Heloise leveled her with an incredulous but patient frown, which made her feel childish for her outburst. “We all must pay the price for our mistakes.”

Yes, and she was paying the price dearly. If she couldn’t convince the queen to reverse her sentence, she would be trapped here forever while her friends died on the border. “I can’t stay here.”

“Perhaps it would be wise to consider this a new beginning. A blessing from the Maiden. Unless, of course, you would prefer the Severance.”

Due to its risks, healing magic was forbidden outside the clergy or the military. A healer who hoped to live among civilians would face the Severance, a procedure mandated by the Danubian government. Although all healers took a vow of nonviolence, Wren always felt attracted and repulsed by her magic’s gruesome edge. It could open an artery as easily as it could cauterize a wound. It could even impact the fola, veins that carried magical energy throughout the body. With a single snip to the central fola within the heart, the Severance cut a person’s connection to their magic entirely. Wren had poured everything she had into mastering her magic. Without it, she’d be nothing.

“No, Mother,” she said quietly. “I wouldn’t.”

“Good. It’d be a shame to waste your talent. You will find your path here, even if it is not the one you imagined.” Heloise’s eyes fell to the letter in her hands again. “Remember what I advised, Sister. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

As Heloise shuffled out of the sickbay, whatever stifling power she held over the place lifted. Her Sisters returned to work as if they’d never been eavesdropping. The coughing resumed. Wren remembered to breathe again, all her muscles unwinding.

Heloise was right, of course. Now that word was out that Wren had no protection from the royal family, the opportunists, both within and outside Danu’s borders, would come prowling. An heirless queen unnerved the monarchists, and any ambitious noble could use a puppet with a drop of royal blood. The barest shiver of temptation passed through her. Was it better to be locked away in an abbey or an aristocrat’s house?

These are desperate thoughts, she chided herself. If she kept her promise to Una, everything would be fine. The safest thing for her to do was to stay here and toe the line.

Burn the letter. Obey the queen’s orders. Rein in her feelings.

It was only a matter of time before she was reinstated, back on Byers’s case, if not ready to fight a war alongside Una. But with dissatisfaction and fear threatening to consume her, Wren couldn’t convince herself that any of that was true.

In her hands she held a bloodred letter and an ocean of doubt.