What pained her most was the knowledge that this was all her fault. The Resistant members Darling had spared were trying to liberate her from his “custody.” After his attack, they’d sent over a demand for her release.

I’m going to be the death of him. No matter how hard she tried to argue it, she kept coming back to that one basic fact. So long as she was with him, he was in danger.

But she couldn’t stand the thought of leaving him. Especially not in the condition he was in.

Yet if she stayed, her allies—his enemies, would kill him.

“Maybe I should leave.”

“Are you serious?”

Zarya hadn’t realized she’d spoken out loud until Mari’s question startled her. Swallowing the lump in her throat, she met his gaze on the other side of the bed. “How can I stay when I endanger him?”

Maris shot to his feet and closed the distance between them. “You can’t go, Zarya. You can’t. Do you not understand what it would do to him? He wasn’t human until you came.”

But she didn’t believe that. “He was human.”

Maris’s face paled and when he spoke, it was in the sincerest tone she’d ever heard. “No, he wasn’t. He was not the man you know.” He pulled Darling’s computer off the nightstand and turned it on.

After a few minutes, he handed it to her.

Scowling, she focused her attention on the video he’d pulled up. It took her a second to realize it was Darling she was looking at—something that filled her with dread. Whatever Maris intended to show her couldn’t be good and she wasn’t sure she wanted to see it.

Yet, she couldn’t take her eyes off the screen.

Dressed in a long flowing cloak over a black battlesuit, Darling had the cowl pulled up over his head. His gold mask glowed in the dim exterior light as he headed across the back gardens, into the barracks where the royal guard took up quarters when they were on duty.

None of them bowed at his entrance. That, in and of itself, was an act of defiance and treason that was punishable by death, according to their laws. Each of those soldiers had sworn a blood oath to lay down their lives for their governor and his family.

But there was no loyalty on their faces that night. Several even spat at the ground near Darling’s booted feet.

With a calmness she couldn’t fathom, Darling swept his gaze around the room.

“What are you doing here?” their commander challenged Darling in a tone that would have had any aristo calling out for the pleb’s arrest.

When Darling spoke, the most terrifying part was how calm and in control he appeared to be. “It’s the Day of Reckoning. I’m here solely for those who have assaulted me. The rest of you can leave.”

By the expression on the commander’s face, it was obvious he was one of the culprits, and that he didn’t see a threat in Darling’s words. “We don’t listen to you, kieratun.”