“I gave you my uncle’s diary. So—your end of the bargain. What is Varia having you do?” Fione isn’t distracted in the slightest, her voice strong.

I wipe my finger on my simple flax dress and smile. “You really care deeply about her.”

I watch Fione draw herself up to her full archduchess height, her mouse-curls gleaming in the library’s sun. It hurts my unheart to see her so protective of Varia, so determined to figure out what’s going on.

“Answer me,” she demands.

I hear no warmth in her words at all. Why should I? I’m helping her lover kill herself.

“You’re right.” I sigh. “I suppose I don’t deserve pleasantries.”

I must hallucinate it, but something like pain runs through Fione’s composure. And then, between the swirling dust, she says softly, “I need to know. That’s all.”

“I’ve been trying this thing lately called ‘getting wiser,’ and I’ve decided there’s a difference between enlightening people and hurting them with knowledge.”

“Zera!” Fione’s voice is firm. “I beg of you; in the name of the friendship we once had, in the name of the friendship we can still have, please—tell me what Varia is having you do.”

I startle, deep down in my soul. The friendship we can still have?

lies, the hunger sneers. all of it. lying to manipulate you like she was born to do, lying because she fears you…

I knit my lips. I burn to tell her the truth—that Varia is planning to force a ceasefire by controlling every valkerax in the Dark Below. But what girl wants to hear her lover is on the verge of effectively becoming the most powerful—and most feared—person in the entire world? Fione’s illusion of happiness would be shattered. I could tell her the truth. But isn’t it better to let her live out her happy dream with Varia for as long as she can, the one she wanted all these five hard years?

Isn’t it kinder, in the end, to be cruel?

So I laugh. “I’m sorry. But you’re just not convincing enough.”

Her mask slips. She blinks a dozen times, wounded. “Our friendship isn’t convincing enough?”

“Not particularly.” I stroke the spine of another book. “All I did was lie to you for two weeks, and all you did was use me for two weeks to get the information you needed from your uncle.”

“We were more than that,” Fione insists. “I felt like I could be myself with you.”

I nearly smile and agree with her. So did I.

But I’m helping to kill the person she loves the most. And I won’t stop. I’ll keep doing it—all for my heart.

I really am the monster.

“Oh dear.” I smile at Fione. “You fell for my lie just like Lucien did.”