loses everything.
To Mum —
For the penguin.
PROLOGUE
Running.
They had to keep running.
The night was dark, the cold so bitter that it pierced straight through to their bones, but still, they couldn’t stop. Not when death itself chased their heels.
“Mama, where are we —”
“Quiet, sweetheart,” the woman hushed her daughter, looking over her shoulder for any sign of pursuit.
“But what about Papa?” the little boy whispered. “What about —”
“Shhh,” the woman cut him off, gripping his hand tighter and hastening his steps.
Neither the little boy nor his older sister uttered another word, both sensing their mother’s urgency, both seeing the silent tears that slid down her face, shining in the moonlight.
On they ran, none speaking of who they had left behind and everything they had lost that night.
The woman couldn’t bear to close her eyes lest she recall the image of her family’s cottage in flames, her husband and youngest daughter being dragged away by the Royal Guard, her youngest son —
A sob left her mouth before she could stifle it.
Her son was dead.
He was dead.
The woman clamped down on her tongue to halt another sob, grateful that her two eldest children had heeded her command to stay hidden when she’d crept back to investigate, sparing them from the sight that would forever haunt her nightmares.
A sword piercing his small chest.
Her husband begging for help.
Her daughter screaming, trying to reach him, desperate to save him.
But it was too late.
“Mama, you’re hurting me.”
Her son’s quiet whimper had her easing her grip and whispering an apology. It was all she could manage, too choked by what she was feeling to offer anything more.
Hours passed as they followed the twisting Aldon River, never slowing, always looking back to see if they were being followed. There was no sign of the guards, but the woman didn’t risk stopping until they were deep in the foothills of the Armine Mountains, far from any civilization. A safe house, she had been told. A place where she might find sanctuary, should the worst ever fall upon her and her loved ones.
When the invitation had come from a cloaked stranger in the marketplace, she’d laughed as if it were a joke, claiming to have no idea why her family would ever be in such danger. They were but humble servants of the people, she’d said, her husband the village healer, she herself a devoted wife and mother.
How they had tracked her down, she had no idea. For years she had remained in hiding, after a lifetime of denying whose blood ran in her veins.
Some called it the blood of traitors.
Others, the blood of kings.
Or — in her case — queens.
The woman had done everything she could to ignore the rumors of the growing rebel group searching for descendants of their long-lost monarch. She’d taken a new name and become a new person, wanting nothing more than a quiet life with her beloved family.
Tonight, half of that family had been ripped from her.
Something vital within her had shattered as she’d watched, helpless to do anything.
She never wanted to feel that helpless again.
She would never allow herself to feel that helpless again.
And so, as she and her two remaining children approached the safe house — a thatched cottage hidden deep in the snow-dusted woods — the woman made a decision.