“Eaaasy.” Jhamal’s arm is sturdy under me, helping me sit upright. He’s wrapped in a dingy set of robes. He holds a bowl to my lips and warm garlicky liquid fills me. The warmth coats my insides and they twist in a cramp. I hurl over and he holds my hair back. The bile is salty when it comes out and I spit until I can hardly catch my breath. I press against the cold wall, panting. Weak. Why am I so weak?

“What have they done to me?” I mutter.

“They tried to remove your cuffs, my Queen.”

I gasp and the puffy skin around where my cuffs meet my skin makes sense. But why can’t I remember? The walls of our cage suddenly feel smaller. My pulse ticks faster. “We’re in prison, so the Chancellor, he—”

But the blood rushing through me so suddenly makes the world swim.

He swipes cold sweat from my clammy forehead before making me drink more. It gurgles right back up, but I gulp it down. Bile and all.

I grunt. He holds the bowl to my lips again.

“More. For strength. Come on, you need it.”

I take another sip and this one goes down. But my words trail off. Eating soup has completely exhausted me.

“Rest,” he says, laying me back on my pallet on the hard cell floor. I’m cold all over, hugging around myself, and he scoots closer to me. Under his warmth my eyes are as heavy as my gilded arms. Sleep tugs at me.

I give in.

“Up.” Jhamal tugs me and my body cooperates. The wall of our confinement cell is at my back. The tiny strings between puckered spots on my arms are gone, and only slightly swollen skin remains. How long has it been? I blink and see the same unfamiliar face with long eyelashes in my head.

Questions are a haze in my mind, but as I try to form them on my lips, a woman with a limpy gait slides a tray between the grates of our prison cell. I recognize her face. She’s one of the ones who brings us meals. The same one who gave Jhamal the needle and thread. She always comes this time of day. I blow out a breath in relief that at least some of my memories are coming back to me. I search for more. Jhamal holding stone bowls to my lips, clanging metal bars, the slap of the food tray on the cold stone floor. And sleep. Lots of sleep. I still can’t remember being brought in here.

“Food,” the woman says.

Jhamal thanks her and I do too… in my head, my tongue still chalky. She glances over her shoulder before pulling a book from under her robe. “Remember, the matches. Burn it if they come back before I do.”