The Essence

But it was Sabara who cleared them for me. She had to be stopped, Charlaina. We couldn’t let her tell anyone.

“We?” I uttered out loud, my voice broken. I didn’t care that Niko was watching, or that I sounded insane. “We didn’t do anything. You did.”

She didn’t try to explain, or to convince me she was right. She simply repeated, She had to be stopped.

I didn’t think she was wrong, but I couldn’t agree with her methods. I stared at my hands—hands that had just betrayed me—and wondered how I could possibly agree with her.

She’d just killed a queen.

She’d just used me to kill Queen Langdon.

“It’s okay,” Niko pledged, gripping my shoulders fiercely as he stared into my unblinking eyes. “I’ll handle this. I’ll take care of things here. The important thing is to get you out of here.” He ran his hand through his already rumpled hair and then reached for the top button of his shirt and tore it open. “Go to your room and stay there. Don’t come out till morning. By then, I’ll have everything under control.”

I shook my head. What did he mean, under control?

“Go!” he insisted, grabbing my arms and shaking me once. The fire in his eyes left no room for argument, and I wasn’t sure whether to be horrified or relieved. “In the morning, we’ll make an excuse to get you out of here. We need to get you away from here and back to Ludania. You’ll be safer there.”

“But . . . what if I’m not?” I thought about everything that had happened, the threats on my life and the soldiers who’d been killed trying to protect me. “What if I’m not safe anywhere?”

I was too keyed up to sleep, but I somehow managed to stay still beneath the covers, mostly because I was afraid. Afraid to move, afraid even to breathe.

I worried that Sabara would come back. Or worse, that someone else would come for me, breaking down the doors to my bedchamber to capture me and drag me away. Take me to the dungeons.

Where monsters like me belonged.

Aron had gone to the soldiers’ quarters to meet with the others as soon as I’d come back. If he’d have argued, or even have asked to stay, I would’ve let him, that’s how frightened I was of myself. Instead it was just me and Brook now.

She slept her drunken sleep, never waking. Barely stirring.

Eventually Max came in too, but I remained motionless. I wasn’t ready to face him, not after what I’d done. Yet even with him sleeping on the floor, I could sense his presence like my own heartbeat. I could feel each breath he took calling to me.

I’d missed him, and I ached knowing that he was so close. That I could have him if I’d only allow myself.

xviii

“Charlie.” The voice was irritating and I rolled away from it, trying to wrap myself back in the darkness. But it came again, annoying and insistent. “Charlie, wake up!”

I groaned, throwing my arm across my face. “Go away, Brook. Can’t you find someone else to bother?”

The bed jostled, and I knew she’d plopped on it beside me. “I could, but I need you. Something’s happened.”

Alarm shot through me as I realized she could be talking about me. That I could be the something she meant.

I turned back toward her, trying to look interested rather than guilty. “What is it?”

She dropped down, so she was right at my face. I didn’t tell her that her breath was flammable, that I could still smell the alcohol lingering from the night before. This hardly seemed the time. “Queen Langdon died.” She whispered the words, her voice sounding ominous, maybe even accusatory—although I’d probably imagined that last part.

“What happened to her?” I asked, rubbing the grit from my eyes. I glanced down, only mildly aware that I was less . . . glowy this morning. “Who do they suspect?”

“Suspect? What are you talking about? She was a million years old.” Brook laughed, even though this was hardly a laughing matter. “She died in her sleep. But everyone’s talking about it. Some of the other queens are already preparing to leave. Queen Hestia claims it’s bad form to continue the summit under the circumstances. Empress Filis just said: ‘When a party’s over, it’s over. And this party’s over.’

“They’re both planning to be on the next ferry.”

I nodded, unsure what she expected me to say. All I could focus on were the words died in her sleep. I wondered what Niko had done. I wondered if he’d known a back way into her chamber too, if that was how he’d staged her death.

Shame choked me and I clambered to get upright, where the air felt less offensive, less critical.

“Where’s Max?” I asked, only just realizing he wasn’t here with us. Brook, too, looked as if she’d been up for a while. She was dressed and her hair was pulled back from her clean-scrubbed face.

“He and Claude are with Aron and Sebastian, making preparations. We’re leaving too,” she added, her brows raised as if she expected me to challenge the notion.

Again, I nodded. It was the right thing to do, to get back to Ludania. To sort things out at home—and with myself—before trying to negotiate such tricky matters as foreign policies and trade. Clearly I wasn’t ready.

Clearly I couldn’t yet manage Sabara.

Being on the ferry again stirred up a new kind of discomfort.

I didn’t like having Max and Niko together like this. We were too close—the three of us. Four, if you counted Sabara, and she definitely counted herself. She reminded me without words that Niko was still the most important thing to her by forcing my mind to wander, filling my head with all kinds of unwanted thoughts of him. My cheeks burned whenever he glanced my way.