Roland had walked past our tripled patrols like they were nothing and then compelled Barabas to let him in. All of the defenses we’d built, all the walls and gates and safeguards, meant diddly-squat. He could just walk into the Keep at any time. He could walk in and sit by Julie’s bed and I would never know it.

Curran’s face turned expressionless. He pulled his Beast Lord’s face on like a mask. He must’ve come to the same conclusion. Whatever little illusions of safety we’d had just turned to ashes.

Roland sat. “It’s a well-made fortress. Considerably more comfortable on the inside than it appears from the outside.”

Lovely paintings you have here on the walls. Don’t mind me, I’m just making small talk. “Did you hurt anybody on the way up?” I asked.

“No. I came to talk, and if I had hurt one of your people, you wouldn’t speak to me.” Roland glanced at the sword hilt protruding over my shoulder. “You visited your grandmother.”

I pulled Sarrat out and showed it to him. He passed his hand over the blade, his face mournful.

“I wish you hadn’t gone to see her. She’s dangerous.”

Yes, she is. Legend said she’d murdered my grandfather. All things considered, he probably deserved it. “It wasn’t by choice.”

“That was an unfortunate turn of events,” he said.

“You shouldn’t have taken her bones out of Persia. She misses it.”

Roland sighed. “Persia is a challenging place right now. Old powers are awakening. Those who had slept, those who were dead or perhaps not quite dead. Mishmar is the safest place for her right now.”

“Close enough so you can crush her if she tries to rise?”

“Exactly.”

This was a surreal conversation.

“How’s the child?” Roland asked.

What?

“The young girl whose blood you purified. How is she?”

I leaned forward. “Leave her out of this. Don’t talk to her, don’t haunt her dreams, or I swear, I’ll finish what my mother started. Was it the left eye or the right? Tell me, so I’ll know which to target.”

“The left.” Roland tapped his cheek below the left eye. “You’re so very like your mother. She was fierce, too.”

“You killed her.”

“Yes,” he said. “Not a day goes by that I don’t mourn her death.”

“And you tried to murder me before I was born.”

“Yes.”

“And you sent your warlord to hunt down and kill the man who raised me.”

“Yes.”

“And now you wish to have a conversation.”

Roland’s eyes turned warm. “I loved your mother. I loved your mother so much that when she wanted a child, I promised her I would give her the kind of child this world hasn’t seen for thousands of years.” He reached over and held out his hand.

Curran stepped forward.