If I did not, those I loved would see the cracks in the facade; they’d see the fear I carried that day after day, the deeper I was rooted here in Stonegate, the sooner the king would discover I was not his ally.

Now I feared what I stood to lose if Roark discovered the same.

A bulky Stav Guard escorted me to the king’s wing of the palace. From open windows, laughter and chatter filtered through the somber corridor.

The guard had a rounded chest and protrusions on his skull that appeared almost horn-like. Soul bones. He was a melded Berserkir, but there was an emptiness about him I hadn’t seen in the younger guards I’d first melded.

The paleness of his eyes was cold and distant, and his mouth seemed permanently set in a stern frown.

He did not bid me farewell when the door to the first sitting room was opened, did not address me in the least. In truth, he seemed wholly aggravated with the air I breathed, and every time his gaze looked my way, his grip tightened around the hilt of his sword until his knuckles turned white.

Glad to be rid of him, I hurried into the open room.

There, the queen, King Damir, Prince Thane, Princess Yrsa, and her parents were all standing near the open hearth. Another man, dressed in a rich emerald tunic, with silver hair shorn close to his scalp, glared at me down the hook of his nose.

My stomach twisted at the sight of Tomas. Nursed by a few palace healers with numbing pastes and oils to soothe toothaches, he moaned more furiously than he had last night.

No doubt, he made the whole of his agony worse than it seemed.

Fingertips brushed across the curve of my back. I startled, then nearly crumpled in a fit of relief. Like a phantom, Roark stepped from the far edge of the room—a position I hadn’t seen—and stood at my side.

I wanted to take his hand, squeeze the rough skin of his palm until his fingertips went numb.

“Melder Bien.” Damir’s words were as cold as a north wind. “King Hundur, along with myself, would delight in hearing your reasons for attacking not only a guest of Stonegate, but a nobleman of Myrda.”

“Choose your words carefully, woman,” Hundur grumbled. “They very well could seal your fate.”

Roark stiffened. His hand went to my back, a touch of possessiveness and protection in one motion.

“Sire, I did not attack Ser Grisen. He spoke threateningly to me, insisting he would…force himself upon me, so you would give me to him as a wife.”

King Damir’s eyes flashed.

“A story, no doubt.” Hundur grunted. “One carefully crafted when a man cannot even speak for himself.”