Fine. Apparently I was. And hell, why shouldn’t I? If I was going to ally with him to get Septimus out of this kingdom, I might as well put my ass on that throne, too.

The silence was suffocating. Jesmine didn’t show shock the way most people did. She just stared at me like she kept trying to make puzzle pieces fit together that were incompatible. I could feel it from the others, too—on me, on Raihn. I wondered if this was the first they were hearing about this arrangement, too.

Finally, Jesmine said, “Understood, Highness.”

It would never get less uncomfortable, hearing her call me that. But I tried to take this in stride, as Vincent would have, like it was nothing more than a given—of course a general would obey her queen.

“You will work with Vale and Ketura,” I said. “Devise a strategy for raising our joint army and using it to retake Sivrinaj. The quicker, the better.”

I felt like such an imposter.

But she obediently inclined her head. “Yes, Highness. It will be challenging. But not impossible.”

“Challenging has never scared us before.”

I found myself glancing at Raihn. Because of course, he and I were the “us.” I had never fought beside Jesmine before—never would have been allowed to, and Jesmine would have never deigned to lower herself to it. But Raihn and I... we had done the impossible together countless times over.

The little smile on his face said, There she is.

Then I looked to the rest of our sorry group—all in their dirty and stained fineries from the wedding, more than a week ago, now. Not that they looked much better than Raihn and I, in our ill-fitting, disgusting leathers. A pathetic sight.

“But that can wait a couple of hours,” I said. “Is there somewhere we can...” There was no other way to put it. “…wash the shit off of us?”

Jesmine’s nose wrinkled slightly. “That would be a relief for everyone. No offense intended.”

None taken.

“There are hot springs in the lower levels of the caves,” she said. “Alliah, my second, can show you. And she’ll find some clothes for you, too. Something less... marinated.”

Thank the fucking Mother for that.

I wasn’t the only one who thought so. Mische audibly groaned at the mention of springs.

“But Highness,” Jesmine said, as the others began to file out of the room, “if I may have just a few more moments of your time.”

I nodded, allowing the others to leave. Only Raihn hesitated, until I gave him a small nod, and he followed the others out.

She waited until the footsteps faded before she stood, her arms crossed over her chest.

“So,” she said. “Is that real?”

I knew what she was asking, and I knew why she was asking it. I would too, in her position.

“Yes,” I said. “It is.”

“Pretty trouble,” she said. “I warned you of that, once.”

Yes, well. Raihn was definitely trouble. Even now, I couldn’t deny that. But maybe he was the kind of trouble I needed. Right now, he was the kind of trouble all my people needed.

I should have had a very diplomatic, queenly response for her. Instead, I just said, “Sometimes we need a little trouble to get shit done.”

A short laugh. “Perhaps.” That smile faded, her face going steely. “You have my full loyalty and respect, Highness. Even if your decisions are not the ones I would make. In light of recent events, I want to make that clear.”

After seeing the way Raihn’s people had rebelled against him, I was so grateful for this, I could’ve hugged her. Yes, I knew this loyalty was borne of nothing but my relation to Vincent, complicated as it may be. But loyalty, no matter the source, was more precious than gold.

“I wanted to speak to you, too,” I said. “About something that Septimus has been working on.”

She listened as I told her about Septimus’s claims of the existence of god blood in the House of Night—and his claims that Vincent had known, and perhaps even harnessed it. I told her about the pendant I had recovered from Lahor, and the unfortunate fact that it was likely now in Septimus’s clutches. With every sentence, her brows rose slightly higher—the only change in her expression.

“Do you think this could be real?” I said. “Did Vincent tell you about it?”

Because surely, if he was going to entrust knowledge of a secret, powerful weapon to anyone, it would have been Jesmine, his Head of War—right?

But she was quiet, a regretful expression passing over her features—like a distant reflection over glass.

“Your father,” she said finally, “was a very secretive man.”

I wasn’t expecting this shade to her voice—sad, and a little vulnerable.

“But he trusted you,” I said. “Didn’t he?”

She laughed, short and humorless. “Trusted me. Yes, perhaps. As much as he trusted anyone.”

I was confused by this. Because when he was alive, I had envied Jesmine and Vincent’s closest advisors. I had envied them because they had a level of respect from him that I thought was beyond my reach. At least, until I won the Kejari and bound myself to him, matching his strength with a Coriatis bond.

My confusion must have shown on my face, because her brow quirked. “This surprises you.”

“I just... I always thought that you two had a...”

I wasn’t sure how to word it.

“You thought because I was his Head of War, and because he was fucking me, he told me things.”

I wasn’t going to put it that way, exactly, but…

“Well, yes,” I said.

A pained flinch, there and gone again in less than a second. “Me too,” she said. “For a while.”

The tone in her voice was so uncomfortably familiar. I’d always assumed she’d gotten some part of him I never could—not the sex, of course, but the trust. It had never occurred to me that she was chasing him, too. Hell, it had never even occurred to me that she had even cared enough to want that intimacy from him.

The question slipped out before I could stop it. “Did you love him, Jesmine?”

I half expected her to laugh at me for asking. It seemed like far too personal a question. But instead, she seemed to actually consider this.

“I loved him as my king,” she said at last. “And perhaps I could have loved him as a man, too. I did in some ways. Maybe I wanted to in more. But he could not have loved me.”

Why? I wanted to ask. Because Jesmine seemed like the epitome of everything a man like Vincent should love. Beautiful. Brilliant. Deadly. Powerful. If he had ever chosen to marry, I couldn’t have imagined a better match for him.

A tight smile flitted across her lips.

“Loving someone else is a dangerous thing,” she said. “Even for vampires. More dangerous still for a king. Vincent knew that. He was never going to open himself up to more weakness. And he already had exposed himself enough with the love he had for you.”

The words struck deep, and I wasn’t prepared. My jaw tightened. A raging monsoon of emotions knotted in my chest, all of them contradictory.

I so desperately craved to hear that Vincent had loved me.

And yet, I was so angry to hear it, too. Yes, maybe he had loved me. But he had still lied to me. He had still isolated me. He had still hurt me.

Maybe he had loved me. Maybe I got what Jesmine wanted and never could have. Was I supposed to be grateful for that alone?

What if I couldn’t be?

I just said, “Well. You said it. He was a secretive man.”

Jesmine nodded slowly, in a way that said, shamefully, she understood.

Then she cleared her throat. “So no,” she said. “He never talked to me about this... god blood. But that doesn’t mean he didn’t have it. On the contrary, I think it seems like exactly the sort of thing he would do. If it existed, he would have found it.”

“If that’s true,” I said, “then I sure as hell hope he hid it well. Somewhere Septimus and Simon can’t find it. Even if the pendant—”

I winced, as I did every time I thought of that damned pendant, cursing myself for ever letting it leave my sight.