My magic is still one step ahead of me. The chains slide around Ethan’s ankles, yanking his feet out from under him as I push myself to mine. My knives pull themselves from their sheaths without my touch until all of them hover above him as he lies on his back, still struggling to yank his other gun out. I stand over him and watch.

Finally he stops moving and stares up at me with a rage I find too relatable.

My knives don’t plunge into him, though, because even with the magic reading my thoughts and acting without my commands, deep down, I don’t want to kill him. As vicious as the power in me feels, it knows that.

And I am in control.

My knives clatter to the ground.

“Ava.” It’s Lucius’s voice. There’s disappointment in it.

I’ve never been prouder.

I turn toward him, willing my face to be neutral, to not give away how much I want to pick those knives back up and send them flying through his heart. Maybe it would work. Roman doesn’t think so. But right now I need him to let both of us live.

Lucius’s face is impassive when I meet his stare until his eyes flick past my shoulder, and his brows draw together just a fraction.

I spin just in time to grab Ethan’s wrist as he tackles me with my own blade gripped in his hand. I barely stop it from plunging into my heart as I crash backward with him on top of me. My head hits the ground so hard that vomit rises in my throat. My vision wavers on the edge of blackness, and my magic fizzles as my mind refuses to focus.

“Weak.” Ethan straddles me, blade poised above my heart.

He jerks as if someone pushed him from behind. His eyes widen as he twitches again. His hand relaxes around the knife, and it slips free just as I drop his wrist to grab it by the blade. I barely register the sting of it slicing through my fingers. His expression shifts from confusion to shock, and I know it must mirror my own.

Ethan slumps on top of me.

The crowd rages as I struggle to break free.

I push against him, and his head lolls like his body is an empty husk.

He is too heavy. I raise my head above his shoulders and find two familiar pearl-handled knives protruding from his back. For a second, I think they’re mine. That my magic called them to kill without my realizing it.

But then Roman strides onto the stage, a third knife in his hand.

I struggle to unpin myself as he kneels beside me.

“This was not your choice,” I tell him. My throat is raw with the kind of grief I thought I was past feeling.