I’m so close to my heart that I can feel it beating in my chest, vestigial and eager. Lucien suddenly flips himself forward, landing gracefully on the bridge’s railing and scaling up it to get around the guards. I start—he’s mad. It’s so high up! He’ll break his spine if he falls! Where is the carefully calculating prince of Cavanos, the one who made sure to never make waves as Whisper, to stay low and quiet and always in the shadows? The lawguards clamor, shouting and brandishing swords and gathering below the rail, just waiting for him to come down so they can arrest him. On the very top of a brass pillar of the bridge, Lucien stands, looking down on Yorl and me, his gaze fixed on my face.

“You don’t have to be alone anymore, Zera,” he says clearly, his words ringing down like rain. My unheart throbs with a spear of pain.

always alone, the hunger snarls. relying on others is a fantasy. a lie. unsafe.

Yorl adjusts his glasses and starts walking away in defiance of the commotion, toward the road to the palace. I take one step after him, and Lucien’s shout is molten iron.

“If you leave with him, there is no going back. No matter how much I despise the idea of it, if you walk away with him now, you will become my enemy.”

Enemy. Not just a traitor but an enemy?

we have always been your enemy, little prince. The hunger laughs riotously, as if it’s the funniest thing in the world, even as my unheart is breaking. An enemy of Lucien’s, once and for all. It’s the last thing I ever wanted, but here, now, I realize it’s what must be done. It’s what I should’ve done, that night in the clearing.

My unheart screams to trust him. I want to more than anything. To accept his tempting offer, to believe in the idea that he wants to help me. That Fione and Malachite have forgiven me. But I know better. Forgiveness isn’t that quick. It isn’t that easy. I haven’t even forgiven myself for killing fourteen men, for the five men when I was turned three years ago. But forgiveness looms so small in the face of reality.

I won’t be anyone’s thrall, ever again. Not his. Not anyone’s. I’m so afraid of losing the hunger, but I’m more afraid of being a monster again. Someone else’s monster. Two sides of my unheart war with each other in the span of a second.

He is Lucien—the kindest, noblest boy I know.

He is a witch.