As Laila’s hand moved up one leg, then the other, Rune stared at Gideon. Remembering all over again what he was. A formidable enemy. A boy who wanted girls like her strung up and killed.

He’d been gathering evidence against her from the beginning, waiting for the right moment to bring her down. The gifts. The kisses. The words whispered in the dark between his bedsheets …

None of it had meant a thing.

“You are everything I thought you were,” she told him.

Laila found the knife strapped to Rune’s thigh, pulled it out, and tossed it aside. Gideon watched it go skittering across the floor.

“And you,” said Gideon, voice quiet, “are nothing at all like I imagined you’d be.”

For someone who’d been hunting her so relentlessly for two years, he should be more triumphant, she thought. Gloating and preening. Instead, he looked … destroyed.

Laila continued patting Rune’s body, never once meeting her gaze. Like Rune was no better than a dog.

“There’s nothing else,” Rune told her, face burning. “Just the knife.”

“I’ll be the judge of that,” said Laila.

The soldier who’d searched her saddlebags came back inside, approaching Gideon with the stolen Blood Guard uniform in hand. He set the clothes down on the table.

Rune swallowed, watching Gideon’s eyes narrow on the uniform, clearly wondering how she’d acquired it.

“What’s this?” Laila pressed the cold barrel of her pistol to Rune’s chest, tugging at the silver chain hanging there, the bottom of which was hidden below her shirt.

Rune watched as Laila used her gun to lift the ring Alex gave her out from beneath her collar. It dangled in the air, catching the light.

Rune tried to seize it, but her arms were pinned, and Laila beat her to it. The girl’s fist closed around the silver band. She yanked hard, breaking the chain, and handed it over to Gideon.

From the way his jaw clenched, she knew he recognized it immediately.

Rune felt like the world was falling apart around her. This wasn’t how she’d wanted him to find out.

“You’re engaged to him?”

He looked like he’d been punched in the stomach.

“I was going to tell you.” Rune pulled one arm free and stepped toward him, her fingers brushing his sleeve. “Gideon …”

He flinched away from her, as if she’d burned him. His eyes blackened as they met hers.

“Never touch me again.”

Rune shrank back, feeling something wither inside her.

But why should she cower? He was the one who’d tricked her into falling in love with him. He was the one consumed by hate. He was the one handing her over to be slaughtered.

Rune straightened. “That’s right. I am engaged to him. Your brother is twice the man you’ll ever be.”

The hurt in his eyes was unmistakable.

“You know what?” Stepping close, he took her hand and shoved the ring onto her finger. “Keep it.”

For some strange reason, the gesture made Rune want to burst into tears.

“We’re done here,” he said, brushing past her. “Arrest the Crimson Moth.”

She watched him walk away, the soldiers parting before him. Watched the door slam as he trod outside, leaving her at the mercy of witch hunters.

As if he couldn’t bear to breathe the same air as her for another second.

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FIFTY-SIX GIDEON

GIDEON SMASHED RUNE’S VIAL on the cobbles, watching the rain wash the blood away.

He couldn’t stop thinking about his mother’s ring on that chain around her neck. A ring he’d given Alex for safekeeping.

Alex had proposed to Rune. And Rune had accepted him.

You are a fucking fool, he told himself as he mounted his horse.

Of course none of it had meant anything. Of course he didn’t mean anything. Not to her. It was all a game, and though he supposed he’d won in the end, somehow, he’d still come out with nothing.

She’d chosen Alex.

And who wouldn’t?

Your brother is twice the man you’ll ever be.

The words turned Gideon’s heart to stone.

Why did it even matter? She was the Crimson Moth—a perpetual thorn in his side for two years now. A fucking witch.

He’d been deceived a second time. He’d opened himself up only to be skewered again. He’d believed in the girl Rune pretended to be. He’d allowed himself to hope. To think that maybe they could have something beautiful together. Something good.

Was there some flaw in Gideon that made him so naive? So susceptible to deception?

He ran a hand across his face, swiping off rain droplets. When Laila had finally secured the witch in restraints, shoving her out of his parents’ old shop and dragging her onto a horse, Gideon couldn’t bring himself to look at Rune. He stared straight ahead as he led them through the storm to the center of town, toward the purging platform standing in the main square, where Seraphine’s execution was soon to take place.

Now, a second witch would join her.

Lightning flashed as they arrived, illuminating the beams of the platform. A crowd had already gathered, waiting for the purgings to start.

Gideon tried to harden his pathetic heart against what came next. He should be celebrating his capture of a notorious criminal. This witch had been his obsession for two years. Hunting her down, putting her to death, seeing justice finally done.

She was the reason he got out of bed every morning.

But now that he had her, and justice was at hand, all he felt was hollow.

“Gideon!”

His brother’s voice made his head turn sharply, searching the crowd. He spotted Alex in the distance. Rain plastered his blond hair to his head as he pushed through the bodies.

Gideon swung down from his horse.

“What the hell are you doing?” Alex shouted, drenched with rain.

“What am I doing?”

Alex pushed past Gideon, moving for Rune, who was still mounted on Laila’s horse. “Let her go.”

Gideon grabbed his brother’s lapel and swung him back. “Watch yourself, brother. You’re on dangerous ground.”

Alex glared at him, his normally gentle eyes full of fury. He jabbed his finger in Rune’s direction while the crowd hissed and spat at her. “You’re perfectly fine with this?”

Keeping himself between his brother and the Crimson Moth, Gideon repeated something Bart Wentholt once said: “Someone has to do the dirty work of protecting you from dangerous witches.”

“She’s not a dangerous witch!” Alex shouted in his face. “She’s an innocent girl!”

“Innocent?” Gideon almost laughed. “She’s bewitched you, Alex.”

She’s bewitched us both.

“Would you look at yourself, for once!” Rain ran in rivulets down Alex’s face. “This warped sense of justice is destroying you!” He shook his head, sending droplets flying. “You’re about to murder the girl I love. Don’t you see how messed up that is?”

Gideon’s hands fisted.

“She’s a witch, Alex.” His voice was as cold as the gray sky overhead. “Sympathizing with them is an offense punishable by death.”

Alex lifted his chin, defiant. “Arrest me, then.”

The words landed like a blow. After all these years spent trying to protect Alex, his little brother was throwing Gideon’s sacrifices back in his face.

“Don’t be a fool,” Gideon said. He had an overwhelming urge to grab his little brother and drag him away. Lock him inside some closet until this was all over. Possibly never let him out. For Alex’s own sake.

His brother’s eyes were bright fire. Staring Gideon down, he shouted loud enough for the entire crowd to hear: “I knew she was the Crimson Moth and I didn’t tell you!”

“Alex,” Rune interrupted from behind them both. “Don’t do this.”