“I agree,” said Alex. He sat cross-legged beside Rune, one hand planted on the floorboards behind her, his shoulder touching hers. With his closeness came the comforting warmth of him, along with his leather and oak smell. “You’ll be safer with Verity at your side.”
Rune slit her eyes at them both. “And if something goes wrong?”
Verity tilted her chin back so the brim of the soldier’s hat stopped obscuring her view. “Then you won’t be alone when they throw you in a cell.”
From the firm press of her lips, she wouldn’t take no for an answer.
Admittedly, Rune felt calmer knowing Verity would be there. “Fine,” she sighed. “Thank you.”
She set her stack of clothes on the carpet in front of her, next to Gideon’s access coin and her last remaining vial of blood. It was mostly full. She’d been trying to save as much of it for tomorrow’s heist as possible, in case something went wrong and she needed to cast a spell—or several—to get them out.
It would have been nice to replenish at least some of her blood stores before tomorrow, but her monthly cycle hadn’t started yet.
“It would make me feel better if we went through the plan one last time,” said Alex.
So they did.
At three o’clock in the afternoon, Rune would meet Verity at her dormitory, and together they would don their Blood Guard uniforms. While crowds of people filled the streets for the Liberty Day festivities, they would travel to the palace and enter the prison.
Alex would wait with the horses a block away.
Once inside, Rune and Verity would use Gideon’s access coin to get past the seventh gate, telling the guards they had orders to bring Seraphine to her purging. They would retrieve Seraphine, usher her out of the palace prison, and bring her to Alex and the waiting horses.
From there, Rune and Alex would hide Seraphine at Thornwood Hall. The next day, they would board the ship to Caelis with Seraphine concealed in their cargo, bound for freedom.
Rune’s heart stuttered at the thought. In two days, she’d be sailing across the Barrow Strait, toward a new life.
As if hearing her thoughts, Alex reached for her hand, lacing their fingers together.
Verity yawned.
“We should all try to get some sleep tonight,” said Rune, worried about her exhausted friend. She pushed up from the casting room floor. “Come on. I’ll walk you both out.”
* * *
AFTER SEEING BOTH VERITY and Alex off, Rune returned to her bedroom and changed into her nightgown. Just before climbing into her bedsheets, she saw a box tied with a ribbon at the foot of her bed.
Rune had been so busy packing for Caelis all day, Lizbeth must not have wanted to bother her with it.
Sitting down on the bed, she pulled the box toward her and tugged the folded piece of paper out from under the ribbon. Unfolding it, she recognized the handwriting and immediately stopped reading.
It was from Gideon.
The conversation she’d overheard between him and the girl called Harrow flared anew inside her, burning like a hot iron. Anger and hurt blazed in her chest.
She wanted to throw his letter onto the fire, unread.
Except … was it fair to hate him so much for pretending? Rune had pretended right along with him. She’d used him the same way he’d used her.
It was Rune who’d invited him to her bedroom the night of their first kiss. She had considered crossing that uncrossable line in her attempt to extract what she needed from him. She’d practically begged him to take her into his bed the other night—to trick him, once and for all. To make him believe the lie she’d built in order to dupe him into marrying her, so she could use him in the future.
At least, that was part of it. The smallest part of it, but still.
Rune had been holding Gideon Sharpe to a different standard, despite playing the same game. Really, she was no different than him.
The thought made her squirm uncomfortably.
Taking a deep breath, she lifted the letter and started to read:
Rune—
The things you overheard yesterday morning—as despicable as they were—I said to protect us both. If I’d told Harrow the truth, she would declare me compromised. I needed her and Laila to believe in your innocence, and the best way to do that was to make them think I felt nothing for you.
It doesn’t absolve my actions—it’s true that I started courting you to try and uncover the Moth. I don’t expect your forgiveness. But I need you to know that what we did the other night wasn’t a lie. Not for me. Everything I said that night, I meant.