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Chapters (50)
  1. Praise for
  2. Title Page
  3. Dedication
  4. City of Mariit: Capital of Maynara Map
  5. One
  6. One
  7. Two
  8. Three
  9. Four
  10. Five
  11. Six
  12. Seven
  13. Eight
  14. Nine
  15. Two
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Twelve
  19. Thirteen
  20. Fourteen
  21. Fifteen
  22. Sixteen
  23. Three
  24. Seventeen
  25. Eighteen
  26. Nineteen
  27. Twenty
  28. Twenty-One
  29. Twenty-Two
  30. Four
  31. By Order of General Ojas,On Behalf of Her Majesty Hara Duja
  32. Twenty-Three
  33. Twenty-Four
  34. Twenty-Five
  35. Twenty-Six
  36. Twenty-Seven
  37. Twenty-Eight
  38. Twenty-Nine
  39. Thirty
  40. Thirty-One
  41. Thirty-Two
  42. Thirty-Three
  43. Five
  44. A Coronation Prayer
  45. Thirty-Four
  46. Epilogue
  47. Acknowledgments
  48. Thank You
  49. About the Author
  50. Violetear Books x Bindery Books

Soon, Imeria would have her vengeance. Soon, her dance with Duja would come to an end.

Twenty-Nine

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Duja

Duja’s brother joined her in her cell. She saw him as the handsome young man he’d once been. Tall and slender, with dark-brown skin and a sharp, mocking gaze. It startled her in that moment just how much he resembled Laya. The outline of his profile blurred in the dim bar of light that streamed through the narrow window. She should have known he would come to her in this miserable prison cell, appearing only when she was at her lowest.

“Poor sister,” he said, sighing as his dark eyes fell on the brass shackles encircling her wrists. “How on earth did you wind up down here?”

“Brother,” she said in a low voice. “You know better than to return.”

None of this was real. Pangil had not come back to Maynara. I watched you, she thought. I watched you sail away.

“You look well, Duja,” he said, smiling sadly. “Did you enjoy my gift?”

She laughed to herself. The sound echoed across the slime-coated walls of the prison hold. Pangil was talking about the precioso.

“Your gift⁠—fat lot of good that would do me now,” she said, waving her hand at the gray walls of the cell around them.

Pangil let out a weary sigh and inched closer to her. “Duja⁠—”

“Don’t.” She recoiled. He was a ghost, but she still feared him.

His eyes dropped to her neck, to the tail of the scar that peeked out from under her ceremonial sash. “I know I hurt you. My own sister. Know that I am a changed man. I will never harm you, or anyone else, again.”

Lies. Pangil would not fool her with his empty promises. Not this time.

Duja shook her head, backing away from him. “How can I believe you? You are the reason Mother is dead,” she said, her voice cracking. “All of this is your fault. Now Imeria has my family, and I can do nothing to save them.”

Pangil fell to his knees before her as she sobbed into her hands. “Don’t cry, Sister,” he said in that smooth, velvet voice of his. “I am here now. All is not lost.”

“It’s too late, Pangil. I bet you’re satisfied with the mess I’ve made of my reign,” she bit out through her tears. “You were always telling me I was never meant to be sovereign. I should have listened to you. Now I’m about to lose everything.”

Perhaps she should have never ordered her brother’s exile. Becoming queen⁠—perhaps that had been her first mistake.

Guilt creased her brother’s face. “I was cruel and immature. I would have made a pitiful king. In a time of turmoil, you brought stability to the realm. You were the queen Maynara needed.”