The ink was already drying on a contract that required her to heal him, at risk of everything she’d taken such pains to secure. But this was a man with too much blood on his hands to wash away. It would be so easy, so right. She could sever his carotid artery right now and not spare a thought to the trifling consequences of breaking her contract.

Wren had never killed anyone before. Her oath as a healer forbade it. But she had watched her friends do it time and time again with the grace and remorselessness of a wolf snapping a rabbit’s neck. Killing him now was as good as an act of mercy, as holy as healing. It was a far more honorable death than succumbing to fever like a feral dog.

Silver magic glowed in her palm. His every undeserved breath rasped.

If Una wanted her to be ruthless, she would be ruthless.

On the opposite wall, Wren caught a glimpse of herself in an old mirror, oxidized with dark spots like mold. With her tousled hair and hollow eyes, she looked haggard and desperate and afraid. She looked nothing like herself.

What was she doing? She was a healer, and besides …

A faint memory from her and Una’s meeting with Isabel returned: His life is mine to dispose of. Wren’s anger slowly cooled into realization. She couldn’t kill him because Isabel wanted him alive.

She hated the sudden flood of relief. She hated that she wasn’t strong enough to do this. But the opportunity Hal presented her with was almost too perfect. The queen had never wanted anything more than to make an example of the man who had turned the tide of war and tarnished her reign.

What if Wren was the one to deliver him to her? She could picture it now. The delicious, enraged shock on her aunt’s face when she made her dramatic return. The shift into grudging respect. Everything she’d come here to gain—redemption, proof of her skill, the reauthorization of the investigation—she’d have it and more. She didn’t have to waste her time here, sucking up to some dithering nobleman until the storm cleared. All she had to do was call a carriage to take her home and cure this disease so he didn’t die before then. With an eerie, resolved calm, Wren settled back into the bedside chair. Her wavering shadow fell over him.

His eyes searched for hers, and she sucked in a startled breath and looked away. From the edge of her vision, she could see Hal staring at her so imploringly, it unnerved her. He said something in Vesrian that she couldn’t understand, so quiet and raw, it sounded like he hadn’t spoken in weeks. It frustrated her, the limits of her own knowledge.

“What did you say?” She shaped each word carefully, deliberately.