“Did you or did you not see Archduke Gavik murdered, Lady Zera?” he shouts. “If someone managed to get to Gavik and kill him, we could be next! Don’t you see? No one is safe! This is a deep-set plot by the witches to destabilize the power within Vetris and crumble us from the inside! And you’re all sitting here entertaining the actuality of talking to one of their sympathizers as if it’s logical, as if she poses no threat at all!”

The king’s gray eyes meet mine for a brief second, and the truth circuits between us. Sarcomel is a fearful little horseshit, but he’s partially right. I do pose a threat, far more of one than he could ever dream of. A Heartless being tolerated in the Vetrisian court? Outlandish. Impossible. But I’ve always been a bit of an impossibility; impossibly good-looking, impossibly well dressed. Impossible girl stands here in front of a Cavanosian king, existing exactly where she shouldn’t, when she shouldn’t.

The ministers quickly devolve to arguing, Sarcomel the loudest of them all. I knit my fists in my skirt, nerves buzzing through me. Whatever they decide, I am at their mercy. Varia said it herself—she can do only so much for me. Their voices ricochet among the stone walls, the lawguards surrounding them unmoving. With the display the ministers are putting on, I’m almost certain Gavik was the faux leader of them, and now without their head, they’re rudderless, flailing.

Sarcomel breaks out of the argument and points at me wildly. “Your Majesty, she is a threat until Lady Y’shennria can be found and cleared. I demand under the Sunless Concordat that you arrest her as an enemy of the kingdom!”

No—not the dungeon. They’d find out I’m a Heartless eventually, if I was caught in a cell, healing quickly and growing hungrier and more mad as they insist I eat their human food instead of organs. The king leans forward, and just as I open my mouth to defend myself, the door to the throne room bursts open. The clap echoes in the cavern and sends Sarcomel yelping.

Four lawguards come rushing into the throne room, led by a winded-looking Malachite, his white brows drawn tightly. He strides by me without so much as an angry glance in my direction—and that’s how I know something’s very, very wrong.

“Your Majesty,” Malachite says, and it’s the first time I’ve heard him willingly use an honorific, but he doesn’t bend the knee. “There’s a witchfire in the common quarter, near South Gate.”

Witchfire? Real witchfire? The air grows so thick, it feels choking. Sarcomel starts to exclaim something, but King Sref stands from the throne, descending the stairs and drawing level to Malachite quickly.