“Oh, I’m sure he’ll do more than accept it. He might even reward you for such a display of devotion. Slide the knife in, and he’ll measure your faith in the spill of her blood.”

No. No, no, no.

The truth of it settles like a stone in my gut. The Wolf’s bargain, my promised end—all of it will be snatched away, and my uncle will do the job. He won’t know how to make it painless, how to make it quick.

Something wild thrashes in my chest, battering my ribs. I need to move. Now.

I lurch out of my chair and rush out of the room.

“Bryony.”

My slippers skid as I careen down the twisting halls. I have no idea where I’m going, just away, away, away—

The sanctum opens up ahead, and I stumble in, knees hitting the marble floor as my body revolts. I heave out the contents of my stomach behind the altar.

Footsteps sound at my back. Idris wrenches me up by the elbow, fingers digging in. “Done with your tantrum?”

I twist against his grip. “Don’t touch me.”

“You think running will change anything?”

“Let. Go.”

“For fuck’s sake.”

He shoves me. I slam into the altar stone and go down hard, my skull cracking against the floor. Pain explodes behind my eyes—blinding, vicious.

“Fuck,” he mutters. “Look what you made me do.” His voice comes from far away as his hands slide under me. “Why can’t you ever make things easy? Always fighting. Always causing problems.”

He lifts me, and my head lolls against his chest as he carries me.

I must lose consciousness, because when I open my eyes again, we’re in the carriage, and it’s moving. My head throbs. I touch my temple, and my fingers come away red.

“Where—” My tongue feels thick. I blink away the darkness overwhelming my sight. “Are we going to the palace?”

Idris doesn’t answer right away, his focus on some distant point out the window. When he finally speaks, his voice is flat. Cold. “We’re going up the Duehavn.”

Five little words that tighten around my throat like a noose.

*   *   *

The Duehavn Ridge is a crooked spine of rock and snow—a landscape pared down to its rawest elements. On the high slopes, everything is still. Quiet. The peaks glitter in the afternoon light, the low-angled sun catching on the icy crags. Nothing green softens its harsh edges. Nothing lives, nothing thrives. It’s the kind of place where things end.

A fitting backdrop for what’s coming.

I press my forehead to the window. Maybe if I close them, this will all melt away and reveal itself to be another resurrection nightmare dredged up from the silt of memory and trauma. Something I imagined after hitting my head on the temple floor. But the cut stopped bleeding thirty minutes ago, and I’m wide awake now.

My fingertips find the crook of my elbow, tracing the upraised lines carved into my flesh.

One notch. Breathe.

Two notches. I feel the velvet seat beneath me. Hear the rattle of the wheels.

Three. My name is Bryony Devaliant.

Four. I’m on the Duehavn Ridge, and my uncle is planning to kill me.

Five. Real.

Still here. Still rattling up the road to my murder.

I suck in a shaking breath. The air in the carriage feels too thick, and I want out, out, out—

There’s a shimmer in my periphery—the Shroud catching the sunlight. It hangs above the peaks, a veil of starlight that ripples and dances like a living thing.

Colors bloom over its surface in pinks and shimmering golds, indigo and red, bleeding into each other across the snowy slopes. The mountain glitters everywhere the light touches.

“Cruel, isn’t it?” I murmur. “How something so exquisite can demand such a brutal price.”

Idris’ lips press together in a grimace. “The gods’ creations often do.”

Nausea grips my stomach. I swallow it down and meet his eyes. “You’re going to do it, aren’t you? What the Oracle said.”

“For Vartena.”

Two words. As if they encompass the beginning and end of all things.

I choke back a bitter laugh. Of course he’s going to do it. The Eternal’s favor is worth a hundred oathbreaking princesses. A thousand. To him, I’m less than nothing, just a carcass to be dumped in some shallow grave. Another doomed woman murdered and discarded.

Murdered.

It feels important to name it. To acknowledge the truth of what’s about to happen.

The rage is sudden. Incandescent. It fills my head with a roaring static, narrowing everything down to the drum of my pulse, to my spiraling thoughts. What has Vartena given me? Nothing but a life spent shackled to the altar. I think of every cut, every dagger shoved into me at the Eternal’s command. And for what?

My fingers curl into fists. What would happen if I let all this fury explode out of me for once? If I turned on everyone, made them bleed the way they make me bleed?

I think about the Wolf in the forest clearing. Those amber eyes searing into mine, bright with a vicious sort of interest. At least he was honest about his work. At least he was quick.

Treat me like an equal.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’d rather die by the Wolf’s hand than yours.” I stand, steadying myself against the seat, and pound against the roof. “Stop the carriage!” I shout to the driver.

“Sit down, Bryony.”

“I said stop.”

“And I said sit.”

Fuck this.

The carriage slows just enough. I wrench at the door handle and jump onto the road, the sharp rocks skittering under my slippers.

Idris grabs me before I can take a step. I lash out with my fist and hit something soft. He grunts, but his grip on my arm tightens, bruising now.

“Let go!” I thrash. “Get off me, you miserable bastard—”

He slams me into the dirt, his weight pinning me down and driving the air out of my lungs until I’m gasping. He shoves his knee into my sternum.

“Get off me.”

I buck, putting every scrap of my strength behind it. Clawing at everything in reach. But Idris only pushes his knee harder and wraps a hand around my throat, squeezing, cutting off my air until bright sparks swarm my vision. Until that roaring static drowns out everything else.

Movement catches my eye. The driver. He’s watching us with his mouth hanging open as if he’s uncertain whether to intervene.

“Get back to the carriage,” Idris tells the other man without looking away from me. His thumb presses into my windpipe. “This girl is an oathbreaker.”

The driver’s mouth snaps shut. He looks at me again, and I see it—the moment he decides I’m not worth it. I’m nothing. He turns and walks to his seat like I’m not dying ten feet away.

Abandoning me to my fate.

“Please,” I rasp to Idris. Grasping, desperate. I force the words out through my narrowing airway. “Please, just let me—”

“No.” Idris’ free hand moves to his coat, and he draws out his jeweled dagger. “The Eternal wants you dead, and you heard the Oracle. Better I do this myself before he sets his sights on me.”

I bare my teeth. The fury inside me lunges against my ribs. “Fuck the Eternal. Fuck Vartena, and fuck you.”

He meets my gaze. Holds it.

And then he sinks the blade into my stomach.

He plunges the weapon in again and again, grunting with effort. It happens so fast. I don’t even feel it when he twists and rips the blade free one last time. Everything is so numb, so cold. I taste blood.

Through the black haze coating my vision, I see him crouched over me, silhouetted against the sun.

“I’d take you back for a pyre,” he says, wiping the knife clean on his pants, “but I’d rather not incite a riot on top of everything else.”

His fingers twist in the ruined tatters of my gown. With a few brutal slices, he cuts the blood-soaked fabric away. Leaving me in nothing but my cloak, naked and splayed open like an offering.