I nod woodenly. There’s nothing else I can do, no words I can find. Maralinde never cozied up to Valka, never simpered at my brother, because she did not like what she saw. She said she liked me. But that is no longer enough in the face of what I have done.

She stands a moment longer, the shadow of regret in her eyes, and then she walks on to her room, leaving me alone.

It will get better, I tell myself as I trudge slowly through the halls to my room. It has to get better.

“Going somewhere?” My brother steps forward from where he leans against the wall, his face hard and ungiving, as if it were carved from ice.

I pause at the top of the stairs. It is morning now; Maralinde has already departed with her family—I watched them from across the courtyard, watched how she never even glanced toward me—and it is finally time for my lessons. I tell my brother so in a halting voice.

“Ah, yes, I agree. You’ve a great deal of learning to do,” he says, only it’s more of a growl, a low, angry sound that roots my feet to the wooden planks. “Seems your teachers haven’t taught you half enough, little sister.”

“I—I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” He laughs, a single harsh huff that frightens me more than his words. What does he want from me? Does he mean to punish me?

“It’s far too late for sorry. It’s far too late for anything, you little fool. How could you do that to Valka? She was your friend. She was—” He shakes his head, his teeth showing between his lips. “Do you know what you need to learn?”

His eyes are as blue and cold as winter, cold as steel that knows no mercy. They are a color that promises pain without remorse.

“You need to learn what happens to traitors who think they’ve escaped punishment.”

He takes three quick steps forward, grasps my shoulders, and then shoves me. Hard. I stumble, teetering for a single, unending moment on the edge of the top step, and then I hurtle backwards, rolling and skidding down the stairs, terror locking my cries within my throat.

At the bottom, I lie curled on my side, my heart thundering in my ears as pain throbs through my legs and arms, across my back. At least I managed to protect my head. And they were wooden stairs, not stone. That is something to be grateful for, I tell myself. As if that might lessen the pain. Or stop my brother.

I lie still, listening for him. Just as my heart begins to calm, I hear the tread of his boots—terror flits through me, and then I realize he is moving away, along the hall at the top of the stairs. The breath I take is almost a sob.