ad felt like the last small cruelty in a day already full of them. She stood at the window long after the palace had gone quiet around

ad watched Alaric use to cross the great hall. When she opened it, he was standing in the corridor alone, without Se

isit," Wren said, no

o her face. "May I come in. There are things about the binding you should und

on needed to happen than any particular trust, and he crossed to stand near the

han marriage as either of our peoples understand it now. Under the Red Moon, both parties open a wound, blood to blood, and the pact renews itself t

hin a

mething almost like an apology in his expression, though he did not quite let it become one. "I won't pretend this is easy for you. I've watched enough of my father's court to know exac

le arrangement feels like it was built to be exactly as thin as it needs to be to keep the two of us tied together without either of us ever having

recognition that comes from someone naming a thing you had not fully l

your council decides the wards need reinforcing an

e would have believed a confident answer. "No binding has ever failed to hold, as far as the histories record. But no binding has ever happened under circumstan

still. "You not

ateful for that small restraint even as she remained wary of everything else about him. "My uncle has run the day to day business of this court for over a year, since my fath

he's behind

ently prepared to lose. But I think it's worth both of us being careful. You especially. A pact bride who arrives under suspicious circumstances an

uspected something like it since the hollow, but because hearing it confirmed by the one person in this palac

lk into this blind. Let your uncle's plans, whatever the

alachi's hands along with it." He held her gaze, steady despite the admission. "I'm not telling you this out of kindness, Wren. I'

ou're hones

one as quickly as it arrived. "You said something at dinner. About true things not always being welcome in a room like th

his bloodline was capable of, and found, somewhat to her own irritation, that she believed him, at least about this. "Fine. Th

"For either of us. Which is precisely

ion over in her mind, unable to decide whether she had just made an ally out of the last person on earth she expected to find one in

he dreamed not of the hollow, or of Bram's ruined throat, but of a thin red