I reached for him again, and though he tried to jerk away, my palm curved beneath his jaw, his skin still slick with fresh blood. My eyes stung as desperation seized me by the throat.
“Please, Henri,” I begged. “I’m only trying to protect you. I’ve lost so much. I can’t bear to lose you, too.”
“Lost?” He laughed bitterly. “What have you lost? You’re the most powerful person in the realm.”
Henri’s features warped into a snarl of hatred and vengeance, revulsion and wrath. I could find no trace of the sweet boy I had fallen for. The man who stood in front of me now had been hardened into someone else completely.
But I saw my grief reflected in him, too. He looked at me as if he were watching me die in slow motion. As if the woman he loved was too far away to save, and he was already prepared to avenge my loss. It was the same despair-induced rage I saw in him when he talked about his mother—how they had stolen her from him, and how he would make them pay for it in blood.
“I’m still here,” I pleaded, my voice breaking. “I’m still me.”
“Are you?” he said archly. “The Diem I know would never send me away. We’ve always faced every challenge together. We trusted each other with everything. Then you become one of them, and you want nothing to do with me.”
The hurt in his voice gripped my heart in its fist and clenched it tight. “That’s not true. I do trust you, I swear it, but tonight, I need you to trust me. You and I can’t take them on alone.”
“We’re not going to be alone.”
My blood chilled to ice. “What do you mean?”
His eyes narrowed and skimmed over my face—assessing whether I could be trusted, whether I was friend or foe. His doubt was a rusted knife, carving me up unimaginably deep.
“The rebels are waiting outside the gates for my signal,” he said finally. “Vance called in all the Guardians across Lumnos. Some from Fortos, too. We’ve got an army two hundred strong. We’re going to take the palace.”
The world was spinning, shattering, crumbling. My eyes struggled to stay focused on the real, too lost in visions of what could be. Everything was in flames, everything covered in blood. Bodies, so many bodies. People I cared for, children, friends—all laying dead at my feet.
I gripped him by the elbow, squeezing until I felt his joints creak beneath my fingers. “Henri, have you lost your Flaming mind? Two hundred mortals is nothing against all these Descended. The Guardians don’t have a chance.”
He tried to pull away, glaring as I held him firm. “We have weapons. We have bombs. We can fight their magic—we did it before at the armory.”
I remembered what Luther had told me about Descended preferring to hide their magic from mortal eyes. I wondered now if that had been a tragically unwise choice, leaving the mortals too naive to the true danger they faced.
Or maybe that was the point—to draw the mortals into a fight they couldn’t win and give the Descended an excuse to slaughter them for good.
“This isn’t like the armory,” I argued. “You’re not just ambushing a few night watchmen. Every powerful Descended in the realm is here, along with half the Royal Guard.”
“Good. We’ll kill them all at once. We’ll destroy the entire ballroom before they have a chance to fight back.”
He said it so quickly, so casually, like running an errand or finishing a chore.
“There are children here, Henri. Innocent people who have done no wrong.”
Even before I said the words, I knew they would have no effect. The radicalization of the Guardians and the unbending hatred they preached had sunk its fangs deep and filled Henri with a venom I didn’t know how to cure.
“War requires sacrifice,” he said bluntly. “Our children are dying, too. Do you even care about the mortals anymore?”
“Of course I do. Protecting them means everything to me.”
“Then this is your chance to prove it.”
A door clattered open behind me, followed by footsteps. By the inferno that flushed Henri’s expression, and the way his palm closed around the hilt of his blade, I didn’t have to guess who had just joined us.
Henri leaned his face close to mine, his brown eyes alight with challenge. “War is coming, Diem. Time to pick a side.”
My eyes briefly closed as I nodded. My shoulders rose and fell in a slow, shuddering breath. I placed a hand on Henri’s heart and trailed it down his chest, my tears mixing with his blood as I pressed my lips to his.
“Please forgive me,” I whispered.
I snatched Henri’s blade from its sheath and jerked to my feet, throwing the weapon out of reach. As I backed away, his eyes went wide with realization, and my heart shattered.
This line, I could never uncross.
“Diem, don’t do this—”
“Guards!” I shouted. A horde of them rushed into the room and surrounded us. “Hold this man in the dungeon until the ball is over.”
“Please, Diem, stop—”
“Do not harm him. Anyone who does will pay with their life. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” they answered in unison.
I held Henri’s frantic gaze in a silent plea for forgiveness as the guards clamped down on his thrashing limbs to hold him tight. They dragged him away, roars of protest echoing in his wake, each agonizing cry a hammer strike against my ruined soul.
Just before he disappeared behind a corner, I caught his eye, and one emotion stared back at me with dreadful clarity—betrayal.
No love. No trust. No hope.
No attempt to understand. No willingness to forgive.
Only betrayal.
A heartbroken sob cracked out of me. The pain was visceral, overwhelming. I couldn’t get air into my strangled lungs. Would he ever see that I had done this for him, for the mortals—that stopping this attack didn’t mean choosing the Descended?
If anything, my hatred for them had just grown tenfold. They were taking everything from me. My life, my family, the man I cared for—everything that made me me was being whittled to splinters by this gods-damned Crown.
A hand settled gingerly on my shoulder.
“Are you alright?”
I went to wipe my face, then froze at the last second at the sight of Henri’s blood smeared on my fingers. A droplet of it fell and landed on the hem of my gown in a tiny scarlet pool.
“No,” I said honestly as the tears streamed down my cheeks.
A pair of hands took me by the waist and pulled me into a solid chest, enclosed within two strong arms.
My body instinctively stiffened. Something felt wrong.
An unfamiliar mix of cinnamon and vanilla filled my nose, then a lock of blonde hair caught my eye. It wasn’t Luther who had walked in behind me, but Aemonn. It was his arms wrapped around me, his hands stroking my hair, his lips offering hushed words of encouragement.
“I… I need Luther,” I stammered without thinking.
Aemonn’s posture tensed, his hands freezing in place.
“I need him to issue an order to the Royal Guard,” I added quickly.
He relaxed, and then he was nodding and holding me closer once more. And still, it all felt wrong.
He muttered something to a nearby guard, and a few moments later, I felt Luther come into the room. The power churning around him was a signature I now knew by heart. Before he even said a word, I sensed the panic rippling through him.